YET another Gazette-sponsored performance player has represented their county.

Jack Waissen was part of the Hampshire County Cup team that narrowly missed out on being promoted in a margin of only two games.

Waissen, who is an LTA Futures player, was representing Hampshire in the under-13 division against teams from Berkshire, Hertfordshire and Durham and Cleveland.

Hampshire's top players at this level, Pete Francis and Karim Aouichaoui, played well, but the star of the team was William Barrett from Winchester, who won all of his six matches.

On the first day, Waissen lost to Markus Williams 2-6 3-6 of Berkshire, and followed on the second day with a nail-biting last-set tie-break finish against Alex Brown of Durham and Cleveland. The final score was 4-6 6-1 6-7 to Brown. On the third day, Waissen was on top form, beating Hertfordshire's Tom Allnut 6-3 6-4. He also won the doubles on the last day, playing with Karim Aouichaoui 6-4 6-3 against Hertfordshire.

Overall, the team narrowly lost to Berkshire on the first day - three rubbers all, seven sets all, but 59 games to 61. They went on to beat Durham and Cleveland 5-1 and Hertfordshire 5-1 and secured the runners-up position after being level with Berkshire on matches and sets, but with two games fewer than required.

County performance officer Mike Book, said: "Jack played particularly well on the last day. His concentration was excellent. He played hard through two good solid sets. Overall, Hampshire lost by the narrowest of margins with a real nail-biting finish on the last day, and so we were unlucky it did not go our way."

Waissen furthered his success in a Robinsons Masters at the Southampton ITI, reaching the finals. He beat both Adam Ahmad and Nick Harknett in third-set tie breaks, but lost out to Tom Deighton in the finals 6-0 6-3.