Niel Hendriks was untroubled in winning the first round of the Wairarapa Regional One Interclub Shirley Corlett Trophy played at Carterton on Saturday.
The South African, who coaches at Jacob Emery’s Red Clay complex south of Martinborough, dropped only three games on his way to securing maximum points for his Dry River team in the new format, which sees the players play a mini-tournament, with matches played over three sets of first to four games.
Hendriks didn’t drop a game in beating Carterton’s Josh Hutchings in the first round before he dispatched Martinborough’s Ed Wilkie 4–2 4–0 to progress to the final against Chris Wilkie, which he won 4–1 4–0.
Ōpaki’s Boon Huxtable, who had gone down 10–8 in a super tiebreaker to Chris Wilkie, won the third-fourth playoff with Ed Wilkie 4–1 4–0.
Promising teenager William Orsborn defeated Carterton clubmate Hutchings 4–2 4–1 to claim the plate, while Martinborough’s Marco de Groot picked up valuable points with a hard-fought 3–5 4–0 10–8 victory over Cory Spooner from Carterton.
In division two, Duncan Oakley [Ōpaki] was undefeated in his four round-robin matches, while Troy Crout [Dry River] won three from four.
Martinborough lead on 22 points, with Dry River on 21, Carterton 20, and Ōpaki on 16 points.
The second round is also at Carterton this Saturday.
