play suspended, raining i assume with slabton at *4-4

QR1: Marcus Willis WR 824 beat Amer Delic (USA) WR 183 7-6(7), 7-6(6)
QR1: Alexander Slabinsky WR 385 beat Adrian Cruciat (ROU) WR 274 6-4, 6-4
QR1: Joshua Milton WR 708 beat (q30) Alexandre Sidorenko (FRA) WR 161
QR1: Marco Chiudinelli (SUI) WR 211 beat Daniel Smethurst WR 843 7-6(4), 6-4
QR1: Stéphane Robert (FRA) WR 178 beat Chris Eaton WR 317 6-4, 6-2
QR1: Daniel Cox WR 627 beat Conor Niland (IRL) WR 266 6-3, 1-6, 8-6
QR1: Dieter Kindlmann (GER) WR 204 beat Richard Bloomfield WR 311 6-4, 6-0

QR2: Marcus Willis WR 824 v Andrea Stoppini (ITA) WR 177
QR2: Alexander Slabinsky WR 385 v (q4) Roko Karanusic (CRO) WR 112
QR2: Joshua Milton WR 708 v Joao Souza (BRA) WR 225 or Alexander Peya (AUT) WR 203 (Peya leads 4-2 in the 3rd set)
QR2: Daniel Cox WR 627 v (q28) Prakash Amritraj (IND) WR 154

-- Edited by Stircrazy on Monday 15th of June 2009 07:09:14 PM

4/7 is more than a good return - it's the first time four have survived the first qualifying round since 2000 

Managed to make the trek from Camberwell to Bank of England Club this morning pretty quickly. When i got there i found the Eaton match about to start, John Lloyd and Arvind Parmar were watching on. Chris served 3 aces in his first service game, and i thought "this is ominous for Robert". How wrong i was - his serve completely fell away after that. At times he seemed to miss practically every first serve, and even though Robert wasn't really hitting the second serves for clean winners, he made Chris hit a lot of difficult first volleys and went on to control the point from there. Chris did put pressure on Robert's serve during the match but was unable to break him, while Robert broke the Eaton serve three times

There was some crumbs of comfort for Chris to take out of the match; he actually traded surprisingly well from the back of the court - he rarely shanked his forehand, and it was arguably the hardest and deepest groundstroke on display. He didn't hit many clean winners but he often put Robert under pressure, especially on the Frenchman's second serve. He did struggle with his forehand a little when Robert got him on the run (especially to his right), but his movement wasn't as horrific as some people make it out to be. His volleys and backhands were a little hit-and-miss - some good stuff with a bit of bad stuff to go with it. I think Chris overall will be incredibly disappointed, but if he gets his serve back together he might actually be a far improved player than before. I also hope he serve-and-volleys less on the second serve - i know he needs to keep the point short, but id rather see him try and finish it with a huge forehand early on rather than keep on charging the net

Final Game of Chris's match
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4X6X30u4Ic

Next up I moved court to watch the finale of the Cox match. I had seen from where i was sitting in the Eaton game Cox come back from 4-1 down in the decider and then break Niland when he'd been serving for the match at 6-5. Some of the GB girls - Curtis, Broady, Moore, Cavaday and i think Heather Watson - were watching on. I have to say, it was a strange match. Cox is fast, and he has nice, deep groundstrokes that have a fair bit of power, but i think he was struggling to break Niland down. This resulted in a bit of a baseline slugfest with very long rallies (the Eaton match started long after it and finished long before it). Cox saw off a couple of break points to win a mammoth game to move to 7-6*. He managed to force Niland to match point, but during a tense rally Niland followed up a brilliant defensive get with a big winner down the line. Then on a deuce point Niland somehow contrived to dunk a basic volley into the net, and Cox converted the match point during another tight rally to secure the biggest win of his career

I then moved on to the Marcus Willis-Amir Delic match, Marcus having just won the first set 7-6. I couldn't believe there was such a huge ranking gap between them, Marcus was arguably the dominant player. He's much taller and stronger than Cox, he must be about 6'1, 6'2, and a leftie as well. He has a very heavy serve, not massive, but he hit quite a few aces and serve-and-volleyed very successfully. His defence and return were very good, as was his variation, and he was able to constantly keep Delic on the run. I wouldn't say he had one particularly outstanding groundstroke, but he was able to work himself into positions to hit winners from either side and he hit a lot of breathtaking passing shots past Delic

Two points stick in my mind from that match. The first Marcus stuck up an easy lob for Delic who was right over the net. Willis somehow read the smash, and managed to flick up another easy lob for Delic to put away. This time Marcus read it and was able to somehow flick it down to the feet of Delic. The American was only able to prod it back deep, and Marcus brilliantly executed the passing shot before letting rip with an enormous "COME ON!". The second point Marcus was working Delic like crazy from side to side; Delic made four ridiculous gets, i have no idea how he got them back. On the fourth though Delic slipped over (leaving Marcus an easy volley) and for a while it looked like he might retire as the trainer saw to his hurt ankle. Thankfully though, he got back and continued, allowing Marcus to complete a well deserved and famous victory. I was quite impressed with Marcus's attitude on court; he never let a poor miss bog him down, he looked focused throughout, and he was very happy to clap his opponent's shot if it was too good (even when he clearly didn't need to!)


I then saw a little bit of Josh Milton. Milton looks about four years old, he plays like the archetypal young tennis brat - a powerful wristy backhand, baseball cap worn backwards and plenty of swagger around the court. His opponent Sidorenko was abysmal, he had one shot (the defensive forehand slice) and he didn't impress me at all. Unsurprisingly Josh did win, although curiously he faced a match point when i was there!

-- Edited by The Knight on Monday 15th of June 2009 07:12:40 PM

Pretty great day for the Brits by the looks of things. Stunning wins for the youngsters, especially Willis, while great to see Milton and Cox come through in tough three setters.

Good to see Slabba keep up his Queens form as well and he's got a nice passage to Wimbledon, or as nice as it is going to get.

Shame for Eaton to lose though and he's going to make a huge drop in the rankings now. Needs to work hard to get those points back as quickly as he can if he wants to be playing at the top level again.

Thanks for the great piece Jon...always good to have this kind of insight.

Much appreciated !