The Under-10 Green Ball tennis players of S. Thomas’ College emerged as All-Island Runners-Up in the recently concluded Inter-School Cool Tennis Tournament at SLTA, all of the leading public and international schools took part, on the 29th of October 2023.
The format includes 3 singles and 2 doubles matches against each school. In the group stages, STC won 19 of their 20 matches, including a 5-0 drubbing of traditional rivals Royal College, on the way to securing a place in the Quarter-Finals. The team played against St. Joseph’s College Colombo, Royal College, St. John’s Jaffna ‘B,’ and De Mazedon Kandana in the Group stage.
In the Quarter Finals, STC beat St. Anthony’s Wattala 3-1. STC met the strong Maliyadeva team from Kurunagala in the semi-finals, 3/2.
The Thomians met last year’s Champions, Ananda College Colombo, in the finals. The Thomians got off to a great start with Revaan Amerasinghe winning the first Singles 4-0, ensuring the Thomians went 1-0 up. Next up was the Doubles, and unfortunately, the Thomian pairing of Methuka Silva and Kian Lukmanjee lost, tying the score at 1-1. Zacharia Akbar played the second Singles for STC and won his match 4-1, putting STC back in the lead at 2-1. The 3rd Singles, Kovidh Gunasekera, lost his match, and the score was 2-2. Thakshin Madhivadhanan and Satheesh Appathurai played the second Doubles for STC. As such, the final result came down to the 2nd doubles match. The Thomians raced to a 3-0 lead and had a match point with the score at 3-1, but Ananda fought back as the rain became heavier, eventually winning a thrilling match 5-3, and thus the Thomians had to be content as the Runners-up.
It should be mentioned that Thomian Revaan Amerasinghe, the No. 1 ranked player, won all his matches, dropping only a single game in the Semi-Finals, and was easily the best player in the whole tournament.
S. Thomas’s fielded a second team as well, which just missed out on qualifying for the quarter-finals, indicating a high level of interest in tennis at the junior level. With the correct structures in place, STC tennis could develop into a leading force for tennis in Sri Lanka.
