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Marco's Catherine Rappaport, right, moves in to return a serve as her partner Mona Carter waits on the expected shot in the Marco-Naples City Tennis Champions Challenger, played in Naples on Saturday. Naples won what is hoped to become an annual event.

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Marco's Ron Veverka charges the net in his singles match in the Marco-Naples City Tennis Champions Challenge on Saturday in Naples.

NEIL PASCOE

Greg Gadoua of Marco follows through on his serve in the battle of champs as Naples downed Marco on Saturday at Cambier Park in Naples.

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It was a long afternoon for the Marco Island city champion tennis players as they dropped an 11-4 verdict to the Naples champions at the Arthur Allen Tennis Center at Cambier Park in Naples on Saturday.

Roberto Pericoli, men’s 3.0 singles, Jane Howard, 3.5 women’s singles, Ron and Corky Trebilcock, men’s 3.5 doubles and Ginger and Bill Miller, mixed 7.0 doubles, carried off the hardware for the Marco Islanders in the inaugural Marco-Naples City Tennis Champions Challenge.

The one-day event featured the past year’s City of Naples champions against the Marco Island city champions for Collier County bragging rights for the rest of the year.

The Naples-Marco Island event is an offshoot of the annual fall Naples-Fort Myers Challenge which sets up Lee-Collier bragging rights.

“We held the Marco Tournament last March at the Marco Tennis Club and 150 players came out for it,” said Bill Van Glabek, the Naples-Marco Island chairman. “We whittled those 150 down to the 25 players who are in the tournament today representing Marco. This year’s Marco Tournament will be held on March 7-9 and those winners will be here in 2009. As you can see, we hope to make this a yearly event.”

The 10-court, 50-participant tourney also pleased spectators who dropped by to take in the goings-on.

Among them were Bill and Sandy Gutowski from Pryor Lake, Minn.

“Bill and I love to get outdoors and play, but living in Minnesota doesn’t give us much chance in the early spring and fall,” said Sandy Gutowski. “We were at the arts and crafts festival next to the tennis courts and decided to stop over here and see what was going on. We both noticed that the competition is very keen.”

One of the Marco players who found that out was Greg Gadoua who dropped a tough 6-1, 6-2 set to Naples’s John Jerome at men’s 4.5 singles.

“There’s some pretty good players out here today,” said Gadoua who’s the resident tennis pro at the Marco Marriott. “I teach tennis at the Marriott, but I still like to play. Most of my playing is done in tournaments — like once a year. I didn’t play too well because I’m — I guess you would say — not match tough. I don’t play enough matches because I’m always teaching.”

Scores of the Marco winners were: Pericoli 6-3, 4-6, 10-1 over Rich Fardy; Howard 6-4, 6-1 over Linda Hayes; the Trebilcocks over Dave Spahn and Greg Gargan, 6-4, 6-3; and the Millers over Nina Harkness and David Palmer, 7-5, 7-6.

Other Marco champions taking part were: Carl Montenegro, men’s 3.5 singles and Kris Wilkosz, men’s 4.0 singles; Chris Torkelson and James Ferraro, 3.5 and Zab Bunkoske and James Harris, 4.0 in men’s doubles; Lynn Jakish and Ellen Vaughn, 3.0, Joan Lancelott and Teri Brody, 3.5 and Elaine Mettauer and Sandy Miller, 4.0 women’s doubles; Marco’s mixed doubles, Jan and Joana Forspaniak, 6.0, Jill and Bryan Hudson, 6.5 and Heather Reynolds and Mimo Moustrata, 8.0.