Tennis
The tennis teams have enjoyed a very good season.
The under 18s have been most successful, having beaten Warwick by 6-3 and winning Glanvill Cup matches against Bishop Challenor, Old Swinford Hospital and Tettenhall College. The score in each of these matches was 6 – 0. As a result we qualified for the National Finals, which were held at Queenswood School in Hertfordshire on 9th-14th July. Here we defeated Lymm High School by 4-2, who themselves had beaten Lancing College in the first round. In the quarter-final we had to play the number one seeded school, Millfield, and we went down 1-5. However, our top player and captain, George Hudson, had a tremendous win against the highly rated Millfield number one. Solihull School is now one of the top eight tennis schools in the country, which is a wonderful achievement, at a time when other schools and tennis academies boost their chances by offering tennis scholarships. Many congratulations to all concerned.
The under 15 team has had a mixed season, losing most of its local fixtures, but securing a good win against a touring team from Bradford Grammar School. Four under 15 boys also represented the School well in early July at the Independent Schools’ Tennis Championships at Eton.
The under 13 A team has had an excellent season, winning all their matches by 6-0 and becoming Solihull Borough champions. Next term they will go forward to represent Solihull in the West Midlands Championships. Some exceptional players from the Junior School have made a good contribution to this team, which is captained by Jathan Malik, who is a star player in the Great Britain team.
An under 13 B team has also competed very well in the same league as the A team, losing only to Solihull A team and to one other team. Next year we would like as many people as possible to play tennis both for pleasure and also to further improve the standard of our teams.
STOP PRESS: Jathan Malik of IIIP deserves enormous credit for his achievements in tennis. In summer 2006 he played in the National Championships at Bournemouth and became British National under 12 singles Champion. He also finds time to play for the School and has captained the undefeated under 13 team this season.
Mr J McGowan