Maiden win for local junior tennis star
A local junior tennis player made his international breakthrough when he recently won his first ITF tournament in Potchefstroom.
The first international junior tennis events for 2017 in South Africa was recently hosted by North West University at the Riaan Venter Tennis Academy in Potchefstroom.
Two under 18 Grade 5 tournaments for boys and girls, called the NWU PUKKE ITF 1 and NWU PUKKE ITF 2 was played at the Potchefstroom campus.
There were 12 countries represented in the two events which included boys and girl’s singles and doubles.
Christiaan Worst of Pretoria was a first time winner on the international junior circuit when he won the boys singles title at this tournament.
Worst, aged 16 and a pupil at Afrikaans Hoër Seunskool in Pretoria, beat 10th seed Richardt Bierman also of South Africa in the final.
After winning the opening set 6-0 in a speedy 35 minutes and leading 1-0 in the second set, the 12th seed lost concentration allowing Bierman back into the match.
“Since a younger age I have had this problem where I get into the zone and on top of my opponent and then drop my level of concentration. It’s a problem I am working on but actually on court I felt rather flat, but I kept calm and believed I had the game and game plan to win. I am really happy and completely satisfied having won by first international title” said Worst.
Photo: BLD Communications
Bierman broke serve in the third game of the second set and held to lead 3-1. The set went with serve until the eighth game when Worst broke back to level the score 4-4. The set continued on serve until the tiebreaker. Worst found momentum and took advantage in the breaker leading 4-2 and then 5-3 and although Bierman put up a fight in the tail end of the breaker, Worst managed to hold on and win the breaker, set, match and title.
Danie Visser, former world number 1 doubles player, uncle and coach of Worst said that he was frustrated that Christiaan lost concentration in the second set. “Christiaan has put a lot of work into his game this year and has realised that to contend at the top he has to put in the effort. We getting there with the on court game now we need to work on Christiaan keeping a consistent mind-set from start to finish in each match he plays,” said Visser.
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