Week 28 - Challenger ($50k) - Ramat Hasharon, Israel

Drew · Jul 7, 2008

RE: Week 28 - Challenger ($50k) - Ramat Hasharon, Israel

Bladetiger · Pro player

Wardy wins 2 &4 acc to MTF smile

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

It's a pretty good win for Ward, but not entirely surprising given Okun's dreadful season so far.

Hope he can build on this and win his second round match which is very winnable and get some good points out of this event

Bladetiger · Pro player

Who's next for him?

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Bladetiger wrote:

Who's next for him?

Miles Armstrong (AUS), who beat the Croat, Vjekoslav Skenderovic, 6-4 3-6 6-4.

Just for the record, Pavel Snobel, the Czech fifth seed, has joined Okun through the early exit door, beaten 3-6 6-7(4) by the Belgian, Niels Desein!

-- Edited by Stircrazy at 22:31, 2008-07-07

Yorkie · Lower Club Player

Great win Wardy

don't forget Okun walked past Skupski in Wimbledon qualies so he's not that past it!

gazzpash · Club Coach

Good win for Wardy and displays a step up for him as he and Slabba should be looking at winning matches at Challenger level

johnnylad · Tennis legend

Wardy

add that to the points frim qualifying makes Johnnylad a happy poster so far!

johnnylad · Tennis legend

It is Armstrong in R2

steven · Tennis legend

Well called, FD! The seven points James has gained so far (2Q+5) will replace his 18th best (1) and lift him to just outside the top 450.

L32: (Q) James Ward WR 474 beat (8) Noam Okun (ISR) WR 408 (dropped 119 places today when his points for winning the Winnetka Challenger came off; CH = 95, 2002) by 2 & 4 biggrin

L32: Alex Slabinsky WR 332 v Gouichi Motomura (JPN) WR 380 (CH = 134, 2000 - now 34 years old) - playing on Tuesday

L32: (Q) James Ward WR 474 v Miles Armstrong (AUS) WR 342

Armstrong lost to Edward Corrie and was taken to three sets by (Myles) Blake, Feaver and Podlewski last year, so he must have improved a fair bit since then to have a ranking in the top 350, which is odd since he's 22, not someone newly out of juniors. I think Wardy should fancy his chances though!

Salmon · Tennis legend

Australian Open qualies, here we come.

Well done, James.

Good luck to Slabba tomorrow. Match seems quite winnable.

steven · Tennis legend

Coverage of Wardy winning his match yesterday - two points and the end of the match from 1:20 to 1:50 on the video near the top right of the page. http://www.sport5.co.il/articles.aspx?FolderID=411&docID=40966&lang=HE - he only makes it onto the round-up because he was playing an Israeli, obviously.

From the very limited evidence of this video, it looks like he was hitting the ball very hard but only to around the service line, whereas Okun was playing much deeper shots back. Usually I'd expect the latter to win the point more of than than not, but that wasn't the case here it seems! (if you haven't seen Wardy before, he's the one with his back to the camera during the rallies and on the right (as we look) at the end, though that's probably pretty obvious even if you don't know what he looks like!

Apparently the semis and Final are going to be on Israeli TV and might be live-streamed on the site too. Of course, the Brits never go deep when this happens, but we can live in hope!

-- Edited by steven at 17:52, 2008-07-08

Sheddie · administrator

Slabba won......plays Smeets on Wed

Sheddie · administrator

he won 6-2, 6-4 against Motomura which is a quality result against an experienced opponent.

Smeets will be tough, he's ranked 153, won Dublin last week and has beaten both Boggo and Bloomers in straights this yr

Slabba won their only previous match 6-2, 6-1 but that was back in 2006

steven · Tennis legend

L32: Alex Slabinsky WR 332 beat Gouichi Motomura (JPN) WR 380 (CH = 134, 2000 - now 34 years old) by 2 & 4 smile

L16: (Q) James Ward WR 474 v Miles Armstrong (AUS) WR 342
L16: Alex Slabinsky WR 332 v (2) Robert Smeets (AUS) WR 153

Ward-Armstrong preview above.

Smeets won the Dublin Challenger for the loss of just one set last week, but hopefully that'll make him a bit tired - he beat his Uruguayan opponent in R1 here but didn't put him away as convincingly as you might expect. He has won his last three matches against Boggo, but looking on the bright side, Slabba thrashed him 2 & 1 in their only previous meeting in Australia in early 2006 on indoor hard - hat an amazing result that looks like now!

Both matches will be played tomorrow.