Puente Romano

IC of GB Team with our amazing Puente Romano hosts

With great expectation, our team of Lewis Burton / Jim May / Ross Matheson / Gary Drake / Shaun Leleu & Johnny Barr headed off to the fabulous Puente Romano Resort in Marbella, Spain to take on the might of the Spanish team.

In previous years Puente Romano have fielded ex Davis Cup players and Grand Slam Champions such as Pat Cash, and this year was no exception with Puente Romano fielding Pato Clavet (ex ATP #18 with career wins over Messrs Agassi / Sampras amongst many others) and his brother Jose (Pepo) Clavet who himself made the 3^rd round at Roland Garros and is the current coach to Feliciano Lopez.

Although the match was on the Saturday our IC of GB team flew out on Thursday and had 2 days of hard clay court training sessions, followed by watching the Seniors Masters Cup also being held at Puente Romano the same weekend. With players such as Tommy Haas, David Ferrer , Tommy Robredo and Feliciano Lopez our IC of GB team were inspired and came out of the blocks fast and furiously against our elegant hosts.

IC of GB Team 3pts v Puente Romano 4pts

Lewis Burton lost to Pato Clavet 1-6 0-6

Jim May lost to Nicolas Delgado 4-6, 6-2, 0-1 (7) *

Ross Matheson beat Ales Dvorak 6-1, 6-3

Shaun Leleu beat Antonio Diaz 6-1 / 6-3

Johnny Barr / Gary Drake beat Rene Primelles 6-4,6-0

Johnny Barr / Gary Drake lost to Jose Clavet & Sergio Gomez 5-7, 6-7

Jim May / Ross Matheson lost to Jose Clavet / Pato Clavet 8-10 in a pro set**

As the match lasted so long in the searing heat and due to the fact that both Clavet brothers had to do the match warm ups for David Ferrer and Feliciano Lopez in their 7pm it was agreed by both team captains that with the match tied at 3-3 that a pro set in front of a packed Puente Romano Crowd who had gathered to watch The Seniors Masters Event would be a fitting finale.

Special thanks and sincere gratitude to Shaun Leleu of the Puente Romano resort and Bill Doyle the Puente Romano captain for their incredible hospitality in their generous hosting, but most importantly for the fabulous teams they put out against us with players who play hard and fairly plus can socialise in equal gusto. This is truly the most exceptional fixture and it is an absolute pleasure to arrange, play and captain it – competition will be hot for places as we aim to compete even harder in 2020.

Johnny Barr (Match Captain IC of GB v Puente Romano 2019)