Record 160 Participants for Kettle Chips Tennis Europe junior tournament at VLTC next month

Malta Independent Sunday, 13 June 2010, 00:00 Last update: about 11 years ago

The Vittoriosa Lawn Tennis Club in collaboration with the Malta Tennis Federation is organising the VLTC Kettle Chips European Junior tournament between 3 and 10 July.

This international junior tournament is being held for the third year running under Tennis Europe 14 and Under Tour and is once again sponsored by Kettle Chips.

The tournament will consist of Boys Singles and Girls Singles events. Qualification and consolation events as well as Boys and Girls doubles events are also being held.

This tournament has once again attracted significant interest from across Europe. In fact, a record 160 boys and girls have enlisted to take part in this event which will see junior players from Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Cyprus, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Russia, Serbia, Sweden Turkey, Ukraine and the United Kingdom coming over to the island. Together with the Maltese youngsters, they will all be looking forward to improve their ranking.

The Maltese junior players taking part are Jeremy Borg, Bernard Cassar Torregiani, Raphael Sammut, Matthew Cassar Torregiani, Alexia Cassar, Maria Giorgia Farrugia Sacco, Naomi Zammit Ciantar, Katrina Sammut and Rebecca McCarthy.

Club president Paul Micallef said the record number of participants showed that a good number of youngsters look forward to such tournaments to improve their standings in Tennis Europe’s rankings.

Dr Farrugia Sacco, president of the Malta Tennis Federation added that such a tournament, being organised locally, was a great opportunity for the local youngsters to gain a lot of useful experience and perhaps some ranking points, as they will incur no travelling expenses to take part. He considered such tournaments organised locally as a bonus for the local players.

He said that players like Kimberley Cassar and Matthew Asciak had also started their way up by taking part in such tournaments. “And for those aiming to reach the top rungs of the European tennis ladder, it is certainly a stepping stone to get into the junior Grand Slams.

Carlos Cluett, on behalf of Kettle Chips, the main sponsors, said the company was glad to be sponsoring this event for the third year. “It is encouraging to see such a large number of youngsters taking part,” he said.