allAfrica.com: Africa: Botswana Fall in ITF/Cat African Junior Championships (Page 1 of 1)

Once again, hosts Botswana has failed to deal with the tough competition at the on-going International Tennis Federation (ITF) and Confederation of African Tennis (CAT) African Junior Championships.

Just like last year, when the country hosted the event, all its 24 players have been knocked out in the second round. The African Junior Championships started at Botswana Tennis Association (BTA) courts on March 17 and end this Sunday.

By Tuesday, Botswana pinned its hope on eight players for both singles and doubles but none of them sailed through to the quarterfinals that took place yesterday. Despite the rout, Botswana Tennis Association (BTA) officials are adamant that the average performance was good.

National team assistant coach Wellington Sibanda told Mmegi Sport yesterday that the performance showed signs of improvement though the players lack international exposure unlike their opponents. Egypt, Morocco, South Africa and Tunisia are dominating the event. Sibanda lamented that local players did not play enough preparatory matches before the tournament. The team only managed a weekend training camp at ITF centre in Pretoria, South Africa, two weeks before the commencement of the African Junior Championships.

"Other countries play many international tournaments and this gives them experience and exposure, hence their outstanding performance," said Sibanda. "They (Botswana players) could have done better if they had the required training. It was clear from this tournament that we still have a long way to go," he added. He challenged BTA to raise more money to send players outside the country to get exposure and to organise more local tournaments. BTA sports development officer, Tuelo Serufho agreed that a number of things have to be addressed if the country is serious about doing well in tennis. Currently there is only one big tournament here - Kims' Auto - but this is not enough. The country does not have enough qualified coaches to drill young stars regularly. "For us to match the likes of Morocco, South Africa and Tunisia, we still have to do a lot of things. Realistically, we knew that our chances of grabbing a medal here were very slim but we considered the benefits of hosting this tournament," Serufo told Mmegi Sport.

He attributed the failure to do well at the event to lack of coaching capacity faced by BTA. "Compared to other countries that have full time coaches, Botswana still relies on group coaching, which is also rare." Serufho said the tournament gave BTA an opportunity to field many players as hosts. This could not have happened if the championships were held elsewhere. Local umpires also got an opportunity to handle more matches and this may see them getting higher gradings. Botswana has only four white badge officials.

Serufho pointed out that through the tournament, the BTA has marketed the sport. He said they have learnt good lessons from the tournament and hopefully it would help them produce better results next time. He said they have realised the need to organise many tournaments to build players' confidence.

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