TRI-SERIES CUP SERVES UP A NEW NORTH-SOUTH RIVALRY
THE best tennis players from southern Tasmania will get the chance to test their credentials against their northern counterparts this weekend at the first Tri-Series Cup.
After battling it out against each other in last year’s inaugural Premier League, southern-based players will travel to Burnie for the two-day competition. The north and northwest regions staged a successful tournament last November, which has been expanded into a statewide challenge in 2021.
Tasmanian No.3 ranked player and Pardey Shield winner Sam Edgar, who was runner-up in the AMT Silver Glen Iris Open in Victoria last week, will spearhead the elite men’s southern team.
“I’m good mates with a few of the guys up north, and there’s some good players,” Edgar said. “It will be good to play against them for the first time in a while.
“I haven’t been able to travel much.”
Leading the charge for the southern elite women is Alyssa Hibberd.
She will be joined by Tasmania’s No.2 ranked Catherine Krueger, while teenager Alicia Dale, who last year became the youngest ever Pardey Shield winner and claimed the 16 years and under title at last month’s Junior State Performance Championships, will feature in the A-grade women’s division.
“I think the tri-series is a really good chance for the state to come together with lots of different sorts of players,” Hibberd said.
Aside from the elite and A-grade men’s and women’s divisions, the Tri-Series Cup will also involve over 40 and over 60 age categories.