Hawke's Bay tennis coach Luke Donovan recalls early days with Kiwi No 2

Rhett Purcell in action during a recent tournament in Auckland. Photo/Wayne Smith

Hawke's Bay tennis coach Luke Donovan always knew former protege Rhett Purcell had the goods to rocket up the national rankings.

"Rhett listened and trained hard. He had good supportive parents too," Greendale's Donovan said when reflecting on the early stages in the career of Purcell who is No 2 on the New Zealand singles rankings.

Donovan coached Purcell, 22, for five years before he left the Bay in 2008. He still keeps in regular contact with him and his parents Mike and Tracey and back in January helped him out while he was playing in China.

"I still give him plenty of banter and remind him he has yet to beat me in singles. But it's years since we had a game of singles," Donovan quipped.

"He's 1.9m these days and his serve and forehand are his weapons. I'm really proud to watch his progress and its exciting for his parents," he added.

A former Greendale and Nelson Park club player, Purcell is relishing life on the professional circuit and has recorded consecutive wins on the ITF circuit in Anning China.

The former Bledisloe School and Hereworth student has reached three finals in the past fortnight.

Purcell, who plays Caro Bowl interclub in Auckland for his Parnell-based club Next Generation, was a doubles finalist in the ITF F12 tournament with Aussie Jeremy Beale.

They lost 6-7(4), 6-3, 10-12.

Purcell then won the singles title at the US$15,000 tournament. That was his first ITF singles title. He beat China's Wei Qiang Zheng 7-6 (4), 6-2 in the final.

Purcell, who told supporters in 2006 he wanted to eventually be ranked among the world's top 10, served superbly and didn't face a break point in the match.

He is expected to climb some 293 places in this week's world rankings to 764.

This week Purcell and Wellingtonian Olly Sadler won the doubles title at the F13 Futures ITF where there was again US$15,000 up for grabs.

They beat India's Anirudh Chandrasekar and Vignesh Peranamallur 6-3, 6-2 in the final.

In May Purcell and German partner Sami Reinwein won the doubles title at a US$25,000 F7 Future tournament in Luzhou, China, with a 7-5, 6-3 victory against the top seeds in the final.

Purcell prefers hard court play and he enjoyed playing at altitude on clay in China.

He returns to his Auckland base today for a training block before heading to Australia next month.

His father is a former Hawke's Bay, Canterbury, Whanganui and Central Districts representative and when he was in the Bay he had stints as principal at Wairoa College and Karamu High School.