Kazakhs sweep all in ATF Asian U14 Series

KUCHING (Nov 12): Ratmir Pulkevich completed a Kazakh clean sweep in the 16th ATF Asian U14 Series Sarawak tennis championship today after he staved off a spirited challenge from Chinese Taipei’s Tsai Bing-Huan in the boys’ singles final at the Sarawak Lawn Tennis Association (SLTA) Tennis Centre today.

It took the tournament seventh seed a tie-break to break Tsai’s resistance 7-6(1) in the first set and he wrapped up his win 6-3 in the second set.

En route to the final, Ratmir blanked Eli Eita Hilton Smith of Malaysia 6-0, 6-0 in the first round, and another Malaysian Jacob Wong 6-2, 6-1 in the second round.

The ATF No. 365 went on to upstage third seed Nicholas Pak of Singapore 6-0, 6-1 before ousting the tournament top seed from Malaysia Gareth Lim 6-2, 6-1 in the semifinals.

On the other hand, Tsai also enjoyed a good run in the tournament, having entered the main draw as one of the qualifiers and blanking Ethan Soh of Malaysia 6-0, 6-0 in the first round, beating Malaysia’s Ari Shuzo Hilton Smith 6-1, 6-0 in the second before upsetting two more seeds from Singapore Leon Ho, the fourth seed, 6-0, 6-0 in the last eight and Matthew Tay, the fifth seed, 6-0, 6-0 in the semifinals.

Matthew Tay finished in third place after he beat Malaysia’s Gareth Lim 4-2, 4-1 in the placings play-off.

The all-Kazakh girls’ final saw the towering Tatyana Ivanova, who is the second seed, edging Gauhar Aktan 7-5, 7-5.

Sofiya Malysheva, also from Kazakhstan was third after beating compatriot Yelizaveta Slepchenko in the placings playoff. Sofiya was leading Yelizaveta 4-1, 2-0 before the latter retired.

On Saturday, the Kazakhs made a clean sweep of the doubles titles through Gauhar Altman-Tatyana Ivanovo in the girls competition and Ratmir Pulkevich-Arken Syzdykov in the boys section.

A delighted Kazakh coach Bolat Mamyr said he was happy and proud of his players’ performance, saying: “they have done very well and performed up to my expectations.”

“We are happy to win all the titles here in Kuching this week and l believe it is due to the good preparations that we made before coming here.

“The boys and girls also trained hard and played hard to overcome the tough challengers and other challenges in this tournament,” said Bolat who was in Kuching 10 years ago playing in the Junior Davis Cup qualifying tournament.

Prior to the Kuching competition, Gauhar and Tatyana were also girls’ singles finalists and Ratmir finished second in the boys’ singles at a ATF Asian U14 Series event in Singapore.