06 Dec 2021

Botswana Tennis Association’s (BTA) long term youth development strategy has started bearing fruit.

In an interview, the association’s president, Oaitse Thipe, said improved performance as well as international rankings were evidence that the strategy was working.

Thipe said testimony to such was the exceptional performance by the national Under 16 at the just ended Africa Junior Championships in Tunisia recently.

The boys’ team comprised Denzel Seetso and Mark Nawa while Chelsea Changanyuka, Refilwe Youri and Naledi Raguin represented the girls’ team under the tutelage of Enerst Seleke.

Seetso won a bronze medal in the boys’ singles and won gold with his partner Nawa in the doubles. However, Nawa lost his first round match in the boys’ singles. Youri and Changanyuka lost their opening match in the girls’ singles.

Youri, who is based in Spain and training with Barcelona Tennis Academy continued her dominance in the girls’ singles by bringing home gold medal.

She had won two women’s open tournaments this year and reached the finals of the other competition. She also recently won ITF under 18 tournament in Spain, beating number one seed,

Sarah Tatu of Britain. On the other hand, Thipe indicated that the Under 18 team, which was made up of most players from under 16, also took part at this year’s Africa Junior Championships, where Changanyuka and Youri reached the semi-finals in the girls’ doubles.

Youri also reached the quarterfinals in the girls’ singles. In the boys’ category, Seetso however lost in the second round of the tournament top seed. Generally, he said Youri finished in seventh positio, Raguin 13th  and Changanyuka 22nd, while in the boys’ team Seetso finished 14th, Batsomi Marobela 24th, Loago Saleshando 27th and Nawa 28th.

He added that prior to Africa Junior Championships 2021, the team took part in a number of International Tennis Federation (ITF) tournaments, some in Pretoria, Capetown, Johannesburg in South Africa as well as in Kenya, where they displayed great performance.

He said youngsters also performed well in local tournaments, with Seetso and Tshegofatso Tsiang winning Botswana Open in July this year in their respective categories.

Nevertheless, Thipe said the association identified players at a tender age and works closely with parents to nurture them, adding that given sufficient resources, he was optimistic that the association would be in a position to have players represent the country well at international competitions such as Junior Wimbledon, US and French Open. ENDS