East of Scotland tennis men will play in elite Group One of the LTA Summer County Cup next year after preserving their place with a decisive 5-1 victory over Northamptonshire at Eastbourne.
Alas there was no such good fortunate for the East women who dropped down from Group Three to which they were promoted last season. This despite a battling last day 4-5 loss to Warwickshire where they were forced to concede a last round tie featuring Hanna Augustynska and Aadya Iyer due to the former suffering blisters.
The Eastbourne event was undoubtedly a triumph for the East spearhead of Scott Duncan and James Mackinlay.
James finished second top of the league averages with 12 sets won from 14 played. Scott’s stats were 11/13 placing him in the top half dozen of the 52 participants.
Just over a year after they made headlines by saving an incredible 13 match points when winning the Nottingham Challenger title the pair showed they retained immaculate sharpness in each of the five matches.
There were other reasons to be cheerful too, notably, 16-year-old Chenming Dong (2/8).coming in and acquitting himself admirably on his debut week while Alan Macdonald (2/4), aged 47, proved he still has the tenacity to be back next year for what will be a seventh straight year in Group One.
All the East players contributed, Sam Macneil (6/9) shrugging aside a foot injury at one stage while Lance Nisbet (4/12), captain Euan McIntosh (6/14) and Rhys Watters (3/10) had their moments.
Group One was won by Surrey for the third successive year with Warwickshire runners up and East in third place.
