Report By Graham Frankel

ON Sunday 3rd November we held our Under 17 Open tournament at BATTS. Another successful and fast-moving competition involving 48 players from 32 different clubs and 14 different counties. It was hugely satisfying to see that every player expected arrived in good time. Thanks to the parents and others for their efforts in transporting the youngsters.

As usual we had a great mix of levels including some highly ranked players looking for a share in the £200 prize fund and many other less experienced competitors who will have benefited enormously from viewing and playing against the experts.

We had more than our normal share of shock results along the way and there were some outstanding performances. Despite the intense competition we were delighted with the high standard of behaviour from all players. They were a credit to their parents and clubs.

All three of the finals were extremely tight matches. Our Band 1 winner was Angus Priestley-Tonner (Brighton) the 4th seed, who defeated top seed Alexander Graham (Britannia) 9-11, 11-9, 13-11, 11-8.

The finalists didn’t have an easy path in the semis. Alexander had to recover from going two sets down against Callum Heath (Urban) but he managed it, winning the fifth set 11-8). Meanwhile Angus was driven hard by Aidan Lees (BATTS) winning 11-9, 11-9, 11-9.

The victor in Band 2 was Edward Lyttle (Ellenborough) who overcame Ezra Darley (BATTS) appearing in his first ever final. Another very tight match: 11-6, 7-11, 11-5, 6-11, 11-6.
In Band 3 it was good see one of our regular competitors who has made steady progress Lydia White (Meopham) reaching her first final where she met Kostia Motovilin (Graham Spicer). Yet another close encounter, with Kostia needing to come back after losing the first two sets, but eventually emerging the winner 9-11, 7-11, 11-7, 11-3, 11-8.

Among the outstanding performances in the earlier part of the tournament, we should mention particularly the remarkable run by Matas Januska (Ellenborough). Seeded third in his group he overcame Michael Dean (Graham Spicer) in five sets to claim his place in the Band 1 knockout and almost created a very early upset by taking top seed Alexander Graham to five sets, losing the final set 9-11. But Matas wasn’t giving up there. In the first round of the knockout, he was drawn against the 3rd seed in the tournament Harrison Hill (Grantham). It was another five-setter and this time Matas was not to be denied. His progress was then halted in the QF by our eventual winner Angus in four sets.

We were grateful as always to our team of helpers on the day, and especially John Andrews on the control desk, trying to teach me some new Excel skills to help automate our tournament administration, plus some invaluable umpiring help from Eamonn Hall, Richard Hallinan, Derek Balding, Sam Scott, Carl Johnson and Vimal Patel.

We now look forward to our final 1 Star tournament before our events are promoted to 2 Star. The next tournament is Under 15 on Sunday 12thJanuary which currently has only 3 places remaining and then our Under 13 2 Star on Sunday 15th February with only 9 places remaining.