The Clare Champion Clare news, sport, entertainment and local notes
AN INTENSE two weeks for tennis player Mia Gavin have been rewarded with two tournament victories and one runner-up spot on the international circuit.
The 14-year-old has spent the past month preparing and competing in the TenPro Global Junior Tennis Tour which is a series of international tennis tournaments for young highly talented tennis players.
Mia’s first tournament in the series was the prestigious Dutch Bowl 2022 which took place in the Netherlands. During her run in the Netherlands she beat national champions from Iceland, the Netherlands and Romania and came runner-up in the U-15 category.
The event was played on hard court, a surface Mia does not train on so she was more than pleased with her performance.
Mia’s second tournament in the series was in Belgium at the world-renowned Kim Clijsters Tennis Academy. The surface this time was clay which is Mia’s favourite surface as it rewards her leftie style of play.
Mia competed in both the U-15 and U-16 category and won both titles without losing a set, winning not only one but two International junior titles.
She competed against national champions from countries such as Brazil, Greece, Spain and Switzerland, many of whom attend fulltime tennis academies throughout the world.
Some of Mia’s matches were played in temperatures up to 35 degrees Celsius and one of her opponents commented jokingly “how can you be a clay court champion when in Ireland you have no clay and so much rain?”
In the final of the U-15 category Mia beat Larissa Brasil from Brazil. Brasil is a fulltime member of Rackets Academy in Dubai and has a quite a number of titles to her name already.
Mia won the final on a score of 6-2, 6-1. In the final of the U-16 category Mia beat Eygenia Kakari a fulltime member of the Deree Tennis Academy in Greece on a score of 6-2, 7-6 in a match that lasted over 2 hours.
Mia started playing tennis at the age of four and is coached by Danny Comerford and Jason Comerford.
She now continues her training and while she is very happy with her recent performances, she and her team appreciate the value of this international experience and how it will contribute to her future development in the game.
