The Tribune

TWO teams from the Bahamas Lawn Tennis Association (BLTA) will depart Nassau for San Salvador, El Salvador, on Saturday to participate in the Jr Fed and Jr Davis Cup BNP Paribas pre-qualifying event. 

Bradley Bain will coach the Jr Fed Cup team and Ashwood Hall of Freeport, Grand Bahama, will coach the Jr Davis Cup team.

Eighteen (18) countries in the North/Central American & Caribbean Zone are expected to participate in this pre-qualifying event, including Aruba, Barbados, Bermuda, Costa Rica, Cuba, Curacao, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, US Virgin Islands, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Suriname and St Vincent.

Representing the Bahamas on the three-member Jr Davis Cup Team are Oneal Mortimer, Donte Armbrister and Ahmad Thompson from Eleuthera and for the three-member Jr Fed Cup Team - Elana Mackey, Lauryn Daxon and Sierra Donaldson. Age requirement for this event is 12-16.

Mortimer, 15, is presently enrolled in a tennis academy. Armbrister, 13, is a student at Temple Christian High.

Thompson, 15, is a student at Eleuthera High School.

Mackey, 12, is a student at Nassau Christian Academy.

Daxon, 15, is a student at Queen’s College and Donaldson, 14, is also a student at QC.

This year, the BLTA is sending two relatively young teams, in that only one player has participated at the Jr Fed Cup/Jr Davis Cup level before.

However, all the other players have gained some international exposure and have served on as few as two to as many as six junior national teams prior to this event.

Both national teams have been training for the past several weeks on strengthening their “individual game” and developing their “doubles game”, as the “doubles” is most times, the deciding factor in which country wins or loses the match.

These players are fast becoming some of the bright talents to watch in tennis in the Bahamas.

The two three-member teams return home on Sunday, February 8. The association looks forward to a good representation from the two junior national tennis teams.

The BLTA’s president is Elwood Donaldson.