A group of tennis players from the Gordon Asciak Tennis School situated at the Marsa Sports Club left Malta yesterday morning on their way to Palermo where they will take part in a friendly tournament against TC Palermo 2.

The squad consists of Matthew Asciak, Malta’s top junior, U12 girls champion Brenda Galea, U14 boys doubles champion Jean Paul Schembri and Bernie Wirth, runner up in the girls U14 Open tournament.

The other juniors are Anthony Seddon, JJ Ver Elst, Malik Atwair, John Calleja, Angela Bartolo, Michela Jaccarini and Nicola Jaccarini.

Former several times Malta champion Helen Asciak will be accompanying the juniors.

This year will be the seventh year that the tennis school will be making this kind of trip. Gordon Asciak firmly believes that these kind of trips will definitely help the Maltese players as they will be gaining valuable experience when facing foreign opposition.

The Gordon Asciak Tennis School now employs two coaches from Serbia and Montenegro. When in Palermo, some of the Maltese juniors will be having some training sessions with Francesco Palpacelli who was the sparring partner of Justine Henin at some grand slam tournaments.

The medals for this tournament were sponsored by Gordon Asciak Sports, a new sports shop opening soon in San Gwann.