The All Island Tennis10s tournament organized annually by the Sri Lanka tennis Association started off in spectacular style at the SLTA courts in Greenpath.
This tournament which is sponsored by VA TEC- WABAG/ HYDRO ALLIANCE will be going on until the 27th of October. The equipment sponsor of this tournament is ‘HEAD’ 3G sports (Pvt) Ltd.
The opening ceremony was held under the patronage of Lt Yoshitha Rajapakse. This annual tournament which attracts lot of schools and players is very popular among the participants every year.
This year too there are over 800 kids representing schools from regions from all over the country in this event. The regions represented in this tournament are Jaffna, Batticaloa, Kalutara, Negombo, Bandarawela, Ratnapura, Kandy, Matale, Kurunegala,
Nuwaraeliya and the host region Colombo. This tournament is considered as the tournament which has the most number of entries in Asia.
Associated at the opening ceremony was Mr Angelo Patrick, Vice President, Sri Lanka Tennis Association who is also the Chairman of the Coaching and the promotion committee, Mr Pradeep Goonesekera, The General Secretary of the SLTA, Ms Sujani Bogollagama, Treasurer of the SLTA who is also the tournament director, Mr Udith Wickremasinghe, Secretary of the tournament and matches committee, Mr Dinith Pathiraja, Director of Coaching and Development of the SLTA along with Mr S Thevanesan, the National Coordinator of the programme.
This tournament is conducted under the JTI programme of the International Tennis Federation. Mr Suresh Menon, the Development Officer for Asia was also in Sri Lanka last week where he had commended this programme highly. He had commented on the fact that this tournament and the programme is held up as an example to the rest of Asia.
The tournament is being conducted in three categories. The Red ball, Orange ball and the Green ball categories. Red ball is the Under 7 age group while the Orange and the Green ball are the Under 8 and the Under 10 age groups respectively. Red Ball is played on quarter of a court with a bigger sized ball, while the Orange Ball is played on a three quarter court and the Green ball on a full court with normal sized tennis balls.
The teams will initially be divided into groups and the matches will be played on a round robin basis. The winning teams will then go forward to the next rounds of the tournament. The tournament referee Mr Dinusha Wijesuriya expects healthy competition among the participants.
The Director of Coaching Dinith Pathiraja said ‘what is important at this age is not the winning or the losing. What is important is that these kids are participating in a competition and understanding the game. Through this we hope that there will the next generation of champions for Sri Lanka tennis’.
