admin
Ellina Mhlanga Sports Reporter
THE pair of Courtney Lock and Lloyd Harris stormed into the doubles semi-finals of the South Central African Junior Circuit second leg when they beat Christian La Grange and Jd Malan in the doubles at Harare Sports Club yesterday. Harris and Lock dismissed La Grange and Malan of South Africa 6-0, 6-3 to progress to the semi-finals and they will take on Brandon Laubser and Alwyn Mushonga today hoping for a win as they seek to defend the title they won last week in the first leg.
Laubser and Mushonga beat the pair of Guy Orly Iradukunda and Innocent Tidimane 6-4, 4-6, 10-5.
The other semi-final match will feature the pair of Ismael Mzai and Chisomo Lumeta who will play against Aziz Dougaz and his partner Gueninle Ouattara.
In the boys singles top seed, Iradukunda continued with his dominance as he beat Malan 1-6, 6-1, 6-1. Iradukunda who won the singles title in the first leg will now meet eighth seed Kris Van Wyk in the quarterfinals. Van Wyk overpowered Chisomo Lumeta 7-5, 3-6, 6-3.
Zimbabwe’s top player in the girls section Nicole Dzenga pulled through to the quarter-finals when she beat South Africa’s Nadine De Villiers 7-6(4), 6-0 and will take on Ialita Devarakonda today. Devarakonda beat Louise-Mare Botes 6-0, 7-5.
Dzenga teamed up with South Africa’s Theresa Van Zyl for the doubles and they dismissed Nadine De Villiers and Katie Poluta from South Africa 4-6, 6-3, 10-5 in a match that had to be decided in the third set.
Dzenga and Van Zyl have a date against the pair of Amelie Boy and Emmanuelle De Beer from Mauritius in the semi-finals today.
Van Zyl had earlier on outclassed Nthabiseng Mogopodi of Botswana 6-1, 6-0 in the singles matches as she aims to defend her title from the first leg.
The other doubles match will see the Botes twin sisters, Huibre-Mare and Louise-Mare taking on France’s Tessah Andrianjafitrimo and Rikeetha Pereira of India.
However, it was a different story for the other two Zimbabwean girls as they lost their matches with Keren Muswere losing 1-6, 4-6 to Huibre-Mare Botes while Beverly Matsiwe went down to second seed Dhruthi Tatachar of India 2-6, 1-6.
The 13-year-old who was making her debut appearance in such a tournament said it has been a learning curve for her as she had the opportunity to compete with some of the best juniors from other countries.
“It was a tough match and I will practice harder so that I will get to the top. I have learnt a lot of things from them and they inspired me.
“This was my first time and I feel I need to play more tournaments so that I can get more ITF points,” said Matsiwe.
Online Reporter