Parents and guardians should encourage their children to take part in the sports of tennis, Doreen Ningalo told Solomon Women Newspaper.
“These days we seen a lot of young kids are getting enrolled in our tennis development. It is becoming evident; our new generations can see a future in sports as well.
“I believe the more we promote tennis, the more we will see more children enrolling in the program. Tennis plays an important role in personality development also. There is a great significance of the sport in overall personality development.
The female tennis development coordinator said to start your child in sports in an early age; tennis would be the best option to start off with. Therefore, I encourage parents to involve their children in playing tennis.
“We have a big tournament coming up later this year, so I encourage the children to train hard. The Tennis registration is still open and we call on more children in Honiara to join the trainings so that you can also have the chance to receive an International Tennis Federation scholarship one day,” Ningalo added.
The Solomon Islands tennis Federation has been active for numbers of years now. However introduction of the JTI mini program, the activities gathered momentum and made great strides clubs and Provincials tennis Association.
She said their vision is to help children aged 3 years and above to play tennis.
“The tennis training program is held on the tennis court at the Multipurpose Hall. The program involves children from different aged groups. The young players are allocated into three categories.
“The groups are categorized as Red Development Team, Green Development Team and National Tennis Team. The Red team consists of children aged 3-5 years and they usually train 40 minutes per day. The Green Development team consists of children who have transferred from the Red team. They usually train one hour per day.
Meanwhile she said they are currently preparing a national training team to participate in the upcoming Pacific Oceania Championships in August this year. The Championships will be hosted in Fiji.
“The training squad has two qualified players, Chrishma Au and Marion Gaute’e who will be teaming up with three local students sponsored under the International Tennis Federation in Fiji. The Fiji based players are Zorika Morgan, Prudence Bird, and Lockland Guba
The tennis development program has set a global benchmark for our local tennis players who have played in international competitions and study at the International Tennis Federation (ITF) Regional Training Centre in Lautoka and also in United States of America (USA).
The following are some of our local prominent player such as Michael Leong who has previously played in the Pacific Oceania Davis cup team and also the only world rank player in the country, Samuel Ramoni, Samuel Tesimu, Irene George, Gurianna Kori, who have studied and played tennis in USA, Luke Paeni, Zinnia Leamana, Amanda Kori, and Ian Honila who studying and playing tennis in Fiji.
