Week 14 - ITF ($25K) - Jackson, USA Clay

RBBOT · Futures qualifying

Week 14 - ITF ($25K) - Jackson, USA Clay

philwrig · Hall of fame

A little bit disappointing given her good performance in the doubles but probably expected.
Hopefully it was close and will put her right for the next two weeks.

Of course the main snag is the fact that it uses up one of her precious 12 tournaments for the year.

philwrig · Hall of fame

First time I have done this but it was pretty easy spoke to the tournament official and he gave me Heather's latest score and Laura's score.

Heather is one set all and down 2-1 in the third going with serve Heather won the first set.
Laura lost 3-6 7-5 0-6.

The guy I spoke to Bunny also said that both girls were great ambassadors for Great Britain and of course are still in the doubles.

philwrig · Hall of fame

Heather cameback to win the third set 6-3.
Great stuff.

SMC1809 · All-time great

Heather just tweeted. She won 6-3 in the third.

-- Edited by SMC1809 on Wednesday 7th of April 2010 08:57:41 PM

Tutu · Club Coach

Heather won! 6-2 4-6 6-3

Tutu · Club Coach

Now she faces the moonballer Klaffner. Will have to stay patient but aggressive. Top 400 is finally assured, hopefully she can keep on moving!

As for Laura, it's a shame but Hamption is a talented player and obviously with the wrist injury it's just good to see hr competing again and on her worst surface.

indiana · Tennis legend

Haether certainly wins more 3 setters than she loses, doesn't seem to mind a battle smile

Now a very winnable L16 match though I'm not sure how she will take to moonballing

Good to see Laura come back to take the second set against Hampton although falling away in the 3rd set. As longs as all well with the wrist a reasonably encouraging comeback match which she can hopefully build on.

Maza1987 · Challenger level

philwrig wrote:

First time I have done this but it was pretty easy spoke to the tournament official and he gave me Heather's latest score and Laura's score.

Heather is one set all and down 2-1 in the third going with serve Heather won the first set.
Laura lost 3-6 7-5 0-6.

The guy I spoke to Bunny also said that both girls were great ambassadors for Great Britain and of course are still in the doubles.

biggrin

philwrig · Hall of fame

Maza1987 wrote:

philwrig wrote:

First time I have done this but it was pretty easy spoke to the tournament official and he gave me Heather's latest score and Laura's score.

Heather is one set all and down 2-1 in the third going with serve Heather won the first set.
Laura lost 3-6 7-5 0-6.

The guy I spoke to Bunny also said that both girls were great ambassadors for Great Britain and of course are still in the doubles.

English grammar was never my strong point at school more of a Maths/Science man. You got the gist though I hope.

jb288 · Satellite level

Just put them where you would breathe, there's no need to know anything about grammar! But yes, gist was gotten ;p

RBBOT · Futures qualifying

Just put them where you would breathe; there's no need to know anything about grammar!

Tutu · Club Coach

^lol

indiana wrote:

Haether certainly wins more 3 setters than she loses, doesn't seem to mind a battle Now a very winnable L16 match though I'm not sure how she will take to moonballing

Good to see Laura come back to take the second set against Hampton although falling away in the 3rd set. As longs as all well with the wrist a reasonably encouraging comeback match which she can hopefully build on.

Agreed. I think it's also down to her inexperience though. When I watched her a couple of months ago, it became really clear that after a few things would go wrong for her, she would get down on herself and lose concentration (which is pretty similar to Laura actually, it must be a Brit thing) and go on walkabouts for games. I think this article I came across a couple of weeks ago sums it up:

"Toward the end of the first set, the wind picked up again, which didn't appear to bother either player. Zhang quickly went up 3-0. When Zhang served at 3-1, 30-15, Watson could see the match slipping away from her, and--though nothing extraordinary had occurred at that moment--she smacked her racquet a couple of times on the court. She then saved a game point with her own passing shot, and earned an ad point by drawing Zhang to the net and passing her again. Watson broke Zhang, and there was every reason to believe we were about to experience a momentum shift, but Zhang broke her right back. Down 2-5 and ever the Brit, Watson muttered "Just give up, Heather, really....""

biggrin

There's quite a bit on Heather in this blog, by the way.
http://womenwhoserve.blogspot.com/search/label/Heather%20Watson

indiana · Tennis legend

I really do think it is more a young / inexperience thing rather than a Brit thing that there are still quite a lot of ups and downs with Laura and Heather.

But as I indicated, my impression is that Heather is generally quite a fighter. That "Just give up, Heather, really..." is surely just a sign of frustration with herself and her play that she's let it slip away like that, err not an indication of actual intention.

Occasionally Heather gets slightly mullered when you don't expect it as Laura has at times, so maybe when they feel it's not their day the wheels come off a bit, they get frustrated and it just gets worse. This can happen in single sets after otherwise reasonable close matches like maybe for Laura in the final set yesterday.

But, as I indicated earlier, once Heather gets in a real fight she generally really sees it out, more often than not victoriously. Of the seven 3 setters she has played this year, she has won five and only in the end lost the other two 7-5 in the decider.

Edit : Just read the interview on the blog which confirms the stuff in the article that Tutu quoted that Heather was getting frustrated when it was just more good play from her opponent than anything else. She clearly recognised that herself, probably knew even at the time she shouldn't have been gettting frustrated but still was. That resonates as true, just an inexperienced player not reacting well to things going against her and she just needs more and more experience. She probably started getting frustrated about getting frustrated smile

-- Edited by indiana on Thursday 8th of April 2010 10:50:07 AM

jb288 · Satellite level

RBBOT wrote:

Just put them where you would breathe; there's no need to know anything about grammar!

Lol! I did consider that, but, not knowing anything about grammar, plumped for the comma instead...Still, better to punctuate poorly than never to have punctuated at all, right?!