LAHORE - Double delight for promising and emerging talent Haniya Minhas as she clinched double crowns in the Rafum Junior Tennis Championship, which concluded here at the PLTA Courts on Saturday.
Very talented Haniya first won the Under-10 title by outclassing Omer Jawad 8-1 in the final. She played classic shots and powerful hits to put her opponent under tremendous pressure and won the encounter and title in great style. Haniya played the U-12 final against the same oppenent , Omer Jawad, but this time she had to struggle a bit hard to claim the second title. Both the players fought well against each other and levelled the score at 3-all. But after that, Haniya showed her class and overcame her spirited opponent to win the final 8-3.
In U-14 final, Asad Zaman faced tough resistance from Shahzaib Zahid before winning the final and title by 6-4, 5-7, 10-6. The girls U-18 title was won by Shimza Durab who outperformed Labika Durab 8-2 in the final. Faizan Fayyaz played tremendous tennis against Ifham Rana to annex the U-18 boys title. Faizan won the first set 6-2 while he claimed the second one quite comfortably with the margin of 6-1. The U-18 doubles title went to Zain Ch/Ifham Rana, who outlasted their opponents, Faizan Fayyaz/Hamza Jawad 4-2, 4-1.
CEO Rafum Group Zahid Hussain graced the finals as chief guest and witnessed the high-quality tennis matches on the concluding day. At the closing ceremony, PLTA Secretary Rashid Malik (Tamgha-e-Imtiaz) and Rafum Marketing Manager Nouman Malik distributed prizes, shields and certificates among the position holders.
Malik thanked Rafum Group CEO Zahid Hussain for sponsoring the event and his all-out support for the development and promotion of tennis at grassroots level. “The Rafum Junior Tennis Championship is conducted quarterly every year with focus on promoting tennis among youth. Besides this event, the PLTA is going to organise great number tennis events till April and after that, JTI camps will be organised to find, train and groom more talent for the country,” he added.