By JARROD POTTER
ENDURING a gruelling nine-match schedule, Berwick tennis up-and-comer Luke Bailey certainly earned his spot on the School Sports Victoria under-12 tennis team the hard way.
Playing nine sets of tennis in two days, at the recently held Bruce Cup schoolboys tryouts, Bailey, 12, had to push himself to the brink of exhaustion but it was worth it to earn his place in the team.
“It felt pretty good to qualify for that – I’m quite excited to do that,” Bailey said.
“I had a pretty tough run, but I managed to get through and pretty easily in the end – just breaking all the boys’ spirits.
“On the first day I played four, on the second day I played five.
“On the first day I finished first in my pool and then on the second day if you came first you went straight into the team.
“I came second so I had to play off the other second in the other pool and I won that one 6-1, so it was really good.”
The Section 1 tennis star at Berwick Tennis Club is keen to make an impact at the national championships, held in Albury from 22-30 October.
“This is my first one of these events (making the national championships) so we have a few training sessions then I’ll head off to Albury and play the other states around Australia,” Bailey said. “I’m not too sure but I think we could do alright cause in the past I’ve heard Victoria has usually done pretty well.”
He comes from great sporting stocks as his mother Maria played tennis on the world tour, held the number one junior rank and represented Australia at both a junior and masters level, while his father Doug played in the AFL for St Kilda and was also a state-representative rower.
Bailey wanted to thank his parents, his coach Tum Rakete and the adjudicators at the School Sport Victoria tennis tryouts so he could have the opportunity to try out.
