Young Canadians Succeed at ITF Events

February 4, 2008

Several young Canadian players were in action around the world last week with all of them garnering noteworthy results. Peter Polanksy was participating in his fourth consecutive ITF Futures event on the men’s circuit while Katarena Paliivets, Khristina Blajkevitch, Alexandra Diamandi and Kelsey Stevenson all played in tournaments on the junior circuit.

Polansky (Thornhill, Ontario) was playing in the Colombia F2 Futures event in Bucaramanga, Colombia. He demonstrated consistency yet again as he reached the quarter-finals for the fourth time this year. However, he was defeated for a second week in a row by Argentinean Diego Alvarez. It was a tough three-set loss as Polansky won the first set 6-3 but lost the second set tiebreak at 7-6(2) and was unable to regain his form in the third, falling 6-2. Polansky should have gained a great deal of confidence leading into this week’s Davis Cup tie against Mexico in Calgary as he played some remarkable tennis in the last month, compiling an 11-3 record.

On the junior tennis scene, the 2008 Inka Bowl took place in Lima, Peru. Three Canadian girls were entered into the main draw of this Grade 2 ITF event in both singles and doubles. In singles, Paliivets (Richmond Hill, Ontario) made it to the third round as the sixth seed where she was defeated 6-2, 6-1 by a tough opponent in Peru’s Claudia Razetto. Blajkevitch, unseeded, ran into a tough match-up in the second round against No. 14 Aranza Salut (Argentina) falling 6-0, 6-1. Diamandi also lost a tough match to qualifier Jocelyn Ffriend (USA) 6-4, 4-6, 1-6 in the first round.

In doubles, Paliivets was seeded first with Mexican partner Laura-Alicia Aguilar. They stormed through the draw all the way to the semifinals without dropping a set, defeating the eighth-seeds on the way. However, they ran into some trouble in the semis against No.3 seeds Iveta Dapkute of Lithuania and Sofie Oyen of Belarus. Dapkute and Oyen had also played some dominant tennis entering the semis and it showed as they defeated the top-seeds 6-4, 6-2.

Lastly, at the BKSP International Junior Championships in Dhaka, Bangladesh Stevenson reached the quarter-finals in the boys’ singles main draw. Seeded seventh at the ITF Grade 4 event, Stevenson soared through his first two matches losing only seven games in four sets. However, he faced stiff competition in the quarters from No.10 seed Yi-Lun Lin of Tapei who defeated Stevenson 6-3, 6-3 to move into the semis. Lin made it all the way to the final before falling to No. 6 seed Ben McLachlan of New Zealand.

In doubles, Stevenson was seeded second with Indian partner Ronak Manuja. The pair made it to the semi-finals where they faced Lin and his partner Ranjan Ram of Bangladesh. Again, Lin proved to be a thorn in Stevenson’s side as he ousted him from the competition 7-5, 6-3 and went on to capture the doubles title.