HEREFORDSHIRE and Worcestershire's 12 and under girls' county team have made history.

They qualified for next weekend's Inter County Cup national finals at Bolton Tennis Arena for the first time.

The county team finished overall area winners and top of their qualifying group which included Berkshire, Gloucestershire, south Wales and Warwickshire.

No other under 12s county team has achieved this level and it is testimony to the hard work of players, coaches and their support network.

The team consists of Anna Southam (Bromsgrove), Monika Kondratowitcz (Billesley), Joanna Kondratowitcz (Billesley), Katie Eckersley (Pershore) and Lucy Simper (Bromsgrove).

They were skippered by Steve Bauer who is the county captain.

The qualifying weekend was a hard-fought battle with Herefordshire and Worcestershire squeezing out the hotly-fancied Warwickshire team in a close contest.

Bauer said: "All of our players contributed to this absolutely massive result for our county.

"The girls competed hard to win all their matches on the first day and, despite losing to south Wales on the second day, won through as worthy winners with some gritty and courageous performances. We were level with Warwickshire on matches and rubbers won, but we were victorious because we'd beaten them on the head-to-head' ruling.

"I can't wait to see how our girls match up with the top teams in the country."

Forty-four counties have now been whittled down to eight for the national finals.