B Division Boys’ Tennis: ACS(I) beat RI to reclaim title

Story and photos by Marvin Lowe/Red Sports

Kallang Tennis Centre, Thursday, February 25, 2011 — Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) reclaimed the B Division Tennis Championship title after they defeated Raffles Institution 3-2 in the final.

Both teams were missing key players due to a regional Asian youth tennis competition and had to reshuffle their line up. The Finals was also originally scheduled for Tuesday, February 23, but was postponed due to the rain.

Despite the interruption, ACS(I) drew first blood when they won the first singles match. Yeo Ee Jin of ACS (I) won his match 6-1, 6-4, against Tan Jun Sing of RI to secure the first point.

Raffles pulled levelled with a victory in the second singles match when Basir Koh of RI beat Andrew Kwan of ACS(I) 6-2, 6-3.

Bryan Seah and Joshua Ong then teamed up to win the first doubles for ACS(I) against Christopher Wu and Aaron Gan of RI to set their team up for victory.

ACS(I) now needed one more point from either the final singles or the second doubles match. In the singles match, Naoki Nakamura established a one-set lead against Sean Lee of RI.

Meanwhile, in the second doubles match, the RI duo of Benedict Chua and Kang Jin An also had a one-set lead over the ACS(I) duo. However, Benedict and Jin An crumbled before the ACS(I) challenge after leading 2-1 in the second set. The ACS(I) pair of Teddy Cheong and Jaryl Chan won five games in a row to claim the second set 6-2, to even things up at 1-1.

With the momentum shifting their favour, Teddy and Jaryl broke RI’s serve and they held their nerves to win the final set 6-4 to give ACS(I) an unassailable 3-1 lead and the championship title.

“After losing the first set, Coach Hassan advised us to be patient and remain positive. He told us to extend the rallies with our opponents as they might lose focus during these long rallies and commit errors,” said Teddy, when asked about the strategy that helped turn the game around.

Sean Lee of RI staged a comeback of his own to win his dead rubber singles match against Naoki Nakamura as well. Despite going down 3-6 in the first set. Sean blazed past Naoki to claim the next two sets, 6-1, 6-1. However, this result was just a mere consolation for RI.

” It was a close fight against a worthy opponent. The boys have worked really hard and I am really delighted that our boys have brought home the first gold for the school,” said Mrs Fanny Tan, the principal of ACS(I) who was present to support the team.

“We played and lost to this current Raffles team two years ago in the C Division final, so it’s really sweet to be able to bring back the B Division title,” said Joshua Ong, captain of the ACS(I) team.

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