It was truly colorful sight as many as around 50 tiny tots, drawn from various kindergarten schools in Tashkent gathered at the Olympic Tennis school tennis courts to enjoy a game of tennis.

The event was organized by the Uzbekistan tennis Federation (UTF ) to coincide with the ongoing Tashkent Open.

According to Lim Valeriy, Coordinator UTF, these programmes involve bringing children from different schools to the courts each day for the next two days, for two hours in the morning and expose them to the atmosphere of the event and the sport. We will have another 50 kids coming in tomorrow, he said.

Uzbekistan Tennis Federation Junior Tennis has initiated the event to popularize the sport among children “It’s not about teaching them to play tennis but to show them the fun side of it,” Valery added

Says Oleg Haliulin, coordinator of Mini tennis in Uzbekistan, we have been running the programme all over the nation. We have more than 17000 children playing mini tennis.

Now we have tournaments at Namangan, Kharshi , Samarkand , Bukhara and Tashkent regularly, he adds. “We have been able to send 20 young children from our programme into the Olympic school this year, Haliulin adds.

The children attending the event today received souvenirs like caps, towels, balls from the Uzbekistan Tennis Federation apart from Mini racquets and balls.

To make it the event interactive, fun games were also organized for the children. Prizes were given away at the hands of S. Uthrapathy, Tournament Director Tashkent Open.