FAMILIAR faces and perennial leg winners dominated anew at the conclusion of the 7th leg of the Cebuana Lhuillier Age-Group Tennis Championship Series, the country’s longest-running grassroots tennis developmental program now on its 11th year of discovering and producing young champions from different provinces.
Held at the Liwanag Tennis Courts in Maranding Lala in Lanao del Norte, the weekend event attracted 140 entries.
Local bet Andre Cuevas leading the charge together with Sydney Ezra Enriquez from Zamboanga del Norte, Nash Agustines from Oroquieta City and unknown Abel QadzriMatarul, also from Zamboanga del Norte with two titles apiece in the tournament supported by Dunlop as the official ball.
Cuevas posted an easy 8-2 win over another local player, 14-under champion Brent Sigmond Cortes for the boys’ 16-under crown and partnered with John Stephen Sonsona for the boys’ 18-under doubles’ crown with a hard earned 8-6 victory over Jose Maria Pague and Andrew Oserada.
Pague, from Zamboanga, Sibugay, meanwhile, took the 18- under singles’ title by defeating local bet John Renest Sonsona 8-2 in the finals.
Multi-titled Enriquez added two more to her collection as she crushed Kristin Margarette Bandolis, 8-0, in the girls’ 14- under finals and followed it with an 8-3 victory over Lanao del Norte’s Voenn Pamaong for the 16-under crown. Agustines emerged champion in the boys’ 12-under with an 8-2 win over Heinz Asian Carbonilla, and partnered with Eurie Tagal to beat Aaron Geronimo and Mark Tanquion, 8-4, in the finals of the boys’ 14-under doubles.
Matarul swept AJ Bering, 4-2, 4-1, for the 10-under unisex title and together with Jhemz Bryle Enopia, also took the 10-under doubles’ crown, besting Bering and Kristin Gwen Bandolis, 8-4, in their championship match.
“We hold a lot of legs in Mindanao as the region has proven to be a very good source of young tennis talents in the past who have gone all the way to being national champions and represented the country in international competitions, “ said Jean Henri Lhuillier, President/CEO of Cebuana Lhuillier.
Other winners in the recent leg were Kristin Margarette Bandolis in the girls’ 12-under as she blanked her sibling Kristin Gwen Banother Bandolis, 8-0; regular campaigner Brent Sigmond Cortes, who used to dominate the younger age categories the past years and continued his winning ways as he annexed the boys’ 14-under crown with an 8 – 5 win over Geronimo; and Pamaong, who consoled herself with winning the girls’ 18-under over Jackie Lou Mangahas following an 8-1 win after she lost to Enriquez in the 16-under category.