Week 38 - ITF ($75K) - Shrewsbury, Hard

jamatthews · Strong Club Player

RE: Week 38 - ITF ($75K) - Shrewsbury, Hard

wolf · Tennis legend

Great day on Tuesday, some brilliant tennis displayed particulary on Court 1. I arrived around 1 o'clock.

Arrived with Bally level at 2-2 in the second after losing the first set, but I must have been her lucky charm because he barely put a foot wrong after that. I have never seen her so pumped up, I think she knows exactly where she is in the rankings. As said before she was saying come on in a variety of languages. She looked so fit, and made very few errros.

Stancuite moved Rae around enough to win. That said, Rae should have won the second set, she was 5-2 up in the Tb but then she failed to dig out two half-volleys to gift the mini-breaks back. Rae does move well for someone so tall, but I think she doesn't quite seem to take advantage of her physical attributes.

Anna Smith went 5-0 down in her match, got it back to *4-5 and then predictably dropped serve. Smith seemed to have flattened out her forehand since last year, but it's still not the weapon it should be. She was 4-2 up in the second set, but was broken and then when serving to stay in it she hit a couple of strange sliced forehands into the net.

Loved South's match with Meusburger. It was so strange because Meusburger's serve was soooo bad, it was slow because she tossed about ten metres in the air and it was so hard to time it, and Mel would hit it for return winners and about twice a game but just couldn't enough times in a game to break. She did finally break at 5-5 and came back from 3-1 down in the decider to win the next five. Mel started to win the points when it got into longer rallies and not just off serve and return and that killed Meusberger, because she relied on Mel making the errors.

Jade Curtis won a match with Mekel where serve honestly had no effect. Jade won the first set TB 10-8, saving a couple of set points against serve (including Mekel's third double of the TB). and went 3-0 down in the second before coming back to win it 6-4. Jade is a nifty little player but I do wonder where she is going max out in the rankings? Not sure if she can make top 150. Mekel was very good at the net, but she didn't seem to come in often enough.

Flipkins could be the one to beat, she is very simular to Vinci who won here last year.

The doubles action provided some good entertainment. Thomas and Elliot came back from 9-2 or 9-3 down in the MTB against Windley and Rae saving eight or nine match points to win it 13-11. I'm struggling to see why Mandy is doing so badly in singles. I think Liz needs to cut out some silly errors if she is going to go further with the game she has.

Smith/Larsson should really face Hlavackova/Hradecka in the semi, with the winner taking the title. I will be interested to see how far Mekel/South go though.

markymc1983 · Club Coach

Welcome to the top 100 Bally! At last!

wolf · Tennis legend

markymc1983 wrote:

Welcome to the top 100 Bally! At last!

Bally would surely need another win to make sure. Katie definately does.

DavidC · Tennis legend

markymc1983 wrote:

Welcome to the top 100 Bally! At last!

Bally still needs quite a few matches elsewhere to go her way, or preferably to go deeper here, in order to be in the top 100

Here are my impressions of todays matches involving Brits:

Georgie Stoop v Kristina Barrois

Barrois was probably the most impressive player on view today (I didnt stay for the last 2 singles matches involving Flipkens and Foretz though), having a varied game, being offensive in her own service games (served a fair sprinking of aces to boot) and employing consistent defensive slice a lot in Georgies service games. Georgie matched her until 4-4 but then became nervous on serve. She got away with 2 doubles in game 10, but consecutive doubles in game 12 gave the German the first breakpoints, and a dumped volley gave away the set 7-5. Georgie recovered from 0-40 in game 6 of set 2 but eventually succumbed, and then her head dropped, as she clearly no longer believed she was going to win, and tamely subsided.

Elena Baltacha v Lisa Whybourn

I could only see the scoreboard until the last few games of the match, but I was impressed in what I saw with Lisas resilience. I had expected her to be overpowered, but she was only marginally inferior in long rallies. Lisa came through a long game at 2-5 to force Bally to serve out set 1, and also managed to break Bally when serving for the match (saving a match point) at 5-2 in the second. Bally was fired up as usual and should have a good match with Barrois.

Katie OBrien v Nicola Geuer

There was little doubt that Katie would win this. She is a pleasure to watch when manipulating an opponent from the baseline with marginally greater power and precision, as here. As usual there were alarms on serve (she dropped serve 3 times) not so much from doubles, as difficulty in controlling points when the second serve was returned with interest.

She came from a break down in set 2, eventually closing out a long deuce game (game 10) on the Geuer serve at the third time of asking.

Melanie South v Naomi Cavaday

As you would expect in a match between two players whose strengths are power rather than movement long rallies were at a premium. Mel served well and deserved to win, but I was disappointed at how soon Naomi broke down or was outmanoeuvred in rallies. To her credit though Naomis head didnt drop (unlike Georgie) and she fought back from 5-1 to 5-4 in set 2. The first set featured just one break of serve in game 5, with Mel fighting off break-back point in the following game.

Jade Curtis v Mona Barthel

I only joined this at 4-3 in the second. Jade promptly levelled only to immediately dump serve to love on a double. There was nothing on evidence to counter the impression I have had on previous viewings of Jade that she does not appear to have anything to enable her to make an impression in the higher echelons of the womens game in singles.

-- Edited by DavidC on Wednesday 23rd of September 2009 03:09:19 PM

philwrig · Hall of fame

If Cav can't play well indoors that's a big problem as these conditions should suit all players. From what I have seen from her performances this year she has been quite consistent without putting in performances which suggest a much higher ranking is around the corner. In my opinion she will never be a top 100 player unless she sorts out her movement issues because for a smaller than average player speed around the court is essential to mitigate against your lack of size. I would love to be proved wrong and next year she might come out a different player.

djlovesyou · Strong Club Player

Parra-Santonja just beat Fichman in St Malo so that leaves Bally in a rather precarious position of 99, so I would imagine a win against Barrois tomorrow is needed.

Katie needs one more win at least as she's sitting provisionally at 102.

Those rankings are after the points have come off so they can't improve without winning.

Peter too · Tennis legend

Summary:-

R2: CURTIS, Jade (GBR) WC 346 lost to BARTHEL, Mona Q 529 1-6 4-6
R2: OBRIEN, Katie (GBR) 6 107 beat GEUER, Nicola (GER) Q 404 6-2 6-4
R2: SOUTH, Melanie (GBR) 151 beat CAVADAY, Naomi (GBR) 236 6-4 6-4
R2: BALTACHA, Elena (GBR) 5 103 beat WHYBOURN, Lisa (GBR) Q UNR 6-3 6-3
R2: STOOP, Georgie (GBR) 196 lost to BARROIS, Kristina (GER) 2 67 5-7 2-6

QF: OBRIEN, Katie (GBR) 6 107 v KERBER, Angelique (GER) 4 86
QF: SOUTH, Melanie (GBR) 151 v FLIPKENS, Kirsten (BEL) 3 84
QF: BALTACHA, Elena (GBR) 5 103 v BARROIS, Kristina (GER) 2 67

Peter too · Tennis legend

Lisa Whybourn should enter the rankings next week around 725 and therefore just inside the GB top 20.

jamatthews · Strong Club Player

Peter too wrote:

Lisa Whybourn should enter the rankings next week around 725 and therefore just inside the GB top 20.

Really? Am I being thick, I can only count 2 results.

steven · Tennis legend

jamatthews wrote:

Peter too wrote:

Lisa Whybourn should enter the rankings next week around 725 and therefore just inside the GB top 20.

Really? Am I being thick, I can only count 2 results.

I think you're right - she has two results at the moment but one of them is Shrewsbury last year which is due to come off when this week's points go on. Hopefully it won't be long before she gets a third though!

Silver · County player

As it happens, she may only have the ranking for one week because the 2 points from Shrewsbury LAST year will drop off...

If they don't drop off this week that is. BUGGERYCHOPS. Still... 26 from 2 events ain't bad going.

Peter too · Tennis legend

Lisa is on the alternatives list for Barnstaple which might provide a chance for her third scoring event.

wolf · Tennis legend

Lisa will be more than likely given a wild card into Barnstaple, which will give her one point straight away which in turn will give her a ranking.

In the doubles today Liz and Mandy put in a credible effort taking a set off a top 50 pair, plus there were wins for Anna and Mel with their respective partners:

QF
HLAVACKOVA (CZE) / HRADECKA (CZE) (1) defeated ELLIOTT (GBR) / THOMAS (GBR) 4-6 6-4 [10-7]
LARSSON (SWE) / SMITH (GBR) defeated KERBER (GER) / MOORE (GBR) 7-6(5) 3-6 [10-7]
BARROIS (GER) / MEUSBURGER (AUT) (3) defeated HOFMANOVA (AUT) / MAROSI (HUN) 6-4 6-3
MEKEL (NED) / SOUTH (GBR) defeated KLASCHKA (GER) / TAVARES (BRA) 6-3 6-0

SF
HLAVACKOVA (CZE) / HRADECKA (CZE) (1) Vs LARSSON (SWE) / SMITH (GBR)
BARROIS (GER) / MEUSBURGER (AUT) (3) Vs MEKEL (NED) / SOUTH (GBR)

philwrig · Hall of fame

Wolf what makes you think that Lisa will get a main draw wild card, a qualifying one for sure but not main draw, especially with Heather guaranteed a main draw one here.