Tonga’s young tennis champion, Sisilia Teu has won the Girls Under 15 tennis competition at the East Pacific Tennis Championships in Apia, Samoa.

The annual tournament, held last week August 5-9, included teams from Tonga, Samoa, the Cook Islands, Tahiti and American Samoa with three different age divisions (Under 12, Under 15, Under 18).

Sisilia Teu defeated her Samoan opponent to snatch the title in what was described by the Tonga Tennis Association as a “thrilling match up against a strong player with a home-crowd advantage, Anasis Saipele”.

The young tennis “powerhouse” lives and trains in Auckland, New Zealand, but decided to be a part of Tonga’s national junior team after successfully participating in a local tournament in June. She was one of three players sent to Apia.

Sisilia qualified for and is currently competing at the Pacific Oceania Junior Tennis Championship in Lautoka, Fiji, which began yesterday. The first Tongan in a number of years to play in the first round of the International Tennis Federation championship, she is facing tough competition from the wider region but is expected to progress to the final rounds of the tournament later this week.