CEBU, Philippines - It’s a triple celebration for the Arcillas as one of the country’s most decorated tennis players, Johnny Arcilla won two titles and his dad Russel won in one of the classes under the seniors division at the end of the 3rd Cebuana Lhuillier Tennis Circuit at Baseline Sports and Recreation Center yesterday.
The half-Cebuano Arcilla succeeded in defending his singles’ title at the expense of Rocky Paglalunan, 6-2, 6-1in a match which started at noontime and ended past 1 pm.
The scores may looked like it was an easy battle for Arcilla, but the top-seeded player experienced some rough times in the initial set.
Arcilla was less not as imposing yesterday as compared to his game against Patrick John Tierro in the semifinal round as he seemed to have adopted Paglalunan’s style.
Arcilla got caught up with several unforced errors, but managed to overcome his mistakes in the second set, played better to successfully defend his turf.
“Medyo naglisod ko pag-first set. Maayo man pud nakadula si Rocky. Pero na-overcome ra nako dayon. After this event, adto mi Bohol for another tournament,” Arcilla told The Freeman.
After a short rest, Arcilla came back to the court to finish his business here -- to defend his doubles title as well with his partner, Patrick John Tierro.
Paglalunan wanted to avenge his loss to Arcilla in the singles together with his teammate Ronard Joven, but could only do as much as Arcilla and Tierro were too much for them, 6-1, 6-0.
The aggressiveness that Paglalunan and Joven put up in the early going of the first set, but failed to sustain their performance and played a lousy second set for Arcilla and Tierro’s advantage.
Joven, however, got the Pop Sabandon Sportsmanship award. This award is in honor of Sabandon, who died last year.
Before Johnny Arcilla claimed a double victory, his father, Russel, a Cebuano who moved to Butuan when he got married returned to Cebu with so much pride after winning the senior division’s 35-above class with James Wilkinson.
Russel Arcilla and Wilkinson’s way up, however, was not without enough challenge from Gerard Marovilla and Jackie Tomacruz, 7-6 (4), 6-2 (10-8).
Tomacruz, however, made sure he wouldn’t go home empty-handed as he grabbed the 40-above class title together with Dustin de Torres.
Tomacruz and de Torres refused to be intimidated by another pride of Cebu, Jean Henri Luillier and Jun Toledo and posted a 7-6, 6-3 victory to end the week-long PHILTA group-B event. – THE FREEMAN