New Zealand Junior Open

17 of our junior players from Northland attended this event held at the Devoy Squash and Fitness Centre in Tauranga last weekend.

This event is a prestigious event on the New Zealand junior calendar and it was also the final selection tournament for the NZ Junior girls and boys team travelling to the Junior World Championships in Malaysia.  Annmarie Holst and Riley-Jack Vette-Blomquist are both in the running for places in the team and rose to their challenge while representing Northland admirably.

Annmarie Holst held her seeding and placed 6^th in the girls Open division, with Riley-Jack Vette-Blomquist beating his seeding by one and placed 8^th in the boys Open, along the way winning an important nail-bitingly close 5 setter in his second round match against Wellington’s Kobe Fleming.  Also playing in the Girls Open Shea Ferguson beat her seeding,  placing 24th from 27th seed.

A number of other players did well to improve their seedings in the other divisions with Maz Saunders placing 10^th (15^th seed) in Division One boys, Chelsea Traill came 5^th from 9^th seed in the Division One girls with Pippa Saunders taking 3rd place in the Division One girls.  Cam Griffin placed 3^rd in the Division One boys, with 3^rd seed Alex Greatorex making his final in the Division Three boys and came runner-up.

In the J grade division, Emmie Ferguson made her final and placed runner-up while in the J Grade boys there were four young Northland boys in the draw with Zac Laing placing 4^th from his 7^th seed, Tane Traill 5^th, Ollie Maunder 6^th and Jamie Greaterox 10^th.

Auckland’s Gabe Yam defeated Waikato’s Temwa Chileshe in a tight 3 games in the Boys Open final while in the Girls Open Central’s Kaitlyn Watts won her third consecutive NZ Junior Open after a convincing win in her final against Anika Jackson from Waikato.