Bermuda lose to Aruba in Junior Davis Cup

Bermuda were beaten in their first Round Robin match at the hands of an impressive Aruba Team at the Junior Davis Cup pre-qualifying tournament in the Dominican Republic.

Playing on Court 12, Tanner Boyle had the distinction of playing in the first singles match for Bermuda.

He was up against the Aruban # 2 Kyle Frankel. Kayle is known to be a steady player who can consistently move the ball about the court with very few unforced errors.

He certainly lived up to his billing and forced Tanner to go for more winners than expected.

The match started just before 10am following the opening Ceremony. It was not long before the heat became a factor, in particular for Tanner.

Both players held their opening serves with no problems and it looked as if it would be an interesting match. Kyle broke Tanner in the third game and that seemed to be all the motivation he needed. The first set was over at 6 games to 1 for the Aruban. Tanner, understanding that a rally style match was not going to work, went for more power on the ground strokes and mixed in a few serve and volley points.

There was a glimpse of hope but Kyle was up to the task and was never bothered by the game plan change of Tanner. The Aruban won the second set by the same margin to close out the match.

In the second singles match playing in the #1 spots Bermuda's Nick Lines took on the highly fancied Patrick Sydow. Sydow is reported to have played in the finals of the renowned Orange Bowl Junior tournaments in the United States.

He reached the finals of that tournament two years ago in the 12 and under age bracket.

Nick was somewhat unnerved by his opponents credentials, but stuck to his game plan. As in the preceding match the first couple of games were even. Sydow did not look unbeatable as he made a number of errors and Nick was keeping pace with the variety of shots coming his way. Even with the first break of serve in favour of the Aruban there was hope as Sydow was still making a few surprising errors.

The problem for Nick is that the errors did not come at crucial times where he could capitalize. Things got tougher for Nick and on this day there was nothing more he could apply to help his cause. The Aruban took the match by an identical score as his team-mate 6-1, 6-1.

In round robin play all matches count towards final placement. In the doubles Nick teamed up with Dylan Powell for Bermuda and were matched against the Aruban singles winners, Kyle and Patrick. The Aruban took the doubles match in two sets 6-1, 6-0.

Bermuda must now look for victory in their remaining two ties in this Round robin section. Tuesday we play either El Salvador or Jamaica. As play was continuing with afternoon start times, it is not yet known which opponent it will be.

For full results and scores the ITF's website is updated daily at ITFtennis.com in the Juniors section.