VPHS
Girls’ Tennis
went a two-day long, exclusive training camp with
Gary Thorne (Border Junior Tennis Coach). The
players were put through their paces with a number
of drills, and the coaches also focussed on mental
conditioning, match tactics and fitness. The players
learnt a great deal, and also bonded as a team on and
off the court. The training camp was concluded with
a series of matches against players from Selborne
College and Clarendon Girls, that were won overall
by Victoria Park High.
It has been another exciting year for girls’ tennis, a
year that we could regard as a year of foundationlaying and growth.
At the end of 2013 we bade farewell to our first
team players who were all in Matric. Not only had
these players left behind very big shoes to fill, but
they had been playing together for four consecutive
years. This meant that 2014 was the foundation-laying phase for a brand new first team, comprising
mostly younger players with little or no first league
experience. This did not stop the team of 2014 from
darting out of the starting blocks to establish a resumé of its own.
Both the first and second teams had successful singles and doubles seasons, and despite how young
the teams are in terms of experience, they held their
Team trials in January proved to be incredibly exciting, and the arrival of a number of new, young
bloods definitely threw some spice into the mix. The
early phases of the season were not without teething problems, but the players quickly started to find
their feet and were soon making a name for themselves within the PE Districts Schools’ league.
The highlight of the year was definitely the tennis
tour to East London, where the girls and boys under-
own against some very strong opposition. VP tennis
definitely earned a feather in its cap when the first
team was pushed up to play in league 1B –challenging the strongest players in the PE Schools’ league.
Despite our initial apprehension, they were not put
to shame, and emerged with a few wins in the doubles season.
The internal VP tennis championship is a highlight
on the annual tennis calendar and concludes the
tennis year. I departed to take maternity leave, and
handed over the reins to Khanyi Mapalala, ex pupil
and first team tennis player, who is studying Human
Movement Science at NNMU. Khanyi devised an
interesting and exciting format for the championships, and there was great excitement surrounding
this event on and off the court.
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