Family event fun as always

UNDONE BY YOUTH: Northland's Keith Cocking and Mike Clapshaw placed runners-up at the Janet Agnew competition, but found plenty of success at the recent NZ Tennis Masters in January. PHOTO/JOHN STONE

The recent 30th anniversary of the Janet Agnew Carnival tennis doubles proved to be a great occasion for the nearly 100 players that turned up to play at the Thomas Neale Family Memorial Park.

Apart from a brief moment on day two, when management considered cancelling the mixed doubles because of constant rain, players had a ball. The Janet Agnew tennis tournament is well known for its family participation and there were all sorts of combinations playing together this weekend; husbands and wives, parents and children, siblings, cousins and, as Judy Hill put it when she won the B grade mixed doubles title with young Daniel Hammond, a pensioner playing with a junior.

The men's A grade doubles title was taken out by the Auckland pairing of Ben Davies and Andrew Andy van der Vyver in an entertaining final.

The young guys had just too much class for the top Northland combination of Keith Cocking and Mike Clapshaw, winning 6-4 6-3.

Greg Miller from Te Poi and his son Chris Miller from the local Springfield Tennis Club teamed up to take the men's B grade doubles with a very good win over top juniors James Mortimer and Campbell Johns 7-5 6-1.

In the Ladies A grade doubles final, Springfield's Shelley Yeates, together with Gayleen Carson from Koru Club, Auckland, defended their title by defeating Shelley's mother Raewyn Heywood and Maryanne Rogers-Benton 6-3 6-3.

Heywood and Rogers-Benton did very well to get to the final by upsetting top seeds Shona Davis-Brooking and Helen Langley from the Kohimarama Club in Auckland in a close encounter 4-6 6-3 10-3.

The Ladies B Grade final could have gone either way. It was a very close match, with Mairtown girls Laurette Anderson and Ivy Rakich just prevailing over Judy Hill and Aroha Clements in a marathon three-setter 5-7, 7-6, 10-3.

Gaye Carson won her second title with Darron Kocsis, from the Koru Club, by taking the mixed A grade title in a unfortunate way. Their opponents, sister/brother pairing, Waylon and Aaliyah Edwards from Rotorua, had to leave early so they did not have enough time to complete the match.

Northland senior Judy Hill and promising Northland junior Daniel Hammond took out the mixed B grade beating Phil Bowers and Coral Hammer 6-4 6-0.