Top players advance

The preliminaries of the Barbados Road Tennis Open tournament continued yesterday at the Belfield Road Tennis Court in Black Rock, St. Michael, with several players securing their places in the round of 64 to be contested at a later date.

Among those was the top-rated Julian ‘Michael Jackson’ White with a comfortable, straight sets 21-6, 21-4 victory against Damien Millar in the two best of three sets encounter.

After days of rain and cancellation of matches, the return of road tennis was much welcomed and almost all of the seven matches played last night ended quickly.

White’s encounter against Millar was no different and it was just a case of how many points Millar could accumulate against the formidable White who made light work of his opponent.

Millar failed to register at least ten points in either set and it took a total of four minutes and nine seconds for White to complete the job.

The most competitive matchup of the night was between Anthony ‘Charlie’ Chase and Wayne McDonald. The latter showed great determination and went on to take the game 21-11, 16-21 and 21-7 and advanced.

In the opening set, McDonald took the lead over Chase at 21-11. He initially had a commanding 19-6 advantage on his way to a 1-0 lead. Chase had a lot of catching up to do in the second stanza as the stylish right-handed McDonald played those powerfully effective forehand drives.

Chase, from Dover, went ahead 6-4 in the second set which was way more competitive as both men rallied strong and worked the ball around the court trying to stay alive. McDonald had hopes of finishing the game in straight sets but Chase in his approach looked confident of forcing a decisive third stanza.

The players traded shots, particularly some lobs that oftentimes required them both to be patient with their execution. McDonald had a liking for playing the balls from the backarm and that worked well in his favour as he took a 14-10 lead.

Well, that lasted only for so long as Chase overtook his man at 19-15 and went on to claim the win 21-16 and tie the scores 1-1. It was one of those exchanges that had the crowds engaged as the players at times questioned calls made by the competent line officials.

More composed out of the two players, McDonald led 10-6 as they switched at the halfway stage of the third period. One of the things McDonald did well was open up and put away anything that was there to be hit as he took the set with ease and more importantly the match.

With BDS$20, 000 first prize at stake, Dwaine Hope duly won his encounter 21-11, 21-18 over Rommell ‘Cutly’ Forde, the brother of politician Adrian ‘Medic’ Forde. The matches finished at a rapid rate as Simon Bayne [21-13, 21-15] trounced Ricardo Taylor in straight sets.

Jason Parris dominated 21-14, 21-18 when he took on Fernando Burgess. Kerry Francis roughed up Stephen Joseph 21-13, 21-14 while Jeo Thorne 21-15, 21-17 was too much for Fabian Batson to handle.

morissalindsay@barbadostoday.bb