TENNIS stars of tomorrow converged on the Hastings and Kendall tennis courts for the annual Junior Development Series on Sunday.
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The Junior Development Series is a group of round-robin tournaments conducted around Regional NSW for beginner to intermediate players.
The JDS is a great introduction to tournament play for juniors who are developing their tennis skills.
The series culminates in a Champion of Champions tournament in each region, followed by the JDS State Final Representative event (the JDS State Final will not be an Australian Ranking Tournament in 2017).
Tournament director Greg Alchin said overall, the local players had performed well and joined other junior players from Forster and Coffs Harbour to fight it out.
Niamh Cargill finished third in the under-14 girls division after an up-and-down tournament.
“She played okay, but is capable of a bit more,” Alchin said.
“She’s more of a baseline player.”
Alchin said he had seen a shift away from juniors playing from the back of the court and more were coming to the net to win points.
He attributed that to the recently finished Australian Open where Roger Federer was successful with that type of game plan.
“There’s no doubt some of the juniors have been influenced by that,” Alchin said.
“The under-16 boys in particular are the kids who regularly come in to the net and take advantage of their good approach shots.
“The courts are a little bit faster which allows them to do that.”
The Junior Development Series was introduced by well-known tennis identities John Newcombe and Tony Roche several years ago.
“It gives country kids an opportunity to let their racquets do the talking,” Alchin said.
“The best part about it is that it’s a round-robin format which means you still have a possibility of players going through if they lose their first game.
“They get a second bite of the cherry if nerves play a part early on.”
Port Macquarie’s Abby Morrison had a mixed bag of performances on Sunday in the open ladies singles event.
Heading into the second part of the day, Morrison was facing an uphill task to make the finals after two wins and two losses.
“She’s playing good tennis, but is about the middle of the pack,” Alchin said.
Morrison was playing her first Junior Development Series event in two years after she missed last year’s due to preparing for her Higher School Certificate.
The tournament director said just under 100 junior players took part in the event which was down a few on 2016.
“We had about 130 last year and 92 this year.”
