Great Britain has won this year’s edition of the boys’ ‘Copa del Sol’ while Ukraine took the girls’ ‘Europa Cup’ title. Team GB put on a dominating performance and capped off their campaign undefeated, having won all singles and doubles rubbers in qualifying as well as the final rounds. In Valencia, Spain, they were too strong for Slovakia, picking up their second title - and first in 31 years - while in Loano, Italy, the Ukrainians claimed a 5th Tennis Europe Summer Cups victory.
GREAT BRITAIN’S ROAD TO THE FINAL
Qualifying Rounds: R1 d. Ireland 3-0; R2 d. Estonia 3-0; Qualifying Final d. Portugal 3-0
Final Rounds: QF: d.Poland 3-0; SF d. France 3-0; Final d. Slovakia 2-0
In the first rubber of the final, Oskar Laskowski of Team GB saved a match point at 4-5 down in the second set to take the set 7-6 and send the match into a third set. At 3-5 down it was Max Kimak’s turn to save match points: four in total. But on his fifth match point, Laskowski was not to be denied and gave the Brits a 1-0 lead in the final. Martin Adamca and Liam Sharkey then took to the court for their thrid singles encounter of the year. They split the first two sets between them, before Sharkey posted the comeback win to secure the title for the Brits with a 4-6 6-4 6-4 win.
It was an especially poignant moment for Team GB Captain Richard Plews who finally got the win after being in charge of the 14&U squads since 2012. “We had a group with Jay Clarke and Dan Bennett back then and we lost in the semis. We came close (runners-up) a couple of years ago with Eric Lorimer, Niall Pickard-Barua and Scott Watson. Today we had two come-from-behind wins, which was really good for these guys. They dug deep and battled really hard. It looked a bit ugly sometimes, but they fought hard. The boys were warriors today!”
UKRAINE’S ROAD TO THE GIRLS’ FINAL
Qualifying Rounds: R1 d. Slovenia 2-1; R2 d. Croatia 2-0; qualifying final d. Germany 2-1
Final Rounds: QF: d. France 2-1; SF d. Slovakia 2-1; Final d. Germany 2-1
In a repeat of the result a week earlier against the Germans, Ukraine overcame Germany in the final. They took an unassailable lead after two singles wins. First, Anna Kuznetsova defeated Daria Strogalshchikova 6-0 6-2 before second-ranked Mariia Kocherzhenko, who is also fifth in the Race to Monte Carlo, sealed the deal with a 6-2 6-3 win over Alessandra Urga. As in the two previous rounds, the Ukrainians elected to hand their opponents a walkover win in the dead doubles rubber, ending the week with three 2-1 victories.
Summer Cups Facts and Figures
- 35 nations entered both the boys’ and girls’ competitions. Great Britain, France and Slovakia reached the final rounds of both events.
- Ukraine beat Germany in the qualifying final and repeated that win in the final in Loano
- Slovakia were the only finalists without a Summer Cups win in this age category
- More poetic was the fact that two of the three players in this year’s Slovak team (Martin Adamca and Matteo Sanson) were part of their nation’s winning 12&U Summer Cups team in 2024
- The boys’ final was played in Valencia, Spain for the sixth year in a row, and seventh time overall (2008, 2021-26)
- Loano, Italy hosted the event for the 14th time (2008-16, 2022-26)
Final Standings and World Junior Tennis Qualification
The 14 & Under Summer Cups tournament also serves as the European qualifying for the World Junior Tennis Finals in Prostejov (CZE) from 3rd-8th August. Hosts Czechia will be joined by the top 5 teams (in bold) at the world championship event:
Boys: 1. Great Britain, 2. Slovakia, 3. Switzerland, 4. France, 5. Bulgaria, 6. Romania, 7. Portugal, 8. Poland.
Girls: 1. Ukraine, 2. Germany, 3. Italy, 4. Slovakia, 5. Czechia, 6. Sweden, 7. France. 8. Great Britain.
Photos from the Final Rounds can be found here (boys) and here (girls).