Four Starlings and a “ring in” to the all-conquering tennis clan contested the three-day tournament and returned with one title, a couple of runners-up trophies and a string of quarter and semi-final appearances.
Brooke Starling, daughter of family patriarch David, was an unseeded member of the 32 women that contested the open singles event at Bendigo in the women’s open draw.
She beat Rhiann Eddy from Shepparton in straight sets (6-4, 6-3) in the opening round and then beat the sixth seed Daisi Kukuljan in an almost repeat of that effort (6-4, 6-2).
In the quarter-final she caused a big upset when she sent second seed Hope Curtis-McDonald packing (7-5, 6-2), then beat eighth seed Lily Duff in the semi-final (6-2, 6-2).
She then faced the top seed for the tournament, Emily Tinker, in the final and was unable to complete the fairytale story – losing 6-0, 6-2.
Tinker had lost just 11 games in six sets leading into the final, beating the third and fifth seeds along the way.
Originally from Ballarat, she now plays Premier League tennis in Victoria for Glen Iris and has been ranked inside the top 75 female players in Australia.
Starling played in the doubles with Emma Robinson and was involved in a marathon round-of-16 match with top seeds Erin Cahill (singles third seed) and Siya Kothapalli (singles fourth seed). The Kyabram star and her partner won the match in three sets (6-3, 3-6, 11-9 in the third advantage set). They lost the semi-final to highly ranked singles players Daisi Kukuljan (sixth seed) and Mia Kuribayashi (fifth seed) 6-7, 3-6.
Brooke’s partner, Ryan Pool, was the fifth seed in the 32-strong men’s open singles field and won his opening round match 6-2, 6-1. He later beat the ninth seed, Balin Russell, 7-5, 7-6 to set up a semi-final with top seed Zach Adam Gedge.
Monash University student Gedge, 22, dominated that match 6-0, 6-1.
In the men’s open doubles, Pool and David Starling beat the sixth seeds 6-3, 6-3, but then came up against the top seeds in the 16-team field and lost 6-2, 6-4.
David Starling’s teenage son, Kade, and Eli Kingma were the top seeds of the boys’ under-14 doubles. They enjoyed an opening round bye before winning their next game 6-1, 6-1. They then lost a tiebreak decider 10-4 to be tipped out of the tournament.
Twin sister Tayla played in the girls’ under-14 doubles with Skyler Austin, winning 6-0, 6-0 in the opening round before losing a third-set tiebreaker 10-6 in the next round.
Tayla and Skyler also contested the B grade women’s doubles, winning through two rounds comfortably and maintaining their form in the final, which they won 6-1.
