The junior county championships were held recently at Northern.
Northern had a tremendous presence at the event with more than 50 entries.
U11 BOYS The U11 boys competition was a round robin of four junior members from Northern and James Southern from Tynemouth. As befits a boy who is ranked three in the country James won all his games comfortably with Magnus McKay, Kiran Sarkar and Raphie Lavender finishing 2nd, 3rd and 4th.
U11 GIRLS Another round robin of four players , this time all Northern members and Emma Little brought her awesome serve to the tournament and none of the other girls could cope with it! 2nd , 3rd and 4th places went to Alice Pearsall , Elizabeth Muldoon - Smith and Hannah Tufton.
U13 BOYS Matteo Radley from Hexham was the class act in the boys U13 event, winning all his matches 3 - 0 to take the title. Northern members Magnus McKay and Will Ingram were 2nd and 3rd.
U13 GIRLS Rebecca Little rounded off a great weekend for the Little household by winning the U13 final , 3 - 1 against fellow Northern member Freya Finnemore. All seven players in the eight player monrad were from Northern and Meera Jatania won the bronze medal match against Clara Westwood.
U15 BOYS A brilliant entry of 16 boys and full of quality. All the top eight boys are members of Northern and the final was between Duncan Rutherford and Matthew Ansell. They'd played each other in an internal league match earlier in the week and Duncan won that match 3 - 0 ... this was much closer, with both players having chances in a 3 - 2 thriller that saw Duncan become county champion. Sam Tufton beat Aidan Mahoney , also 3 - 2 for the bronze medal and the strength of the competition was exemplified by Fergus Wallace and Will Young , with Fergus battling to a 3 - 2 win .... for seventh and eighth place!!
U15 GIRLS Another round robin of Northern girls with two stand out favourites ... the Naisbitt twins , Kate and Ava. They both breezed through the other opposition and not for the first time ended up playing each other in the final. This time it was Ava , who edged to a very close 3 - 1 win.
U17 BOYS Matthew Ansell had half an hour rest after playing in the boys U15 final and then he had to line up in the U17 Boys final against fellow Northern member Ben Tudor. Matthew couldn't reproduce his form from the U15 final and Ben ran out a 3 - 0 winner to win his first county title. To say he was chuffed would be an understatement. Northern's Sam Ponente beat Jesmond's Tom Watts for the bronze medal.
U17 GIRLS Eight girls in a very strong line up and only one not from Northern but Mia Smith from Tynemouth was a big favourite. Shae Paterson won her semi final against fellow Northern member Zoe Shipsey to take her place in the final and put up a great show against Mia. It was 3 - 1 but the scores were very close. Zoe beat Ava Naisbitt , who was playing up an age group , in a tightly fought match for the bronze medal.
U19 BOYS In a high quality U19 round robin , Kieran Mahoney from Northern took on Lewis Cruz from Tynemouth and favourite Sam Sweeney from Primrose. Kieran took a hard earned 3 - 0 win over Lewis and then a mammoth 3 - 2 win over Sam to take the title.
U19 This event saw the end of an era for junior squash at Northern. Josie and Katie Barker have dominated their age categories for more than decade and this was the final appearance of a Barker girl in the junior county champs. Proud dad Tim , watched on as Katie beat Emily King from Tynemouth 3 - 1. Evie Paterson, also from Northern , picked up the bronze medal.
In the final act of a very busy weekend, organiser Dave Barnet had to award the John Dale trophy to the junior who has achieved the most in representing and promoting junior squash in Northumbria for the last season. To his total surprise the award went to Kieran Mahoney ... a fitting reward to a player who is a credit to the county both on and off court and who at such a young age is already actively involved in coaching.
