Whakatane School Defeats Opotiki At Tennis

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 13, Issue 33, 15 December 1948, Page 5

Whakatane School Defeats Opotiki At Tennis

The first inter-school tennis tournament conducted by the secondary schools of the Bay of Plenty was held at Opotiki last week. One had been planned 12 months ago, but owing to the epidemic and the sudden closing of schools it had to be abandoned. Competitors were classified into seniors and juniors, and allowed to enter for one event •only, either singles or doubles. Whakatane District High School was represented by a full team, but only juniors were successful in getting through.to the finals. In the junior boys’. singles R. Mahy had an easy win, 9—o, and then by arrangement played against th,e winder of the senior boys’ singles, whom he defeated 9—2. In the doubles L. Alley and I. Breward eliminated a ‘Tauranga pair 9—4, and then in the final defeated an Opotiki combination 9—6. Playing very good tennis Margaret Pithie reached the final of the junior girls’ singles, but then went down to a Tauranga player 9—6. In the senior Boys’ doubles E. Kane and R. Heta started well by defeating two Tauranga players 9—B, but "they were then beaten 9—4 in the semi-final. ISoft Ball And Cricket On the same day Whakatane District High School’s first eleven and boys’ an<l girls’ soft ball teams also travelled through to Opotiki to play matches against teams from Opotiki District High School. The eleven showed a very decided superiority over their opponents. Batting first they made a total •of 58 runs, the principal scorers being: T. Lyon 10, K. Carter 11, N. Mita 11, J. Meikle 8, J. Wano 8. By accurate bowling and fairly smart fielding they then dismissed the ■Opotiki team for 18 runs,'in a remarkable innings in which only ■two players scored at all. Bowling for Whakatane Lyon took 5 wickets for 13 runs, McKenzie 3 for 5, and Brown 2 for 0. Each team then batted for half of the remaining time, Whakatane compiling 76 (W. Kirg, T. Lyon and K. Carter retiring with 20, 23, and 21 respectively), and Opotigi 43. The Opotiki players proved themselves just as superior at soft ball, 'their girls’ team winning 28—16. •and boys’ 28—5.