by Lovely A. Carillo
Tennis was literally kid’s play for Nathaniel “Coach Nat” Naromal many years ago. He was only eleven years old when he would play around with his father’s tennis balls and racket and do “walling” exercises at home.
“Every time he left the house nagpa-praktis ako ng walling and he had no idea I was doing that,” Naromal said. His father, a class C player who dabbled in tennis as a recreation, did not encourage him to play tennis then.
As fate would have it, the grade five Naromal went to the Tagum Tennis Court with his father and was told that they were short of one player. “Nakita nila na marunong pala ako mag walling so sinali nila ako sa laro (they realized I can hit the ball in walling so they allowed me to join the game),” he said.
His father may have seen the younger Naromal’s potential in hitting tennis balls as he was made to join a Tennis Clinic in Tagum under Coach Ed Abastillas. That was good for one summer but his father got Bert Limana to coach him one-on-one for almost two years.
Naromal moved to Davao City and studied at the Ateneo de Davao High School. He actually belonged to the “Huling Barako”, the last batch of an all-boys class at the Ateneo.
At the time, tennis was a very active part of the Ateneo varsity, and the school, represented by Naromal, regularly bagged the Davao City Athletic Association (DCAA) tennis championship. He was with the Ateneo varsity tennis team up to fourth year high school, and competed in various tennis competitions, including the national junior championships.
Naromal took up management at the Colegio de San Juan de Letran on a full tennis scholarship. It was there where his tennis career blossomed and peaked, having ranked number seven in the singles division and number four in doubles.
He was supposed to join a national tennis competition in 1990 when he suffered a shoulder injury, forcing him to stop playing tennis for two years. During this lull, he was lucky to have tennis great Bjorn Bjorg as his boss when he worked for the Bjorn Bjorg Sports Management Company in Manila. His job then was to organize tennis events.
After his stint with Bjorg’s company, Naromal worked for PTV4 Tennis Review, where he tried his hand on being a scriptwriter, cameraman and even as video editor.
Naromal returned to Davao City in 1993 and worked in the Apo View Hotel where he met his future wife, Jenny. Married, but still raring to conquer the world, the couple went to Qatar where his wife worked in the hotel industry and Naromal doing what he loved best–playing tennis!
“I was hired as a tennis coach of the Doha Sheraton Hotel in Qatar, so I coached hotel guests and members, even kids,” he said. Naromal said tennis commanded respect in Qatar as they looked at the sport on a higher level.
He was made to attend the Bolletierri seminar and the ITF (International Tennis Federation) seminar for coaches. Armed with enough capital and know-how about the business of tennis, Naromal returned to Davao City and started his own business.
Tennis Connection, a sports shop along Magallanes, was born. “We had all kinds of sports equipment, but we specialized in tennis,” he said. Business was doing great, he said, but unfortunately all their savings and capital went down the drain when the bank they trusted was shut down. The only money they had left after the bank closed was the P100,000 guaranteed by the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corporation.
With a family to support and barely a pittance left to start another business, he went back to coaching. He served as coach of his alma mater, the Ateneo de Davao High School, between 2000 and 2003. Unfortunately, he said, the Ateneo tennis varsity suffered from intrigues to the point of becoming inactive.
After several ups and downs in his career as an entrepreneur, Naromal decided to try his luck overseas for the nth time. He served as coach of the Hagiyoka Tennis Club in Hamamacho, Shizauoka in Japan for three years.
“It was really a very enriching experience as I was able to coach world class Japanese players,” he said. Naromal served as coach of Tetta Oyama who ranked 900 in the world then, but who rose to No. 180 after he coached the young Japanese tennis player. Oyama’s parents asked Naromal to become the personal coach of their son, but he had to decline since he had to honor his existing contract with the Tennis Club.
It was in 2007 when Coach Nat came back to Davao, pretty sure of what he wanted to do with his life–coach children and help them become champions. Naromal’s magic touch when it comes to helping kids become champions surfaced once again in the person of top-seeded Ralph Kevin Barte when he was only 10 years old.
Naromal’s two children, Jay and Natalie, also play tennis regularly and are known in the local tennis circuits. Natalie has started to join tennis competitions and won the 16-under trophy last year during a Kadayawan tournament.
The Naromal Tennis Academy based at the GSIS Tennis Club started in 2007, surprisingly with an impressive number of students. One of the problems he encountered as an entrepreneur and a tennis coach has been the lack of an honest-to-goodness tennis court for training the kids.
Luck seems to be on his side this time, as Naromal found a new home at the Bangkal Tennis Court. Here, one will find kids of all ages hitting balls, practicing their swings, or just playing around with their tennis pals.
“My dream is to see one of my students land in the Top 300 of the World Tennis ranking,” he said.
Anyone who wants to see potential tennis greats, or just wants to see kids enjoying themselves while engaged in a serious tennis match, may drop by at the Naromal Tennis Academy in Bangkal and not be disappointed. After all, this is the place where dreams can become a reality.
