Juniors honoured

Manama

 Bahrain Tennis Academy (BTA) has held its 2014/15 Junior End of Season Awards at the Dilmun Club in Saar, as the shortlisted players gathered to honour the most outstanding players of the season with 14 awards presented. 

These awards were split into two sections - ‘Best of 2014/15’ (11 categories) and ‘Player of the Year’ (three age groups).Some of the categories included best forehand, best backhand, most improved player and best sportsmanship. 

Five players were short-listed for each award and then the winner was chosen based on the criteria for each category, but also taking into account each player's level and experience in the game.

Winners of the player of the year awards were Juno Verbeek (under-6), Rohan Mukherjee (under-8) and Owen Verbeek (under-10). Other category winners were Boudica Verbeek, Haruka Kobayashi and Katelin Reed. Longtime student, Owen Verbeek, was the star of the ceremony as apart from being crowned  player of the year. He collected awards in six of the 11 categories and also became the first student in the 12 year history of the awards to be short-listed  for all 11 categories having recently won both the Under-10 and Under-12 events in the recent Citi BTA Junior Tournament.

Owen is now preparing to take on some of the world’s best 10-year olds in Germany in August where he will be Bahrain’s first and only representative in the event.

Awards were presented by BTA Director, Dan Barrie who said, “It is very rewarding for all involved to see a player like Owen, who started with us as a 4 year old, develop his game to the level that it is at today. Hopefully some of the younger players at the awards ceremony will be inspired to work hard and follow in his footsteps."

The junior programme resumes in September and for more information on BTA activities contact the director at dan@bahraintennisacademy.com