Weeks 22 & 23: French Open (Roland-Garros) (red clay)

philwrig · Hall of fame

RE: Weeks 22 & 23: French Open (Roland-Garros) (red clay)

steven · Tennis legend

philwrig wrote:
If she could just play her best tennis all the time, she would make rapid progress up the rankings.

I wonder how many players that could be said of - most, I'd have thought! But I know what you mean and Laura is young enough for there to be a reasonable expectation that her consistency could see very significant improvements over the next few years.

I wonder if she's wishing she'd been 2nd out of the LL pot (or Soler Espinosa had held on until Tuesday) and got Babos instead. Not an 'easy' draw either, but not as bad as AMG.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Bugger!

R1: (1) Victoria Azarenka (BLR) WR 1 defeated Alberta Brianti (ITA) WR 105 by 6-7(6) 6-4 6-2 bleh

I was really hoping Brianti would hold her nerve at 7-6(6) 4-0 & go on to remove Shriekarenka from the draw to spare my ear drums the constant assault in later rounds! I suppose Shriekarenka deserves some credit for digging herself out of a bloody big hole. The mark of a champion, no doubt... furious

Interesting choice of outfits: both girls appeared to be wearing curtain pelmets for skirts, with Shriekarenka's probably winning the prize in the taste stakes...

Maza1987 · Challenger level

When do they release the schedule for tomorrow. Praying I will get good times for Anne and Heather.

Julia Carrot · All-time great

steven wrote:

I wonder if she's wishing she'd been 2nd out of the LL pot (or Soler Espinosa had held on until Tuesday) and got Babos instead. Not an 'easy' draw either, but not as bad as AMG.

And Babos just retired at 1 - 6 !

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Julia Carrot wrote:
steven wrote:

I wonder if she's wishing she'd been 2nd out of the LL pot (or Soler Espinosa had held on until Tuesday) and got Babos instead. Not an 'easy' draw either, but not as bad as AMG.
And Babos just retired at 1 - 6 !

The RG site says that Karatancheva won by 1 & 0. confuse

philwrig · Hall of fame

steven wrote:
philwrig wrote:
If she could just play her best tennis all the time, she would make rapid progress up the rankings.
I wonder how many players that could be said of - most, I'd have thought! But I know what you mean and Laura is young enough for there to be a reasonable expectation that her consistency could see very significant improvements over the next few years.
I wonder if she's wishing she'd been 2nd out of the LL pot (or Soler Espinosa had held on until Tuesday) and got Babos instead. Not an 'easy' draw either, but not as bad as AMG.

I know what you mean as well. Having seen her alot in practice ahead of the Fed Cup tie, there would be periods where she was so inconsistent, but then she would hit a purple patch when she didn't miss, and that would be point after point, so its there, I just think her fitness is maybe 80% of what it could be and that also affects her mentally regarding her ability to focus for long periods.

Julia Carrot · All-time great

Stircrazy wrote:
Julia Carrot wrote:
And Babos just retired at 1 - 6 !
The RG site says that Karatancheva won by 1 & 0.

Yes. I obviously need better glasses !

Peter too · Tennis legend

Injuries have hampered her training. She should have just about stopped growing now and that should reduce the number of injuries and make it possible to train more and improve her fitness and speed.
The best way to stop her opponent moving her around is to use her power to force her opponent to keep moving. When she hits a purple patch and blasts the ball from corner to corner she is unstoppable but then she hits a patch when the balls just go out instead of just going in and the points slip away.
She clearly has enormous ability she should improve the mental side of her game as she competes with the top players. If she can get into that almost Zen like state of relaxed concentration of the top athletes allied to a belief that she can't lose she may just find that actually she can't lose.

Maza1987 · Challenger level

Heather is 1st on court 6 with Anne 3rd on the same court.

Heather's will be televised like Laura's today.

thegingerlightbulb · Intermediate Club Player

Peter too wrote:
Injuries have hampered her training. She should have just about stopped growing now and that should reduce the number of injuries and make it possible to train more and improve her fitness and speed.
The best way to stop her opponent moving her around is to use her power to force her opponent to keep moving. When she hits a purple patch and blasts the ball from corner to corner she is unstoppable but then she hits a patch when the balls just go out instead of just going in and the points slip away.
She clearly has enormous ability she should improve the mental side of her game as she competes with the top players. If she can get into that almost Zen like state of relaxed concentration of the top athletes allied to a belief that she can't lose she may just find that actually she can't lose.

I was going to say something very similar. When I saw her win junior Wimbledon at 14 I thought it inevietable that she would be a top 20 player at the very least. But I worry about her mental side holding her back more than anything. She has choked on too many big occassions (i'm referring to the qualifying round rather than round one here). I noticed that Jonathan Overend said not too long ago that he felt she needed to get serious. I'm not a big reader of players tweets, but on the few occassions I have glanced at hers she seems to be more concerned with glee and pop idol than in Tennis. That is understandable for a teenager, but if she wants to get to the very top then she needs to start knuckling down in my opinion

Mervatron · Masters Series Champion

I have to agree with what you guys have said about Laura. At time she seems to lack the desire but then you see her at wimbledon and she's like another player.

It would be nice to see her go 6 months injury free then we might see the best of her.

Helen40 · Grand Slam Champion

This is where the Eastern block players have it over us - they really desire it, and don't get all the freebies for failure that our players do.

steven · Tennis legend

thegingerlightbulb wrote:
Peter too wrote:
Injuries have hampered her training. She should have just about stopped growing now and that should reduce the number of injuries and make it possible to train more and improve her fitness and speed.
The best way to stop her opponent moving her around is to use her power to force her opponent to keep moving. When she hits a purple patch and blasts the ball from corner to corner she is unstoppable but then she hits a patch when the balls just go out instead of just going in and the points slip away.
She clearly has enormous ability she should improve the mental side of her game as she competes with the top players. If she can get into that almost Zen like state of relaxed concentration of the top athletes allied to a belief that she can't lose she may just find that actually she can't lose.
I was going to say something very similar. When I saw her win junior Wimbledon at 14 I thought it inevietable that she would be a top 20 player at the very least. But I worry about her mental side holding her back more than anything. She has choked on too many big occassions (i'm referring to the qualifying round rather than round one here). I noticed that Jonathan Overend said not too long ago that he felt she needed to get serious. I'm not a big reader of players tweets, but on the few occassions I have glanced at hers she seems to be more concerned with glee and pop idol than in Tennis. That is understandable for a teenager, but if she wants to get to the very top then she needs to start knuckling down in my opinion

I know what you mean about the impression Laura gives but surely it's unlikely she'd be doing even this well without lots of desire and a lot of work to back it up. She may still need to mature a bit (she'd probably even admit that herself, I imagine) and may need to train still harder, who knows, but these kind of things used to be said about Andy too and he certainly upped his game. I certainly don't think there's much chance of Laura ending up as the Ernests Gulbis of the WTA or anything like that. smile

As to her tweets, different players have a different emphasis to their tweets. Laura is obviously very keen to be seen to be 'cool' (as opposed to, say, Heather or Bally, who don't seem to care nearly as much about that and, for me, end up cooler as a result ... though bear in mind that this is coming from someone who has never tried to be cool and has never managed it accidentally either biggrin ) but that doesn't mean the things she tweets about are the main focus of her life.

I do remember laughing when she said in an interview once that she doesn't tweet about results because that's boring and nobody wants to hear about them. Why does she think the majority of her followers follow her - for her fashion tips?! (although once she starts playing exclusively WTA tour events, she could have more of a point, since scores & results for them are so easy to find)

Anyway, interviews on the ITV site:

Laura post-match: http://itv.co/LCFBGw
Heather: http://itv.co/LCFMlp

Ratty · County player

Gosh, this sense of moral outrage about poor Laura is just fascinating.

She just DOESN'T WANT IT ENOUGH (oh, yawn) and she's LETTING US DOWN!!!

Actually, I really don't think that ball-striking ability - on its own - is a particularly good indicator of success at the highest level. I would speculate that athleticism - which usually brings with it movement, stamina and freedom from injury - is a better indicator.

Yes, there have been a few - Sharapova and Davenport spring to mind - of players whose ball-striking has been so good that they've managed to compensate for poor athleticism. But I'd say this is unusual.

And the thing is, athleticism - or lack of - is determined by your genes. So criticising the poor girl on this score is a tad unfair.

As Michael Shermer wrote in rueful regret about his failure to make it as a professional cyclist: "I should have had better parents".

Anyway, good luck to Laura, she seems like a nice, well-adjusted 18-year old. Just keep on ploughing your own furrow ...

smile