johnnylad wrote: 3 Brits thorugh to qualies final round....
Karen Paterson, Naomi Cavaday and Jane O Donoghue...
Danielle Brown lost to Panova....
Bad news is Karen and Naomi now face 1st and 2nd seeds...
Jane plays Neuza Silva. If USM is right about her, and she plays like she did when he watched...Jane should qualify!
I think that Karen has a very good chance. She plays Spanish top seed Carla Suarez Navarro who's ranked 284. Karen has beaten her twice in recent weeks...6-4, 6-2 in the Sunderland 10K final and 6-3, 1-6, 7-6(4) a week later in rd2 of the Hull 10K. Hopefully she can make it a 3-0 head-to-head record tomorrow.
Tough draw for Naomi, but if she's playing well I'd back her to beat Czech 2nd seed Veronika Chvojkova especially indoors but it will be close. Chvojkova's ranked 288, has a big game and is a good indoor player, she beat Mel South in Glasgow last autumn but lost to Amanda Keen in two breakers in Milan in Nov. She hasn't had the best start to 2007, lost in qualies last week for an Italian 25K.
Regarding Jane's match, I'm not so sure Johnny. This will only be Jane's 2nd match of the year, she'll be pretty rusty. Silva doesn't have many weapons but she's the sort of player who can give Jane problems through her consistency. She's got a decent serve, topspin forehand and a heavily sliced backhand and doesn't make many errors at all. Jane will have to hit through her and not make too many unforced errors, how well she serves will be a key factor. Jane's a big hitter but her erratic groundstrokes are the reason why she's not yet broken the top 150 and is currently languishing in the high 300s.
Shame that Dani Brown didn't get through aswell but I'm not surprised about that result having seen both players last week. Panova and Dani play the same game - aim to smack the cover of the ball from the back, but Panova makes less errors and has the better serve (Dani's is more powerful but she gets very few 1st serves in and is prone to double-faulting).
Georgie Stoop Sarah Coles Natasha Khan Anna Fitzpatrick
Jade Windley was down as a WC in the qualies, but isn't signed in for qualies, so is probably taking a well deserved rest.
Good to see that the LTA are rotating the wildcards, Natasha and Anna definately deserve them given that of the Brits in Sutton they came the closest to qualifying.
I'm surprised that Sarah C got one ahead of Naomi but maybe the LTA thought that on current form, Naomi would stand the better chance of coming through qualifying.
I guess that Jade Windley's also limited to the number of senior tournaments she can play.
That's a fantastic win for Naomi A real gutsy performance. I'm also pleasantly surprised at Jane's result, she was a few points away from defeat in the 2nd set tiebreak but ground it out and took control in the 3rd.
Shame about Karen, given that she's beaten that Spanish girl twice recently, but again it was a really close match.
I'm going to speak to Nigel Sears about the matches later tonight, I'll let you know what he says.