Week 17 - Great Britain F6 ($10,000) - Bournemouth - clay

Maza1987 · Challenger level

RE: Week 17 - Great Britain F6 ($10,000) - Bournemouth - clay

Fitzy · Intermediate Club Player

Tough day at the office today. Felt I had all the tools and the form to win but my hand if I'm honest was in tatters.
Being indoors any tape I tried to place in my hand was off with sweat within a game.
Serving was the hardest part.
Regarding the score at 76 5-3, I was serving to stay in the match and saved 6 MP in a game that lasted about 25 minutes! Ha. No one can say I don't have heart.

My form at the moment speaks for itself, I just am keeping the pressure on myself to keep it going and hope someone notices me to help me out.
If not then maybe I can win the lottery, I bought a ticket yesterday so will be checking if I won!

NCL tomorrow which I can't financially afford to not to do, even though I won't be able to play properly.
Hope that most of the people on here can watch me play at some point so they have an image to put to my words when talking about my game.

steven · Tennis legend

Bad luck today, Fitzy. I must admit, I was pretty convinced before the match that you were going to win, so I'm not surprised to find there was something fairly drastic wrong. Well done for fighting so hard despite all that - I hope it didn't exacerbate the injury too much because you're on such a good roll at the moment that it would be a pity for it to end. Try to fix in your memoery what it has felt like to win so many matches recently so you can draw on it if things aren't going quite so well any time!

I'm happy that Oli got his first senior title too, of course - sounds like he wasn't 100% either so it must have been a bit of a hospital court out there!

Reeltime · Satellite level

Ok, I have to ask. What's NCL?

Julia Carrot · All-time great

National Club League (former name for what is now Aegon Team Tennis)

Shhh · Challenger level

You've played 7 ranking events in the last 8 weeks Fitzy and made 4 x quarters, a semi, a finalist and (as if we'd forget!) a winner. Does the prize money from that not help keep you going or, being mainly 10k's, do you still run at a loss despite achieveing those results?

I get the impression the LTA announce there choosen few at the start of the year and dont review it until the years over, are you likely to get any help from them at all mid-season?

steven · Tennis legend

The Knight wrote:
looks like there's a bit of twitter beef going on...

Yes, not quite sure why that's blown up so badly. It looks like Oli's unhappy about the talk re. Fitzy's blister taking something away from his win when he thinks he played one of his best matches, which he probably did.

If Fitzy's comments about his hand had been aimed at Oli then it would be fair enough to be miffed but from what I've seen here and on Twitter, Fitzy was simply genuinely frustrated that the problems with his hand prevented him from making a closer match of it (as anyone might be under the circumstances), but unless I missed something (or it's something said offline that's causing the problem), that's not the same as saying Oli didn't deserve to win.

I said yesterday that I thought Fitzy was the favourite going into the match. meaning simply on the basis of their respective recent results and hence likely confidence levels. It's been good to see Oli make a move this week just as it's been good to see Fitzy going from strength to strength over the last few weeks.

Both Oli and Fitzy have got a lot to be proud of this week and much as a bit of a spat can be a bit of mindless fun to an outside observer (as long as it doesn't last - especially when you support both of them!) they'd probably be well-advised to leave it at that.

Then again, what do I know ashamed

-- Edited by steven on Sunday 29th of April 2012 03:59:37 PM

Maza1987 · Challenger level

In a bid to encapsulate the flippant Twitter spirit--all I'll write is #Lulz.

-- Edited by Maza1987 on Sunday 29th of April 2012 04:43:08 PM

Spectator · All-time great

This is the difficulty with Twitter etc., isn't it. As a comment to friends, expressing frustration about a hurt hand (and it must have been really frustrating!) is fine. But when anyone can look at Twitter, it can come across -- even if not at all intended that way! -- as unsporting. I'd also initially wondered ... but did notice the "Too good" which seemed clearly designed to show that while Mr Fitzpatrick was frustrated with himself, he wasn't taking anything away from Mr Golding's fine play.

At any rate, they both seem fairly mature folk, and likely to realise it's pointless to hold on to grudges.

-- Edited by Spectator on Sunday 29th of April 2012 04:44:45 PM

Reeltime · Satellite level

Julia Carrot wrote:
National Club League (former name for what is now Aegon Team Tennis)

Cheers

Gary Denton · Intermediate Club Player

As regards C Betancourt being Oli's girlfriend, it would make sense given Ms Betancourt's propensity to play over here more than you would expect from a Mexican tennis player
As regards the win, well done to him.

As she's his ex, it now makes perfect sense

-- Edited by Gary Denton on Sunday 29th of April 2012 09:55:25 PM

The Knight · Challenger qualifying

looks like there's a bit of twitter beef going on...

Maza1987 · Challenger level

^lol.
That's what Twitter is for I guess. Heck, I only use it to report, I don't bother following anybody really.
Hopefully it's all in good nature.

The Knight · Challenger qualifying

to be fair to Olly when i read Fitzy's twitter/comments myself on here it did give the impression of "my injury was the thing that stopped me winning", whether Fitzy meant for it to come across like that or not...although i think olly was wrong/immature to make a big deal and post sarcastic comments about it

But yes i hope this doesn't descend into anything too bad :/

Gary Denton · Intermediate Club Player

Makes for a tasty encounter, the next time they meet. Hope I can book my ticket!