indiana wrote:

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So no Brits among the seeds at a British 10K.

Maybe rather worryingly what it highlights is not that folk haven't entered, but that we have such a lack of depth after our current top 12 and just 3 players that are within a very wide seeding range for this tournament.

The seeds are shown as ranked 369 to 725.

GB actually has only 3 players ranked between Anna Fitzpatrick WR 358 ( GB no 12 ) and Jade Windley ( competing here ) WR 734 ( GB no 16 ).

These are Amanda Carreras WR 496 ( seems to prefer warmer / Iberian climes ),  Anna Smith WR 539 ( currently injured, but really above this level when fit ) and Joss Rae WR 587 ( apparently just getting over injury )

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Funnily enough, there is an unprecedented glut of GB men between those ranking levels at the moment! Yet we're not too happy about that either. (though obviously happier than we would be if we didn't have lots of men in the 350-500 range as well as having hardly any in the top 350!)

markymc1983 wrote:

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Good God I didn't realise Amanda Elliott is now ranked outside the top 1000! What happened??

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She's been heading that way for a while unfortunately - she reached a career high of 311 towards the end of 2008 on the back of qualifying for a 75K (then getting an extra 14 points when Anne Kremer retired against her in R1), qualifying for Birmingham WTA (where she had two very good wins against Abigail Spears and Brenda Schultz-McCarthy), winning a match in Wimbledon qualifying then beating Mirjana Lucic in QR1 at Portoroz WTA.

She then had a lean time in 25/50/75/100K events for the rest of the year, including getting double bagelled by Katie in Phoenix. She started 2009 with a 10K QF, four R1 losses and a 10K SF, but starting from that SF, she went on a 15-match losing streak from March to August (a period over which a lot of her 2008 points dropped off), beat an unranked Italian then lost another 5 matches, culminating in a loss to Elisha Gabb in Barnstaple qualifying in early October.

In fact, that 10K semi in Dijon just over 2 years ago was the last time she won back to back main draw matches in an ITF event. As a result, she had slipped into the 700s by the end of 2009, into the 900s by the end of 2010 and has now slipped out of the top 1000 altogether.

Towards the end of last year, she was only playing about one ITF per month, which can't have helped in the quest for ranking points, though I seem to remember she was playing quite a few BTs, probably to try and get some money together for a renewed assault on the rankings this year. She had played more ITFs since the start of 2011 (W 4 L 6 including qualifying) but is yet to pick up a ranking point this year.

It must be very discouraging to be down so low after having been so close to the top 300 (as you'll have gathered above, even then her CH was due to getting wins and a bit of luck at bigger events rather than to consistency), but at least she's still giving it a go.

Maybe she can take some encouragement from what has happened to Chris Eaton, who hit a very similar career high in 2008/9 on the back of a couple of even more extreme results, had a couple of very lean years (though not quite as lean as Amanda's) and now seems to have finally got his act together on a more consistent basis.

Peter too wrote:

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Q2: WALKER, Alexandra (GBR) 1 1011 v RICHARDS, Holly (GBR) UNR
Q2: DUNFORD, Kyria (GBR) UNR v ADAM, Josepha (FRA) 2 1040
Q2: BASTICK, Georgina (GBR) UNR v MECCHI, Costanza (ITA) 4 1162
Q2: MCMINN, Lauren (GBR) UNR v MELROSE, Abbi (GBR) UNR
Q2: BANOS-GREGORIANS, Emilia (GBR) UNR v BOULTER, Katie (GBR) UNR
Q2: INCE, Michaela (GBR) UNR v ORSI, Carolina (ITA) UNR

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LTA twitter reports that Alexandra, Abbi and 14-y-o Katie (into her first ITF main draw at only her third attempt) all won.

I guess that's a roundabout way of saying all the Brits who weren't playing other Brits lost

There was a very good match between Katy Dunne and Bianca Koch which Katy finally lost 6-4 in the 3rd after having eight or nine break points and saving two or three match points in a twenty minute final game. I arrived when katie had just won the first set and was off court for some reason. In the 2nd set she had some good rallies but was struggling to hold service against the 6th seed. In the third Katie really got her game together and went into a 2-0 lead. She seemed completely unfazed by Koch's hitting and blasted her own shots low over the net to within a foot or so of the baseline. At times she was hitting low from corner to corner and putting Koch under real pressure, even closing on the net to finish the point with a volley. Katy's only seemed to have problems when Koch took the pace off the ball and hit wider angles.

Katy was well worth her wild card, never giving up and I doubt if her opponent ever felt sure of the result, particularly during that marathon final game.

-- Edited by Peter too on Tuesday 26th of April 2011 08:13:57 PM