Super 'A' Junior National Tennis from today

Anuradha ABEYSEKERA

The Super 'A' grade Junior National Tennis Championships 2012 will be worked off from August 11 to 17 at the Sri Lanka Tennis Association (SLTA) courts. The Junior Nationals will be followed by the 97th Tennis Nationals, which is to be worked off from August 18 to 26 at the SLTA courts.

The apex tournament of the local junior tennis fraternity will include 16 singles/doubles events for boys and girls in age categories of under-10, U-12, U-14, U-16 and U-18.

Only the players who have registered at SLTA for this year (2012-2013) will be eligible to participate in the tournament and a player will be given the opportunity to enter maximum three events. The SLTA player registration ID is a must for all players and should be produced with the entry form.

With the record participation of more than 500 players, the tournament will showcase some exciting tennis as most of the top junior talents are to be inaction. The matches will start at 8.00 am everyday.

Bringing Sri Lanka tennis to a higher platform, SLTA joined hands with a leading telecommunication company, Bharti Airtel Lanka (Pvt) Ltd. who turned up with a first time main sponsorship for the most important two tournaments in the local tennis fraternity. Airtel will sponsor both tennis Nationals and Junior nationals for the next three years and the signing of the sponsorship agreement took place between Bharti Airtel Lanka CEO Suren Goonewardena and SLTA President Iqbal Bin Issack during the press conference. Iqbal appreciated Airtel for the sponsorship and said because of Airtel's generous sponsorship they were able to reduce the entry fees, specially for the junior events and as a result have received a record number of 510 entries. The tournaments will conduct in accordance with the International Tennis Federation (ITF) rules and will be a great experience for participants.

The 97th Tennis Nationals will feature some foreign players from Pakistan and India along with the local elite players, but unfortunately Sri Lanka's number one Harshana Godamanna will not be taking part as he is in abroad for studies. Altogether 15 events in Open, Veteran and Wheelchair categories are on card for the Nationals and the two local 2012 Paralympians, Upali Rajakaruna and D. M. Gamini will battle it out against each other in the wheelchair singles. The chief referee for the Junior nationals is Anujoun Subramaniam while Avantha Suranimala will be the referee for the Nationals. Ravindranath Perera is the Tournament Committee Chairman and Udith Wickramasinghe has appointed the Tournament Director for both tournaments.

The Junior National events - under-10 singles (boys/girls), under- 12 singles (boys/girls), under-14 singles and doubles (boys/girls), under-16 singles and doubles (boys/girls), under-18 singles and doubles (boys/girls).

97th Tennis National events - Open singles and doubles (men's/women's), Mixed doubles/ Veteran singles and doubles for men in over-35, over-45, over-55 and over-65 / Wheelchair singles and doubles.