Lumeta among world’s best 1 000 junior tennis players
South Africa-based lawn tennis whizz-kid Chisomo Lumeta broke into the world’s best 1 000 junior players after participating in two competitions. These are Tunisian Open Junior Championships and the International Junior Championships in Egypt last weekend.
The 15-year-old Malawian has further improved from position 1 162 to 904 on the International Tennis Federation (ITF) junior players’ rankings.
At the end of the 2012 season recently, he also moved 450 places up after scooping gold in the ITF South/Central Africa Junior Championships, silver in the North African Circuit-1 and bronze in the North African Circuit-2.
This was the player’s highest climb on the ITF ladder since he was roped into South Africa’s High Performance Centre (HPC) in 2009 after winning gold during the Under-12 Junior Circuit Championships. His highest rank within the 2012 season was position 959.
During the International Junior Championships in Egypt last Sunday, Lumeta succumbed in the quarterfinals 7-5, 6-3 to Lloyd George Muirhead Harris of South Africa but in the Tunisian Open Junior Championships, he failed to progress to the last-eight after losing 7-6, 6-4 to Polish Michal Dembek in the round of 16.
However, his performance at the two international events were powerful enough to earn him a place in the top 1 000 players’ list.
“We are happy that he is improving fast on the ITF rankings and we are hopeful that he would further pick up his performance by the end of this year,” remarked Lawn Tennis of Malawi (LTAM) president Duncan Gumbi.
