Easy Win For Pagon

Ryon Jones, Gleaner Writer

National Davis Cup representative Dwayne Pagon was ruthless in his opening match at the inaugural Hi-Pro Ace Supercentre Tennis Open, which got under way yesterday at the Liguanea Club.

The fourth seeded Pagon ran out to an easy straight-sets win over Michael Jones, stopping him 6-0, 6-1 in the first of four matches contested on the opening day.

Pagon now moves a step closer to the $500,000 prize money on offer, which was initially being vied for by 32 men.

He was happy to have stamped his class in his opening match, but knows the competition will only get tougher.

"Every match is going to be tougher, because the quality of the draw is a pretty good one," he added.

In the days after the other matches, fifth-seeded Macoy Malcolm dismissed Dwayne Lueshing (2-0), 6-0, 6-0.

Seventh-seed Christopher Lawson got the better of Simon Levy (2-0) 6-1, 7-5, while Horatio Ludford strolled past Donovan Reid (2-0) 6-0, 6-1.

All of the opening-day matches were con-tested on the male side. Just five women are in the female draw and they will be playing in a round-robin

format which gets under way today. The five women vying for the top prize of $100,000 are overseas-based Simone Vronov-Brown, Fion Fletcher, Simone Hudson, Carlista Mohammed out of Trinidad and Tobago, and Stacy Moore.

The five-day tournament was originally advertised to begin at 2 p.m. daily, but will now get under way at 4 p.m. each day. Tennis Jamaica's first vice-president, John Bailey, explained the reason behind the change.

"Two o'clock at this particular time of the year is blazing hot," Bailey reasoned. "The second reason is that a four o'clock start will get much more support," he added.

Bailey was disappointed with the low turnout on the female side.

"Yes, we are disappointed, but women's tennis in Jamaica is really at a little low now, but we are hoping in another year or two we will bring it up again," he said.