Summer Series starts with a bang

GIPPSLAND’S summer of tennis kicked off last week with some incredible matches being played on the courts of Korumburra in the 5th Annual ‘The Recruitment Alternative Korumburra Unisex Graded Tennis Tournament’ on Wednesday and Thursday. 

The man behind the tournaments is coach Matt Pocklington and he was good enough to talk to the Sentinel Times recently about tennis in the Gippsland region, and what’s coming up in the next month. 

“In general, I think participation is just as high as it was a couple of years ago, COVID and that has probably helped it bounce back due to being a non-contact sport, our juniors’ comps and Saturday morning comps are going well, all the clubs have teams in those, in the area,” he said. 

“Say, Leongatha has eight teams, Korumburra’s got six teams, that’s 14, in South Gippsland alone there’s probably 35 teams involved in Saturday morning competition.

“Obviously the tournaments are a bit different so and we have kids come from far and wide, so we’ve got kids from Melbourne way that train at Elsternwick Park, Tooradin, Berwick as well as our local guys from Fish Creek, Leongatha and Korumburra, plus others.

“We’re running a big tournament series, so I run the Korumburra and Leongatha tournaments and then there’s Phillip Island and West Gippsland, a good spread of tournaments over January.

“We’ve called it the Gippsland Summer Series of tennis and we’ve all come together as coaches in the region to offer a tournament every couple of days so there’s eight over January, so between them all we’re talking 500-600 kids playing.”  

At the Korumburra tournament there were 85 matches played on Wednesday alone, playing from 8:30 in the morning until 6:15 at night over the five courts, showing that the participating kids were getting plenty of experience on the courts, an invaluable asset to have. 

Pocklington did admit it takes a mammoth workload to get the tournaments up and running, although was positive the benefit for the kids is worth every effort. 

“We run tournaments a bit different over here, we just have the kids playing tennis all day if they’re winning or losing it doesn’t matter, they’re still guaranteed three to four singles matches and three to four doubles matches,” he said. 

“A lot of these guys wouldn’t have played more than two or three sets of tennis in a day in their normal competition so to come out and play seven matches on both days is a huge volume of tennis and that’s why they improve so much.”

Pocklington was bullish on how tennis is going and what it does for anyone who plays and encourages anyone looking to get involved to do so.

“It’s more of an individual sport, whereas your team sports you’ve got support from your teammates out on the field, but tennis is more of mental game, and for those who don’t like those contact sports tennis is great,” he said. 

“And it’s a very rewarding sport, you do get to meet new people and travel and the exposure you get and the people you meet is awesome, it’s a sport you’ll play for life, it’s a wonderful thing.”

This year’s tournament was run over two days with the inclusion of section six singles & doubles. Play commenced from 8.30am on Wednesday morning in near perfect playing conditions, with section one, three and five singles and doubles events. 

Thursday morning play kicked off at 8.30am in perfect conditions again, featuring sections two, four and six singles and doubles events. 

All but two entrants played both days, a total of 61 singles matches and 18 doubles matches (80 total) were played on Thursday. 

“Of the 35 entrants it was great to see 27 who have come through South Gippsland Tennis Coaching programs. For 7 of those players, it was their very first tennis tournament, for Lucy Carter (Leongatha) it was her first time playing a competitive match and she even won a trophy,” Pocklington said.

“Eight players made the effort to travel and all parents and players had nothing but positive feedback for the tournament.”

Pocklington also gave his thanks to all of those who chipped in to help set up and run such a terrific couple days of tennis.

“Thanks to the Korumburra Tennis Club, assistant directors Alicia Marshman and Keerah Pocklington, Trenton Hughes for helping prepare the club the night before,” he said. 

“Thanks to Marty Nicholas, Steve Wood and Trenton Hughes for helping during the day with bagging courts, watering courts and sweeping lines both days to ensure optimum playing conditions for players.”

Following this tournament and the Leongatha one last weekend, Gippsland Summer Series action continues at Drouin (January 9-10), Newhaven College (January 11), Warragul (January 12-13), Moe (January 14), San Remo (January 15) with the final tournament Beaconsfield on January 16-17. 

In total there’s eight tournaments from January 4-17. 

For further information on any of these tournament’s head to www.southgippslandtenniscoaching.com