Primary School International Championships Isle of Man 4-6^th April 2008

Girls Team

No 1 Renee Ho Dumfries

No 2 Alice Williams Dumfries

No3 Jennifer Hart Stirling

No 4 Nicole Wright Dumfries

The order of play consisted of eight single matches and two doubles. 1v2,2v1,3v4,4v3, two doubles followed by 1v1,2v2,3v3,4v4.

The girls team successfully gained a bronze medal, marginally missing the silver medal won by Wales. The overall winner was the strong team of England.

The first of the two matches played on Friday the 4^th of April was against Guernsey. The girls played eight matches and it was even at 4 all, however the girls successfully won the last two games to bring the final score to a 6-4 win. All girls had wins in this match, however undefeated in both singles and doubles was Jennifer Hart.

The second game of the first day was against Wales. The girls all raised their games during this more difficult match against the stronger team of Wales. It looked like a defeat near the end of the match with the girls down 5 – 3, however yet again the no 3 and no 4 girls took the initiative and won their final two games to finally draw 5 – 5. There was a count back on ends and the Welsh girls won by 1 end!! The Welsh no 1 Charlotte Carey was a little too strong for our girls. However yet again Jennifer Hart the Scotland no 3 remained undefeated in both singles and doubles.

Day 2 of the team event, however the girls only played two matches ( in comparison to the boys three) as unfortunately the Isle of Man did not have a girls team. The first match against Ireland was a good win of 7-3 with the first defeat of the competition for Jennifer Hart in her last game. Renee Ho raised her game during this match to win both her singles and the doubles with Alice Williams.

The final match of the team event was against England with a 10 – 0 defeat. However the games were at times closer than the score suggests with two 3 – 2 defeats and others going to the fourth set. All of the girls had difficulty reading the spin from service and also lifting the ball from a backspin service or return.

Day 3 saw the individual event, with two of the four girls successfully qualifying from their groups (Renee Ho and Alice Williams) and the other two (Jennifer Hart and Nicole Wright) having difficult groups and progressing to the consolation event. Alice was defeated close in the fifth end by Guernsey’s no 2 Rachel Harm and Renee lost in the fourth end to England’s no 4 Lee Dickinson. In the next round of the consolation event it was a Scotland clash against Jennifer Hart and Nicole Wright, with Jennifer winning 3 – 0 to go all the way to the final to win 3 straight against the Ireland no 1 Amy Rock.

All in all a successful championships with every effort from all of the girls at all times. Maureen Moran NPC