Arkansas Tennis Blog

Well not much to say other than Miller/Fairley dominated going 15-0 this weekend, very dominating. They were money in MTB going 5-0, including 2 in the Birch match and 2 in the Kiker match Birch took 2nd squeaking by Robinson in final match with MTB win at #3 doubles after dominating the singles lines. MVP for the weekend: Matt Ridgeway Jones 3-0 in dominating performances with the best win being a straight set shellacking of Guy Gilliland/Brent Herring, probably equals strike #1. Bynum Matthews as always solid in doubles winning with 3 different partners. Otto Fry also appears to be recovered from calf injury and put together 2 solid singles wins over the weekend beating Kyle Clem and Kevin Luneau handily. Eddie Bailey showed he is one of the best singles players in the state and puts any injury issues to rest for now. Interesting result was the Luneau/Toliver doubles team beating a solid Taunton/Martin team and then nearly clinching a win over Gilliland/Herring tandem. 2n

Well the annual tradition of playing a Mid-Season Tournament continues in Arkansas with the 4 Central Little Rock Teams being the only representatives this year, guess NWA and WATA decided to save their $150 and play with each other back home, more like beatdown their weaker step-brother to advance to State. So with that said lets look at matches: Match #1 2:00 PM Saturday Birch v. Kiker: Already played one full match with Birch winning 4-1, think will see the same score, Kiker may have a few more of their players this time, but so will Birch. 1st match Birch did not have a few big guns playing, such as Hoffmann, Gilliland, and Byrd. Expect them both to play as well as the addition of Herring who appears to be eligible by the skin of his teeth. Just do not see Kiker having any chance to pull this out. Doubtful the team will miss Lyon, Hudson or Edens for this match Miller v. Robinson: Much like the other match-up, see this one going 4-1 as well for Miller. Just do not see where Rob

Open up the League site on USTA and what do I see 2 new names on Birch's team. They are not in time for Mid-Season Tournament but will play regular season matches. Additions of Aaron Hudson and Matt Edens make the race for CLR very interesting as they now balance out the singles in many ways with Miller having Eddie Bailey and Patrick Murphy. Hudson and Edens can both play singles and will help out Hoffmann more than likely and allow Delco into the doubles line-up. Some strong possibilities now and some great match-ups could be headed to the LR Area Courts in the near future as Miller and Birch go to Battle. Excellent recruiting by Birch, but also opens the question will there be a Jonesboro League or do we see more defections from Jonesboro to a CLR team. Maybe Armstrong/Hunter go to Miller if room? Daniel Milnes, Huckabee, Harris where do they go?

IN CLR Birch beat Kiker 4-1. The match had 2 5.0 appeal downs playing one for each team and not surprisingly both won their respective matches. Brett Taunton teamed with Jonathan Martin to beat Birch/Bacon 2-6, 6-0, 10-8 @#1 doubles. Jason Lyon played with Stuart Jones at #2 to defeat Kiker/Anderson 6-4, 6-4 using late breaks in both sets to serve it out. Remaining Matches Brad Delco defeated Shaun Wiseman 1,0 Kyle Garretson (5.0 Bump down) beat Kyle Clem 4,2 #3D: Marquez/Jackson snuck by Nordentoft/Williams 5-7, 6-4, 10-7 In NWA Humbert-Stursma/Bella Vista/BV shutout Purkey 5-0 in two straight matches and have all but clinched a state berth, not playing mid-season Humbert is led by Appealed Andrew Todd, self-rate so will need to watch scores and any grievances, though think he may already have 2 strikes with consecutive straight set wins 1,1 and 1,2 The team has may solid doubles players in Humbert and Sturmas as well as Slaveski, but the big question as always will be will they