Serbia’s Jovic, Egypt’s Kamel reign supreme at ITF Nairobi junior tennis event

Serbia’s 15 year old tennis prodigy Nikola Jovic had a memorable first week in Nairobi as he clinched the gold medal both in the boys singles and doubles matches in the J5 Harambee International Junior Circuit held at the Nairobi Club from 20-25 June 2022.

Having partnered with Egypt’s Aly El Rafie in the boys doubles, Jovic claimed his first gold at the clay court event on Friday when the duo powered to a 6-3, 6-2 straight set victory over Chinese pair of Sicheng Li and Shixun Zhu.

On Saturday morning, the Serb returned to face Sicheng Li in the boys singles final and it was a second time lucky for the 15 year old as he got the better of Li in a hard fought three set battle.

The first set had gone Jovic’s way as he held serve after breaking to take the set 6-4. However, having already lost in the doubles final, Li showed great character to force the game into a decider as he came from a break down to take the second set 3-6.

A charging Li then took the game to Jovic in the third set with a couple of forehand winners but an injury at 3-3 derailed his momentum, Jovic taking advantage to win the third set 6-3 for his 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 victory that secured his second gold medal.

“It was a very tough match that I am glad I won. The first set went over one hour because it was really competitive. He came back at me from the second set and you could see he really recovered and had the momentum. When he got the injury, he did not play so well and I managed to get the victory,” Jovic told Mozzart Sport.

In the girl’s side, Egypt’s Lojain Kamel picked a 6-3, 7-5 straight set victory to win the girls gold singles medal after defeating Israel’s Adi Bitton in the Saturday final.

"I feel happy that I have won the first tournament in my first time in Kenya. I think I played well overall. My target now in the second and third tournament is to win again. This victory gives me the confidence to push into the remaining weeks,” she said.

In the girls doubles, Kenya duo of Alicia Owegi and Roselida Asumwa were unfortunate not to clinch victory on home soil as they lost 6-4, 3-6 (10-5) to Great Britain’s pair of Macy Denney-Richards and Elizabeth Evans.

The Nairobi club will play host to two more junior ITF tournaments in the two weeks – J5 Nairobi Junior Open 1 from 27-2 July and J4 Nairobi Junior Open II from 4-9 July.