Alnwick Tennis Club continues its success in the North East Winter Tennis League
Alnwick Tennis Club has continued its good run in the North East Winter Tennis League.
The league is for clubs from Northumberland, Durham and Cleveland, and is played from October to March.
Overall, 64 teams compete in a league format in tiered groups followed by a knockout stage. Teams comprise two men and two women, and the match format is two games (each with two sets) of single sex doubles followed by two games of mixed doubles.
Following success in this league for the last two years, Alnwick Tennis Club, captained by Laurence Reeves, repeated the success this year.
Alnwick’s campaign in the Tier 3 league began rather unpromisingly with just one win, but they finished a creditable fourth in their group (based on percentage games won) giving them a place in Section 8 of the knockout phase.
Alnwick won their first game by a walkover. In the semi-final they beat Northumberland 6 by five sets to three.
The final against Hexham was played at the Alnwick club’s venue in Prudhoe Street.
Alnwick coped better with the very blustery conditions, winning both the Ladies’ and Men’s matches.
Rich Matthews and Xander Hume won 6-3, 6-1, while Rosanna Curtis and Claire Marshall won 6-2, 6-1.
As the wind moderated the Hexham team became more competitive in the mixed matches and the tennis was very entertaining for spectators.
The Alnwick first pair of Claire Marshall and Xander Hume, and second pair of Rosanna Curtis and Rich Matthews won their first sets by 6-1 and 6-2 respectively, but Hexham finished strongly, taking the final two sets 7-5 and 7-6 in a tie-break set. Final score Alnwick 6 Hexham 2.
Nine different players turned out for Alnwick across the games.