Today started for the UK team with an early wake up call by coach German who , during the night, had been woken up by a loud noise next to him. “Good luck charm Franky” had fallen out of his bunk bed above him only to climb into another bed at a lower level without remembering anything about it the next morning….
At 7:50 sharp all our players had to be down for breakfast. Charly Ferguson was named captain the first thing this morning. Congratulations Charly ! The bus picked them up from the sports residence at 8:30 am and took them to the Club de Padel Real . When they arrived the team started warming up on court and did some stretching . Everyone was quite nervous. A real tough 1st round team competition was lying ahead of them. The opposing team was no other than the world team champion…the Spaniards.
Charly, new UK Junior Team Captain
First on were the under 14´s . Alex Tom and Tom Lynk´s opponents were absolutely phenomenal and without a doubt unbeatable for our young lads. But , believe it or not, they did manage to win a game !!! Congratulations for that one Alex and Tom !
The following match was the under 16´s. Danny Bristow and Andy Lynk gave it their all and had truly stunning rallies. After a really slow start and quite a quickly lost first set they managed to build up some confidence in the second and from then on most games went to deuce. Still, the others were way too experienced and strong our boys which then lost the match 1/6, 2/6.
The third team match was played in the under 18´s by Franky Langan and Charly Ferguson. Their opponents were not just really amazing, but already Pro Tour players! They transmitted pure confidence and dominated throughout the match. How could they beat them ? Well, they couldn´t… but nonetheless they gave it their best shot . 0/6, 1/6 was the final score. Both Franky and Charly had definitely enjoyed the experience and learned a huge amount from it.
Together with German all our team then took the shuttle bus back to the “El Fuerte Club” where all players always meet for lunch. This was followed by a few hours of pure relaxation on the lawn of the club where Alex fell fast asleep under the tree and the rest had a long game of trying to hit the bin with a padel ball…This just shows how competitive our team is both on and off the court !
At 5 pm everyone took the shuttle over to the other club where Alex and Tom played their 2nd round open match against….the Spanish… yet again ! The opponents were Jesús Bochicchio and Miguel Gonzalez García. This match was pretty much over before it really began. Even though our two youngest fought harder than ever the result was inevitably the same as in the morning for them 1/6, 1/6.
Two hours later Andy Lynk and Danny Bristow took on the Spanish top two players Miguel Portellano Salamanca and Juan Lebrón Chinchoa in their second round of the open at the “El Club Fuerte”. On center court they truly tried everything they could and did us proud proving that their experience in tennis competition came through , which helped them to persist and have some amazing rallies with the champions. Their final score was 1/6,1/6.
Today´s last match at the “El Fuerte Club” was the 2nd round open competition for Franky Langan and Charly Ferguson. Their opponents were argentinian Juan Cruz Belluati and Elias Estrella. It turned out to be an amazing match and our boys played outstandingly. Congratulations to them. Even though they lost 6/1, 6/0 it was a great match and enjoyed extremely by both players and spectators.
Just as Charly and Franky were on court at this club Dylan and Ivan were fighting a match against the Brazilians Gabriel Almerda y Felipe Furghetti on the other side of Melilla at the “Club Real “. Unfortunately their opponents were much better and much more experienced and Dylan and Ivan never stood a chance of getting into the game. The match resulted in a 6/1, 6/0.
Another day of great day of competition came to an end. Everyone was exhausted but happy to have been part of it. Tomorrow, Wednesday, German will have to be waking up the “gang” even earlier than today as the matches will already start at 9 am….Get a good night sleep , boys!
