James Murphy
FINALISTS have been locked in ahead of this weekend’s Mount Gambier and District Tennis Association grand finals.
Semi finals were contested on Saturday, with Uniting and West Gambier set to do battle in the Division 1 decider.
That comes after Uniting cruised through its first semi final against Mount Gambier with a comfortable 12-0 set win.
There were a couple of closer sets along the way, but for the most part the minor premiers were untroubled.
Kobe Cole managed to pull off a tiebreak win over Gambier’s Hayden Hancock, but that was the closest result.
The top men’s singles had Andrew van den Hurk topple Will Cameron 6-0, while Jace Maxwell’s 6-3 win over William Le Cornu was the next closest match after Cole’s.
The doubles followed the same trend with the closest sets a 6-2 win for Ashlea Dunn and Alison Telford against Giaan Ferguson and Shae Delaney, along with a 6-2, 2-6, 10-4 win for Maxwell and Daniel Moon over Hancock and Tyler Hannigan.
West Gambier’s second semi final win was a closer affair, as it defeated Reidy Park eight sets to four.
The singles had West’s George White in fine form to win the top men’s rubber 6-0 against Zayne Young, while the top women’s singles was won by West’s Jessica Stutley 6-2 over Bailey Young.
West won five of the seven singles sets, with Maggie Collins and Dane Heemskerk the only victors for Reidy.
The doubles was a similar scenario and Reidy secured two wins.
Heemskerk and Zayne Young had a hard-fought win over White and Brady Cook, while Bailey Young and Collins defeated Stutley and Emily Jolley 7-5.
Shaunn Robinson and Toby Stutley came back after losing the second set to Ben Gaffney and Ty Lang, while the remaining sets were comfortable wins for West.
In the other senior divisions, Suttontown/Glencoe Tigers had a nailbiting win over Mil Lel/Reidy in the Division 2 first semi final.
At the end of the day they were locked at six sets apiece and game count came into play.
Suttontown/Glencoe won 59 games, which was enough to edge out their rival by 10 and book a grand final berth.
The minor premiers will now face West Gambier Red in the grand final, after the latter defeated West Gambier Blue 8-4.
Finally, the Division 3 semi finals were full of upsets.
Minor premier Mount Gambier, who had lost just one game for the season, was defeated by fourth-placed Glencoe.
Glencoe was in impressive form on the day to best its rival eight sets to four and progress to the season decider.
In the second semi final, Uniting-Glencoe also defeated a higher-ranked team when accounting for second-placed Centrals.
They won 8-2, with forfeits plaguing Centrals and hindering the chance for success.
All grand finals will be contested this Saturday at Olympic Park, apart from the women’s and mixed doubles which will be played at Corriedale Park and Mount Gambier Tennis Club respectively.
