The Sunday News
Ngqwele Dube, Sports Correspondent
SEVERAL sporting families have emerged both locally and abroad to dominate a certain sporting codes, talk of the Black siblings Byron, Wayne and Cara, Williams sisters, Serena and Venus, Mawisire sisters, Tafadzwa, Vimbai, Fadzai, Takudzwa, in tennis, and the famous footballing Ndlovu family that gave us Madinda, Peter and the late Adam.
Two young sisters are holding their own in the lower rungs of tennis and if they remain consistent they could be on their way to carving their own piece of history in the sport.
While most youngsters wait until they are much older to start playing sports, Frederick and Alice Chapepa decided to introduce their children, Kuziva and Kudzai to tennis from a young age after falling in love with the game.
Both parents did not play the sport but fell in love with it after coming across it on television.
The Chapepa siblings, Kuzivaishe (5) and Kudzai (8) have shown immense potential they are now playing against older opponents as they have no contenders in their respective age groups.
The siblings were introduced to the sport just over two years ago when they joined the GC Academy, under the tutelage of Adam Joelson.
Joelson said the performance of the two sisters led him to making them play in older age groups.
He said Kuziva has been dominating the red ball age groups which are usually a preserve of eight and nine-year-olds and is now playing in the orange age group, a bigger version of the court for the intermediate under 10 players using orange balls.
According to the International Tennis Federation website, itftennis.com tennis balls for lower age groups are designed so they are slower, allowing greater opportunity for players to rally.
The balls “have been developed to make it easier for beginners and recreational children and adult players to learn the game.”
The three groups of beginner balls that have been introduced include the red, orange and green dot.
The red format is played on an 11-by-5.5 metre court, with a red foam ball and 48- to 58-cm racket. “Kuziva is quickly adjusting to the orange age group considering her pint-size age and height but I foresee her quickly dominating that section also in the near future,” said Joelson.
She is in grade 0 at Dominican Convent.
Kudzai started playing the red ball just before she turned six years old but didn’t see much action in that section nor in the orange ball as her dominance in those age groups was vast and she is now playing with under-10s and 12s in the green dot and normal green ball respectively.
Kudzai is already playing for the Dominican Convent Fillies team which is usually made up of grade 4s and 5s.
“Despite that they began training under me over two years ago, the two started featuring in tournaments this year and they have really impressed with Kudzai reaching the quarter finals of Midlands open and Bulawayo Open tournaments respectively.
“They have played in Harare in the New Winners tournament in January this year where Kuziva played in the red ball tournament for the first time and Kudzai played in the orange ball but because of their good showing I decided to move the latter to the orange ball and she continued to improve hence I further elevated her to the green dot,” said Joelson.
At this year’s Midlands Open and Tarryn-Leigh De Souza tourney, Kuziva came third in both competitions despite the fact that most of her competitors comprised bigger Under-10 girls and her performance was a marvel to watch for most of the spectators in both tournaments.
Their mother, Alice said they were looking forward to seeing the siblings grow in the sport and achieve greater heights, adding they were mindful of the opportunities that come with excelling in sport such as scholarships.
@rasmthembo
