JEDDAH, 15 March — Saudi Oger Tennis Club took its turn at prime time on the backdrop of a storyline that fired up its deserted players to play with conviction, and then came out in joyful glee after successfully hurdled their elimination matches that allowed them early passage to the quarterfinals in Category B2.
Their initial victories were made sweeter on accounts of having their teams underdogged due to player’s promotion and desertion to another rival team.
Playing without sponsoring support this time and despite the back-out of core players, the SOTC players who opted to stay put with their club turned in unlikely heroes out of the blue and catapulted SOTC B2 into second top position in Group 1 Category B2 and SOTC-C into the playoff round of 16 in Group 2 Category C.
Playing team captain Jojo Casem took over the precarious handling of doubles combination and lineup in SOTC-B2, then engineered an adroitly shuffling of doubles matchup that came up with string of upsets against Team B2 of Malaysia Airlines (3-2) and Apo-B2 (3-2). What mattered most to them was the win over Expresspoint that brought the roof down on their former players, Cromwell Marzo, Gerry Ragunjan, and Ellie Mallari and finally installed SOTC at 4-1 overall after the round-robin elimination. Jojo himself paired and worked in sync with Orly Estilong that set the tone for a gritty will of the their team to win their battle by overcoming Expresspoint’s first double Tony Mirasol/Ariel Ortilla from 1-4 sets down and up to 5-5 all, lagging behind again at 6-7 before they forced a tie-break which they won at 7-4.
Things were looking up for SOTC’s Dhir Kumar and Wessam Saab in the 2nd set as they lived up to the sort of hype that Cromwell Marzo must pay a price for turning his back on his club — which he did with partner Ben Briola in a 5-8 loss to his former teammates after losing grip of their 4-3 lead.
An ailing Gerry Ragunjan, another former SOTC core player now paired with Expresspoint’s Voigh Reyes, suffered similar fate with a 2-8 drubbing from the scorching overhead shots of Alex Duma and sneaking shots of Vooch Maniri. With SOTC having sealed the match at 0-3 overall, the last two Expresspoint doubles saved their team from humiliation with the 4th set win of Ellie Mallari (another former SOTC team player) and Bert Amacan, 8-5, against SOTC’s Romy Legaspi and Erwin Tolentino. Expresspoint’s Arman Monasterial and Ayee Lodor made it 2-3 overall by downing Ramil Adrayan and Willy Alarcon, 8-5.
In Group 2 Category B2, the Saudi Divers-Tetrapak maintained their oxygen at moderate level enough to skim the challenge of KFNB-B2, and waded out undefeated in the elimination round to stay on top of their group with 4-0 overall.
Their new star player Martial Barro doubled with Rashed R. in the first set, grinding the court with sweeping points against KFNB’s E. Resma/A. Batoy from 4-all and nailed out an 8-4 finish. Team captain Khalid Hizam with Carlos Masinsin duplicated the score after a series of comfortable game leads at 4-1, 5-2, 6-3, and 7-4. P. Adiova/Aris Galon had their own lopsided win, 8-3, over Ricky Torres/Francis Idjao to bring KFNB back into contention. Nes Arandela and Rhey Gonzales followed up with a tie-breaker win, 7-4, against Allan Beltran and Ed Santiago after a creeping 6-7 deficit to bring KFNB back in equal footing against the Divers.
However, the pressure built up on the Naval Base workers as Ave Ordinario and Nilo Bacunawa, succumbed to the net zone scoring binge of Saudi Divers-Tetrapak duo of Ely Sajo and Albert Arriesgado.
In the Category B1B action, SGTNF-Aramex star player Anthony Pangililinan lost his last two games in a row as his team lost to Malaysia Airlines B1B (1-4) after their previous loss against Elaf Travel B1B. The loss relegated the over-rated SGTNF-Aramex to the last slot.. ()
