Sunu to defend title at Salonpas junior tennis tournament
Zakki Hakim, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesia's No. 1 junior tennis player Sunu Wahyu Trijati will try to put his dismal performance at the Cigna Open behind him when he defends his title at the Salonpas Junior Tennis Championships next week.
The tournament, which will run from March 8 to March 15 at the Kemayoran tennis center here, tentatively has some 150 players from 24 countries.
Sunu, who crashed out in the early stages of the Cigna Open last week, will be one of Indonesia's top six contenders in the main draw. Others include Elbert Sie, Sandy Purnomo, Ayrton Wibowo, Jonathan Amdanu and Anthony Tan.
Enggal Karjono, the chairman of the organizing committee, predicted the Grade 2 ITF category tournament would be a difficult one for the host players, with some of the participants from abroad ranked in the world junior top 100.
Yi Chu-Huan of Chinese Taipei should be the favorite in the tournament given his current ranking of 30, which is the highest among the boys' participants.
Other likely hot contenders are Weerapat Doakmaiklee (70) of Thailand, Luka Ocvirk (98) of Slovenia and Keith Meisner (107) of Britain.
Febri Joana, the surprise winner of the Cigna Open, will lead the local girls which comprises Denise Harijanto, Dian Mayasari and Lavinia Tananta.
Ayu Fani Damayanti is on the list but she will not turn up because of illness, which forced her to scrap her Cigna Open matches.
Local top junior players Septi Mende, who is number 134 and the highest ranked Indonesian junior, and last year's finalist Maya Rosa, will be looking for a strong effort on own home turf. They will be playing as wildcard entries.
However, their fellow national team member Sandy Gumulya is doubtful as she has dengue fever.
Defending champion Chan Yung-jan (12), who beat Maya in the finals last year, fellow Chinese Taipei Hsu Wen-Hsin (36) and Pichitra Tongdach (63) of Thailand are the top three players in the girls' field.
Other players in the tournament come from Australia, Austria, Botswana, China, Hong Kong, Germany, India, Japan, Khazakhstan, Korea, Kuwait, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Romania, South Africa, the Solomon Islands, Singapore, the U.S. and Vietnam.
The Indonesian Tennis Association (Pelti) hopes that the Salonpas event will provide one of the expected tough tests to shape up their juniors in the association's pursuit to groom the younger players for greatness later.
Pelti's junior development department head Danny Walla told The Jakarta Post that Pelti would be looking to stage more tournaments and clinics to spur the development of the juniors.