Kiwis Grab Small Lead on Day 1 of Trans-Tasman Junior Test Series

The Executive Travel Junior Trans-Tasman Test Series Team has finished Day 1 with a slight lead 10-8 heading into Day 2.

The Under 13 Girls Sophie Hodges and Ella Lash got the team off to a strong start with 3-0 wins over Courtney Scholtz and Madison Lyon respectively. In the Under 13 Boys Noah Thomas took out Benjamin Murray 3-1 whilst Tom Marshall took his win 3-0 putting New Zealand at a 4-0 lead.

In the Under 15 Girls it was a tough day for Natalie Sayes and Jena Gregory after both players went down to their Australian counter-parts after having made the final of the Oceania Junior Championships the previous day. Gregory went down 2-3 whilst Sayes went down 1-3 to Katie Davies and Ella Burge respectively making the current match score 4-2 to New Zealand.

In the Under 15 Boys Tarin Love went down in a hard fought five setter to Gregory Chan, whilst Riley-Jack Vette-Blomquist took his win from Oscar Curtis 3-1 putting the match score at 5-3.

The Under 17 Girls followed a similar trend to the Under 15 Boys with a win a piece for New Zealand and Australia with Winona-Jo Joyce taking her win 3-1 from Mackenzie Slepp, whilst Georgia Robcke lost out to Alex Haydon 3-0. This saw the match scores at 6-4 to New Zealand.

In the Under 17 Boys Elijah Thomas and Glenn Templeton were too strong for their Australian counterparts with Thomas and Templeton claiming their wins in 3 over Abel Jin and Sam Sergo respectively to take New Zealand out to an 8-4 lead.

The Under 19 Girls saw Nadia Hubbard claim her win in 3 over Grace Pattison whilst Courtney Trail went down in 4 to Shehana Vithana putting the match scores at 9-5 for New Zealand.

The Under 19 Boys saw Temwa Chileshe and Keidah Bungard go down in 3 to Eugene Heng and Joel Arscott whilst Sean Dykes picked up his win in 3 over Remi Young. The last match of the day was between Lwamba Chileshe and Nicholas Calvert. It was a match of physicality and both players put everything on court for 83 minutes but it was eventually Calvert who got over the line in 5 to take the win for Australia and close the gap in match scores. The final match scores of the day being 10-8.

The last day of the Trans-Tasman Junior Test Series kicks off today and will be livestreamed. View the draws, Schedule and results here. 

Follow Squash Australia on Facebook and Twitter for live updates and results. Matches will also be livestreamed on Youtube here.

Good luck to our team as they seek to make it 4 in a row for the Trans-Tasman Junior Test Series.

Test One: New Zealand 10 Australia 8