Rain cut short the march towards the first title of the BLTC Invitational tennis tournament last night where top seed Maureen O’Berg was three games from claiming the Ladies 50 Singles crown.

She breezed past a frustrated Henrietta Gates 6-0 in the first set and was leading 3-2 in the second when the rain came. The title match will, in all probability be completed at the original scheduled time of 8:30 this morning.

O’Berg, the player with the deceiving slice, whether it is with the forehand or backhand, had her opponent doing a unique kind of dance, or stomp when time and time again as she attempted to play a shot the ball would veer away, or in some cases just stop.

If O’Berg’s style of play was frustrating to the spectators, one only wonders what it was doing to her opponent. During the first set Gates was hitting the ball well then on occasion when she attempted to hit the ball it curved away and either she missed it entirely or mishit.

The second set was turning out to be an interesting affair with the players on serve, that is until the rain came. Now the crowd had the night to wonder if it was a reprieve for Gates or recharging O’Berg’s batteries.

Meanwhile the top-seeded pair of Janet Green and Earl Leader came through with a surprisingly comfortable 6-1, 6-1 victory over Deming Holleran and George Lynch.

Green turned the match in their favour when she withstood the expected barrage of shots by returning everything hit her way and left it to Leader to finish the points. After losing the first set with what seemed little effort, though that wasn’t the case as Green and Leader got on top and every shot they made appeared to find it way to the far angles of the court, Lynch and Holleran opened the second by holding serve.

When Green stood up to a powerful overhead smash at the net and volleyed down the middle for a winner, the writing was on the wall. Less than an hour later the proof was in the result as Green and Leader ran off six straight games to take the set 6-1, and the match 6-2, 6-1.

This defeat came after Lynch had run roughshod over Ron Cole in the Men’s 65 singles, winning 6-1, 6-1. In one other interesting match, Leader teamed up with Craig Brand to defeat Bob Brown and Fred Wells 6-0, 6-4 with Brand playing his usual aggressive game, almost a completely different player from the day before.

In one of the more entertaining matches of the day, Joan Snyder and Sam Maybury came from a set and two breaks down to defeat Carol Reid and John Moore 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the Mixed Doubles Open while Janet Green teamed with Christine Creelman to defeat Ann Manning and L. Suderman 6-1, 6-3.