STA kicks off Aon Insurance tourney

Saipan Tennis Association kicked off the inaugural Aon Insurance Tennis Tournament yesterday at the American Memorial Park tennis courts with veteran netters taking the top seeds in the men’s and women’s open singles.

Seeded in the men’s 5.0 are standouts Faheem Ebrahim and Peter Loyola. The tournament marks Ebrahim’s swan song, as the former ATP tour player will be relocating to China in a week’s time.

Joining the top duo in the men’s open division are Ji Hoon Heo, John Johnson, Nanding Cajigan, Ed Johnson, Lito Cabrera, and Lope Padilla.

Letty Jones and Lucita Pacita, meanwhile, are headlining the women’s open where they will pit talents with national team members Laila Mailman and Vivien Lee and veteran netter Cleofe Santos.

A total of 92 entries for the singles division were submitted to the STA tournament, which will also feature play in the men’s 4.5, men’s 4.0, men’s 3.0, men’s 2.0, women’s 4.0, and women’s 3.0.

Hands down, the intermediate men’s 3.0 had the most entries with 28, followed by men’s 2.0 with 16, men’s 4.0 with 13, men’s 4.5 with 10, men’s open with eight, women’s 4.0 and 3.0 with six apiece, and women’s open with five.

Fourteen games were on tap yesterday evening in the men’s 4.0, men’s 3.0, men’s 2.0, and women’s 3.0 but results were still not available as of press time.

It was the first time Aon Insurance has sponsored an STA tournament and the tennis club’s president Roy Pangelinan was very thankful that the local insurance agent came forward to sponsoring the competition despite the hard economic times.

He also congratulated STA officers for helping stage yet another tournament and thanked them for setting aside a few hours of their time a day to help in the organization of the event.

The singles competition will be followed by the doubles next week. It will feature play in men’s, women’s, and mixed open, men’s, women’s, and mixed 4.0, and men’s, women’s, and mixed 3.0. STA will hold a draw for the doubles and mixed doubles competition on April 23, 6pm at the AMP clubhouse.

For more information about the inaugural Aon Insurance Tennis Tournament, call Pangelinan at 287-7697, Nelia Luna at 287-0859, Ricky Castro at 234-5091, Richard Asuncion at 287-0856, Edwin Maratas at 287-0870, Babu Malayil at 287-4472, Peter Loyola at 285-3135, Lenny Pantaleon at 285-9500, or email saipan_tennis@yahoo.com.