Tamarua Payne 4th in Pacific under 15s

Cook Islands elite junior tennis players have wrapped up their first campaign in Fiji and are now into a second tournament.

In the first tournament the Pacific Oceania Junior Champions the players performed well but the tournament highlighted the need for more regional and international tournaments for the local players.

The best result from the team came via Borneo-based Cook Islands player Tamarua Payne.

The teenager placed 4th overall in the under 15 boys division with team mates Roland Neururer 8th and Jake Bergman 14th overall.

Sole under 15 girls representative Tayla Beddoes finished 8th in her competition.

Andrew Terupu placed 8th overall in the under 12 boys and in the girls division of the age grade, Kiana Sword-Tua came 10th.

The teams under 18 players performed strongly with Frederick Goodwin taking out 6th place in the boys division and Lillian Maui taking 7th in the girls competition.

The Cook Islands team played in the East Pacific group along with Tonga, Samoa, American Samoa, Fiji and Tahiti and together the players earned a total of 126 points.

The group was 1 point away from eventual group winners North Pacific comprised of Guam, Federated States of Micronesia, Northern Mariana Islands, Palau and the Marshall Islands.

The West Pacific group was made up of players from New Caledonia, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Papua New Guinea, and earned a total of 121 points.

The young Cook Islands team will return home early next week after their 2nd tournament in Fiji which is an open tournament and will see players step up and play the bottom half of the age division above their own.

Tennis Cook Islands expects the players to do well after the first warm up tournament.