Home|Sports|Play suspended with The Bahamas down in tennisSports
Simba FrenchSend an emailJuly 27, 2023 8 1 minute readFacebookTwitterLinkedInShare via Email
The Bahamas’ Billie Jean King Cup team in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, had its first day disrupted by bad weather.
The team of Sydney Clarke, Simone Pratt, Elana Mackey and Sapphire Ferguson, started the Americas Group II Tournament against Paraguay yesterday and one match was completed and the second was underway when play was stopped with Clarke in action at the number two singles. Coaching the team is Kim Gillian O’Kelley.
In the first match, on the hard courts at the Centro Nacional de Tenis Parque Del Este in Santo Domingo, Mackey went up against Lara Escauriza and fell in straight sets, 6-3 and 6-2.
The next match was stopped in the first set with Clarke trailing Risso Britez, 5-3. Clarke was up 30-15 in the ninth game of that first set when play was suspended. It will continue from that point today.
Clarke went down 0-3 early in the set but appeared to gain some momentum, pulling to within 5-3 when play was suspended.
In Mackey’s match, she went up 1-0 in the first set, but Escauriza rebounded to go up 3-1 and never looked back. She went up 5-2 and closed out the first set, 6-3. The second set was at 3-2 in favor of the Paraguayan but that was as close as Mackey got the rest of the way. Escauriza won the final three games of the set to put the match away in straight sets.
The doubles match did not get underway.
In Santiago, Dominican Republic, the under-12 boys and girls were in action on clay courts against Puerto Rico. Their matches also got suspended because of inclement weather.
In the girls games, Caitlyn Pratt won at the number two slot for her third consecutive singles win. Danielle Saunders played the number one position in the girls competition and lost. Pratt and Marina Bostwick teamed up in doubles. They lost the first set before the match got suspended in the second set.
In junior boys competition, Chase Newbold dropped his match two sets to one in the number two position. That match lasted three and a half hours. Playing in the number one position for The Bahamas was Kingston Rees. He was in action in the first set before play was suspended.
Action resumes today in both tournaments.