EA players shine in Surrey

EA players Michael Willgrass, Maddie Brooks, Alex McNaughton and Matthew Cott travelled to Surrey to take part in the Grade 3 tournament at St George's Hills for a week of competition and intensive training.

Historically this tournament has been of a very high standard and we knew the players mental & physical skills would be pushed to the limits. However with 6 months hard winter training behind them and some good form in local events coming into the tournament we were
quietly confident of getting some success.

Michael Willgrass competed in the boy's U16's and U18's. This was always going to be a big test for the self proclaimed 'mickster' as he is still only 15. Michael got an unfortunate draw in the U16's, after comfortably seeing off his lower rated opponent in the first round he found himself up against the number 2 seed. Michael competed hard and gave his all against his older, more experienced opponent before being outclassed and going down 6-3, 6-1. It was a similar story in the U18's as Michael was drawn against the number 5 seed. Again Mike gave
everything he had but in the end his opponent was just too strong - going down 6-2, 6-4. Michael was in no way disgraced and more than held his own against a player 4 ratings higher and a good deal taller than him!

Maddie Brooks also had tough draws in both of her singles events. This was to be expected as she is also a year young for the U14's and also competed in the U16's. Maddie however came into the event full of confidence after some impressive recent performances representing Norfolk at County Cup & beating some strong opponents in Aegon Team Tennis. The number 7 seed Brooks breezed through to the quarter finals of the U14's before bowing out to the number 1 seed in two tight sets. This proved to be no disgrace as her opponent got to the final of both the U14's & U16's girls events. Maddie again comfortably saw off her first round opponent in the U16's but then found herself up against the 4th seed. It was toe to toe in an extremely tight first
set but at 4-4 her opponent crucially edged ahead to take the set 6-4. This seemed to knock the wind out of Maddie and spurred her more experienced opponent on to steamroll the 2nd set 6-1.
Maddie also entered the U14 girl's doubles with Surrey's Olivia Berry. The girls were confident going into the event and so it proved as they battled all the way to the final, unfortunately they had to concede the final as Olivia was due to compete at the National Championships and their opponents refused to reschedule.

Matt Cott played in the under 12 event and was the highest seeded under 11 player at seed number 11 which was excellent considering he is in the first year of the age group. Matt had a tricky first match in blustery conditions against a very defensive player who played well. Matt was clearly showing a few nerves, with his older team mates watching, but focused hard and played cleverly to win 6-3 6-2. In the next round Matt faced a difficult player who was a year older and ranked higher. Matt struggled to keep up with the pace in the first set and was frustrated by his opponent but as the match went on Matt settled and competed hard to narrowly go down 6-4 in the second.

Matt was pleased with his performance but quickly turned his attention to next year when he would come back top of the age group and be looking to win the event!

Alex McNaughton was seeded number 2 in the boys under 12 event and cruised through the first three rounds without breaking into a sweat until the quarter final stage. Here he met Paul Monczakowski, who had defeated Alex in the final in Ipswich at half term, in a bad tempered affair Alex kept his head in a mature performance to come through 6-4 6-1. A good victory in the semis against a player ranked in the top 30 gave Alex a match up in the final against the highly rated Tiran Sanghera. Alex was clearly showing some nerves in the early stages of the match and let Tiran storm to a 4 - 0 lead but a battling fifth game gave Alex his first game in the match and inspired him to play some great tennis for the next 30 mins giving Alex set point at 40 -15 6 -5 up in the first set! But here Tiran showed some resolve and fought back to save the set points and then took the first set in a tie break 7 -4. The emotional effort to come back in the first set and then to lose was too much for Alex to cope with as he then faded away 6-1 in the second set....non the less Alex was delighted and felt he had made some great strides in his game to be able to mix it with some national standard players.

Alex had a second chance of a title by making the final of the doubles with Matt. After some long rain delays the boys finally went on to play the final against two players of a similar ability. By this stage it had been a really long week with a lot of tennis played and the performance in the final showed that, although the EA boys fought hard the quality wasn’t there so in the end they were defeated 6-3 7-6.

The trip was a huge success with the players gaining experience and knowledge during the week and all of them had some successful results

Bring on next year!