What team to choose? Evans (our number one, so has to be there) for one singles, Evans and Rice (best Junior team out there) for doubles, but who'll be third member - Cox or Dyce?
We did well to qualify but got a bad draw in the form of top seeds Slovak Republic and lost. We finished sixth, which means that we sneak into the World Junior Tennis tournament that's played in August.
16 and under team - James Chaudry, Greg Goodall, Ahmed El Menshawy.
Arvind Parmar is the team captain!!
18 and under team - Cox, Evans, Pauffley, Smethurst (reserve).
I am not too happy with Cox and Evans playing this as they will have to miss a Challenger and Futures. Now that they are on course for a direct entry into the USO and a seeding at next year's Australian Open, they could have been made to play men's tournaments every week till December except for the three weeks of the G1 in Canada, the USO and Osaka Mayor's.
But I guess that it's a great honour to represent your country.
Knowing nothing about this age group, the follwing questions may be a little bit naive and is not meant to be over critical...
Given that all the new coaching regime believe that the current crop of 14 year olds represent the best chance of future champions is the result not a little disappointing?
Were there players missing who may have made the side?
No, no one was missing due to injury. Although Watkins was the reserve even though he is our number two.
At this moment none of our 14 and under players can be considered as one of the best players in their age group.
But this may not mean much as loads of players don't do too well before they are 15 and 16. Eysseric, the best player in the 18 and under circuit at the moment, was extremely ordinary when he was 14 - he wasn't even the best in France. Federer himself was nothing special when he was 13 or 14 but started winning big tournaments soon after.
Who knows... maybe someone like Morgan or Watkins or Golding will mature a lot over the next two years and will show signs of Tour players in the making.
Hi Arka and all. I think you may be forgetting that there is also an under 12 cup this year for the first time. The GB team is Jonny O'mara, Luke Bambridge and Chris Pearce. Hot news just off the press (re phone call from Jonny) is that they have just qualified for the finals in sardinia, Italy with a win over Bulgaria. In fact the boys did very well with wins over sweden and Turkey as well as Bulgaria without losing a set. They all had to deal with the dreaded "Delhi belly" as well as the intense heat there at the moment all the best
Hi Arka and all. I think you may be forgetting that there is also an under 12 cup this year for the first time. The GB team is Jonny O'mara, Luke Bambridge and Chris Pearce. Hot news just off the press (re phone call from Jonny) is that they have just qualified for the finals in sardinia, Italy with a win over Bulgaria. In fact the boys did very well with wins over sweden and Turkey as well as Bulgaria without losing a set. They all had to deal with the dreaded "Delhi belly" as well as the intense heat there at the moment all the best
I know I am a pedant but..(don't you just hate contributions that start like that?)...I decided to look up the details of their success on the appropriate Tennis Europe page.
Don't you just hate contributions that contain words you have to look up? At least I now know what "pedant" means
The table you mention Robxon is just a simple representation of the two qualifiers from the group stage. I don't know for sure whether there will be seeds in Italy but I suspect not and they will go with a four team group draw with winner and runner-up opposing group play off and subsequent final-but thats a guess. The home team have a very strong team as well as home advantage, France and ourselves also look pretty good.
Thanks for the welcome! Not doing Bournemouth as he has had a tough schedule recently and I had a feeling they would qualify for the finals in sardinia so a week at home seemed a better plan. He's now got sardinia followed by the Nationals then probably one more trip before starting at the new tennis academy at merchiston school in edinburgh
Evans will be playing Rumenov, who's ATP top 1000 but doesn't play much Juniors. Cox will face Sergio Gutierrez, who has 4 or 5 ATP points but doesn't play Juniors at all.
Both the matches are tough but both are highly winnable. I don't know who we'll play in doubles, though. Cox/Evans, Evans/Pauffley and Pauffley/Cox have done well while playing together in the past.