Plus Thornley is doing well in Greece!


John, Cox next defends points in early August. But this will be he last Futures for a while...

Thanks a lot for the great work, Niall and Drew.


Niall, was Judy there to watch Dyce?

Is there instances where people have stayed in juniors to long?, whats the optimum age to pull out and concentrate on mens circuit.

I really enjoyed myself today, first of all I have decided I much prefer the outdoor tournament to the indoor one. There is room to move outdoors and aggainst all the odds it was sunny all day.

Center court is a proper little stadium with between 5 and 8 rows of permanent seats all round. The other four courts are pretty bog standard but there is a nice grass slope where you can observe courts 1 and 2. Courts 3 and 4 are less accesible and sadly Evans and Rice are where on 4 but I still saw lots of good tennis.

I got there early and womens qualifying was going on which I wasn't prepared for especially as they were competeing without umpires. As I didn't know what was going on and it was a bit cold despite the sun I went home to get a jersey.
I did watch Jade Curtis play a bit, she seemed to be winning most of the points but she also had most of the rants which confused me. She was arround for the rest of the day looking quite cheerful so I would guess she won.

When I came back someone gave me a little program and things became clearer. I pitched up infront of court 2 to watch Dan Cox and also Josh Milton on 1 so I can't answer the big question of how Josh Goodall tanked it so badly on center. I looked over a few times and the play seemed to be quite even but the scoreboard tells a different story.

Something that made me smile, when Josh lost the first set the linejudge put 6-1 on scoreboard but left 5-1 on the other side. Dyce and Rice where also watching Cox (or Coxy as he is known) and someone, maybe his dad, rushed over and told Graeme Dyce he better get ready as preceeding match is one game from conclusion. I was going to say something but they left in a hurry although I think Graeme knew there was something wrong.

To my uneducated eye (I have to enphasise that point) Dan Cox looks a real player. He is obviously a bit small but he looks fairly stocky, he moves well and hits the ball cleanly with a good range of shots. He started really well and was worthy of a 6-2 start, then his opponent stepped up and it looked like the score would be reversed in the 2nd half. Crucially Dan fought back from 5-2 down to 5-4, I missed the next game as I was trying to work out what was wrong with Josh Goodall but I think it was important that the two players went into the deciding set on a even footing. The third set was hard fought with both players just about holding serve and it was Dan who got the break for 4-3 and he held serve from there.

I have to say that the French lads have the edge in ranting. The Brits usually exclaim there disapointment with 1 or 2 words but Pellerin and Manarino treated us to several rants of 10 to 20 words delivered with a creshendo.

Joshua Milton looks like a boy but he impressed in patches, I think he did quite well aggainst a tough opponent. He could have folded at 1-3 in the second set but he fought back to 3-3 which was good.

Then I went to watch Graeme Dyce. I was most impressed with his serve, he hit some good winners on the fh and bh, if anything I think movement is his weekness he was of balance for a fair number of shots. He had an extra level above his opponent today and won fairly comfortably.

I couldn't really see Rice's game but I was able to watch the closing stages of Smith vs Smith. JP Smith took a medical timeout at 2-1 up but he seemed to be ok as he moved to 4-2, Matt Smith was really struggling at that point and I thought he was about to implode but he pulled himself together to win the next four games.

Thanx for the report.

I know what you mean about Cox hes quite small. I mean i'm only 5'8 but he's a bit smaller than me. It doesn't seem to affect him too much as he has a good serve and a cracking backhand crosscourt.

Haven't see any of the others play so couldn't comment.

I have seen Matt Smith play and at times he looks unbeatable then he just seems to start missing.

Thanks Niall! Great to hear your views...

v.excited about Cox and Rice and Evans and Dyce!