IN a gloriously sunny day Selkirk Tennis Club held their 1st day of their Junior Club Championships 2015 on Sunday.

With 28 entries in the younger end of the junior membership categories and some great tennis on display by the players it is clear that the future of the club looks very bright indeed.

The club, who have recently been approved as a charity is focused on access to the sport for all and the tournament was part of it’s comprehensive junior program, with the second day scheduled for September 12.

Starting the day were the youngest competitors of all in the Under 8 category. Using red tennis balls (25% compression) and smaller courts the game is designed to scale for the youngsters size and ability and allows strong foundations to be established at an early stage of development. The entrants competed well and had a great deal of fun with Matthew Raffier emerging as the winner.

Next to compete were the Under 9 category. This group move on to orange balls which are 50% compression and to a three-quarter size court as their skills develop. This category provided some great matches played in good spirits and was won by Oliver McClymont who followed up his win the under 8 category last year with his win.

Last in the mini tennis category was the Under 10 group which contains some of the clubs most promising young players. This category plays on full size tennis court with a green ball (75% compression) and is the final step before playing with with a full compression ball. After some incredibly high quality matches Ivan Burt Smith completed his clean sweep of U8,U9 and U10 wins in the club championships and emerged as the winner beating Daniel Main in the final. They were closely followed by Finn Mallin in third and Oliver McClymont in 4th who deserves special mention for 'playing up’ an age group and competing extremely well.

The final category of the day was the Starter Cup, which is an event for players who are Under 12 and have not won previous trophies at the club championships. Again this category had a number of players 'playing up’ an age category including both the winner and runner up who are clearly able to punch above their weight! After some incredibly competitive matches the winner emerged as Daniel Main and runner up Finn Mallin.

The event was deemed a great success by all and Junior Club Convener Ian Main was quoted as saying “I am very proud of all the junior members who took part in the championships this year. They have worked hard in training and its great to see them competing and having fun on court. The quality of tennis continues to get stronger at the club and I’m delighted to be involved. A huge thanks to everyone who helped on the day to make it a success and to my fellow junior coaches Josh Thomson & Donald Nichol who have worked hard with the competitors this season.” With such a talented crop at the lower end of the age range the older sections who compete later this month will certainly be worth watching and the club invites all along to spectate. See the club Facebook page for more details at www.facebook.com/selkirktennisclub