Taranaki teens at tennis nationals

Will Johnston

Three up-and-coming Taranaki tennis stars will represent their province in Christchurch in a five-day event on Thursday.

Pukekura and New Zealand’s top junior player Diego Quispe-Kim (pictured) will be joined by Rotokere’s Jayden Harrison and Will Roberts at the 18U National Junior Championships.

The event will be held at the Wilding Park Tennis Centre in Avonside and will feature 89 of the country’s top junior players in four events.

The trio will play in singles and doubles qualifying matches before moving into the next stage of the draw starting on Friday.

Quispe-Kim will play Northern’s Hyeok Min in the singles qualifier. The 14-year-old will then team up with fourth seed Jakob Naylor from Upper Hutt in doubles on Friday. Their opponents are still to be confirmed.

Despite not being seeded in the event, Quispe-Kim is predicted to be one of the favourites in the singles.

Harrison will play Auckland’s Sam Allais in his first match. He will then partner with seventh seed Max Dickey and play doubles against regular teammate Roberts and 16-year-old Aucklander Yu Dian Dong.   

Roberts will play his singles match against Wellington’s Tom Bevan.

Matches on court 17 will be streamed on Sky Sport Next from Saturday.