Play Your Way To Wimbledon Success For Riverside
Play Your Way to Wimbledon, formerly known as 'Road To Wimbledon' is the UK's largest junior grass court competition, with almost 9,000 girls and boys from 650 clubs, parks and schools competing to qualify for the National Finals held at Wimbledon in August. It is a definite highlight of the competition calendar and one which our players have competed in for over a decade. Players can qualify for the National Finals by winning their club/school's event and then winning or coming runner up at the county stage. This year for the first time ever players under the age of 18 could also qualify via a doubles pathway.
Following investment from new sponsor Vodafone the competition has seen an exciting relaunch. A Riverside player who has been a part of that rebrand is Cameron Simpson. The new under 18’s doubles event has allowed him and partner Elliot Sykes to play their way to Wimbledon following success in the event at Riverside as well as the regional competition held in Gloucestershire. Following qualification, Cam was invited to do a day of filming alongside Laura Robson and other players who qualified for the finals at Wimbledon to help promote the event. Can you spot him in the video below?
It’s an event that hasn’t needed much promoting at Riverside in recent years. With Mike Barry, Rio Moss, Guy Mitchell and Hari Chowdhury all playing at Wimbledon in recent years, our best players have always seen it as a real possibility to qualify for the finals.
Adding to that list this year were four (yes four!) Riverside players. Cameron Simpson and Eliot Sykes played in the under 18 boys doubles as well as Annie Hall, and Jiselle Stringer, who were champion and runner up respectively at the county stages in Swindon back in July in the under 14 girls singles. Annie and Jiselle were the first girls from Riverside to get to this stage of the competition.
