Both very tough assignments, as both opponents in good form. Wozniak was very close to beating Radwanska in Dubai, and Dellaqua has had a new lease of life during which is effectively her second career, she also made the L16 the last time she played here.
I'm not sure Laura is 100% given her recent injury/illness setbacks, arrived at the pre IW training camp in Las Vegas very late. A couple of rays of hope are 1. Laura enjoys playing Aussies 2. Dellacqua put in a stinker against Barty( another young prodigy) at the end of last year and 3. She was playing doubles in Malaysia only on Saturday so is coming in here late.
Obviously Hev has beaten Wozniak but the Canadian was starting to struggle with a serious injury at that stage in her career and of course Hev is not playing at her best at the moment. One ray of hope for me though was that Hev seemed to play better in the second set of her last match against Arvidsson ( the eventual winner).

Hev held serve having saved 3 break points and survived the ignominy of being foot faulted!

She then broke Wozniak to lead 2 - 0

Now face 3 break points again

And broken

2 -1*

-- Edited by Julia Carrot on Monday 5th of March 2012 06:30:04 PM

All the other qualies are in Tiebreaks right now. Shame Hev's isn't 

* 4 - 6

-- Edited by Julia Carrot on Monday 5th of March 2012 07:12:28 PM

No pressure Laura from your Brit fans, but we're counting on you

 

-- Edited by Julia Carrot on Monday 5th of March 2012 08:18:46 PM

philwrig wrote:

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indiana wrote:

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philwrig wrote:

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Laura clearly has alot of issues at the moment, which of course we are not privy to.

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I really don't think an awful lot more than basically not having had an off season and missed so much training and practice to work on her consistency.

Maybe would have hoped for a little more, but gee lets not overdramatise this unless you think you've heard of possible other issues ? 

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 Stress fracture, wrist, back, and Tonsilitus to name but 4 relatively recent issues. I watched an out of sorts Laura at Nottingham last year, when she was losing but reasonably competitive. This though the way she just seemed to fully fall apart without winning many points, especially on her serve which is a strength, is a big concern.

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Yes, the wrist and / or back and tonsilitis are other issues that have affected other performances this year, understandably.  

But unless there is anything seriously ongoing with these, there is no need for any big worries.  To me, just got to get in work, get in the consistency which is clearly not really there just now, and try and resolve any current technical issues.  We all know the big game she has and that's not suddenly going to disappear unless yes seriously injury restricted.  And she was in pretty decent form second half of last year.  So two months into the next year and with the issues mentioned I cannot see any big reasons for such worry as yet.

I am not setting out to be the Laura Defence League leader, but I was wondering initially if you had heard more serious things in the background for all this alarmism.  Apparently not, so again I really do not see such great cause for worry.

Though would be good to see her get a good injury / illness free run and yes maybe play a few ITFS as tony orient was suggesting.

If there are other current issues with her actual game, such as serve, there is no reason to think these are any more than temporary.

Re Heather, yes hopefully she just needs a win or two to get going again.  Certainly does seem a bit short of her best form, but has been a bit unlucky in various ways since last summer.  Not had a lot of breaks.

-- Edited by indiana on Monday 5th of March 2012 10:49:33 PM

Don't think so