20 Jul 2017

Edgar Kazembe of Zambian has won the Botswana Open Tennis Championships men’s singles title with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 victory over Bishop Mosebi of Lesotho on Tuesday.

In an error-infested final which was played at Notwane Tennis Courts, Kazembe broke serve twice to seal the first set 6-3.

Mosebi punished several unforced errors by Kazembe in the second set and held serve four times in a row before breaking in the seventh game to take a 5-3 lead in the second set. The Lesotho player then converted his next service game to level the match at one set each.

However, Kazembe recovered his momentum and quickly broke to establish a 2-0 lead in the final set. And after Mosebi broke back to temporarily halve the deficit, the Zambian claimed the championship by winning the next four games in a row and sealing victory with a smashing winner.

“It was a tough final. I was somehow not happy with my performance, some shots I didn’t play well. But I am happy to win this tournament. Two weeks ago I was in a tournament in Kenya, and it boosted my level of performance,” said Kazembe, who lost in the final last year.

On his way to reaching the final, Kazembe defeated local player Tshepo Mosarwa 6-1, 6-3 in the second round, Muzingaye Sibanda 2-6, 6-2, 6-4 in the quarter-finals, and Tsholofelo Tsiang 6-2, 7-6 (5) in the semi-finals.

Mosebi, who was playing in his first final in the tournament, admitted that Kazembe was the better player on the day. “He hit a lot of short balls and my mistake was to try and do the same. The standard of the competition was high and I was determined to reach the final this year,” he said.

Georginah Kandoah won the ladies singles title by beating Sylma Phillip 6-2, 6-3 in the final. Shingirai Muzondiwa and Siyabulela Nkachela won the men’s doubles by beating Kazembe and Liberty Nzula in the final, while Mmammuso

Rannana and Pulane Monyatsi sealed the ladies doubles title by beating Leungo Monnayoo and Kelebogile Monnayoo in the final.

Botswana Tennis Association public relations officer, Shelton Benzah said the standard of the tournament was good even though the number of entrants had declined compared to last year.

Benzah put the decline in the number of entrants to the fact that the tournament clashed with other tennis activities.

“Some of our local players are engaged in tournaments like the Davis Cup. We have four of our top players there. We have others participating in ITF (International Tennis Federation) tournament in Pretoria. So it is an issue that going forward we have to look into. Maybe we will move the tournament to another date instead of the traditional President’s Holidays because year in year out we always have the clash of the Davis Cup and the tournament (Botswana Open),” said Benzah.

Motor Centre sponsored the tournament with P150 000 and cash prize for the men’s singles champion was P10 000 while runner-up got P6 000 with semi-finalists getting P4 000.

The ladies singles champion got P7 000 while her runner-up got P4 000 and semi-finalists P1 500. The men’s doubles champions got P3 000 while runner-ups got P2 000. The ladies doubles champions got P4 000 while runner-ups got P2 000. BOPA.