CAY HILL—The Pineapple Pete Open Doubles Tennis Tournament got off to a wet start at the Raoul Illidge Sports Complex Tennis Pavilion Friday. Mehrdad/Peter beat Jory/Jaring in a very close match: 6-2, 2-6, followed by the deciding super-tiebreak, which ended in 15-12 after a rain-delay of about an hour in the first Men’s Doubles match in group 1.
Organized by the St. Maarten Tennis Club, Pineapple Pete Open Doubles Tournament will run
to December 18.
The competition features three categories of play with 33 teams in total. There are 12 teams in each of the Men and Women groups and eight in the Mixed. The format is best of 3 sets. A tie-break decides at 6/6 in the first and second set. If the third set is knotted a super tie-break will be played consisting of first to 10 points with two points difference wins. In the regular sets, there is no ‘ad’; at 40-40 one final point decides the game.
Many matches had to be rescheduled due to rain Saturday and Sunday. It also forced officials to shorten the super tie-break from 15 to 10 points.
On Saturday afternoon, the Mixed Doubles were opened by Frietjof and Katja, who comprehensively beat Ard and Sabine 6-0, 6-3, although the latter team made an admirable effort, considering that they haven’t been playing all that long.On Sunday, only the matches scheduled in the early morning were played; the afternoon brought too much rain, even though the court was dried by the players several times before really giving up. In group 1 of the Men’s, Jory/Jaring were beaten by Paul/Albert 6-2, 6-4, so Monday’s match between Paul/Albert versus Mehrdad/Peter would decide who won this group. Paul and Albert dominated play throughout and won comfortably: 6-2, 6-4. In the next round, they will face even tougher opposition, of course. The other Sunday morning match was in the Mixed category; Roeland and Debby came up short against Arend-Jan and Carla: 6-1, 6-1. Monday’s matches were all played. In Men’s group 2, Roeland/Joeri were facing tough competition in Luuk/Joep – after 6-3, 4-6, the match went to a tie-break, which ended in 10-8 for Joeri/ Roeland.
In Women’s, Katja and Erika made short work of Meike and Michelle: 6-1, 6-0, though once again, the losers should be commended for their effort, since they are also rather new to the sport. The other Women’s match, between Carla/Geraldine and Ria/Annemarie ended in the same score line: 6-1, 6-2 for Carla/Geraldine.
