Week 43 - Israel F11 ($10,000) - Ashkelon (Hard)

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Week 43 - Israel F11 ($10,000) - Ashkelon (Hard)

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Let's not forget the other two Brits:

L16: (1) Pierre-Hughes Herbert (FRA) WR 306 defeated Joshua Jones WR 986 by 4 & 3
L16: (7) Richard Gabb WR 761 defeated Henrik Sillanpää (FIN) WR 1124 by 5 & 1

****

QF: (1) Pierre-Hughes Herbert (FRA) WR 306 vs (7) Richard Gabb WR 761 bleh

Oli's tweets about the rockets are reported by OEM in today's Times.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

QF: (3) Oli Golding & Maximilian Neuchrist (AUT) WR 856 defeated Cédrick Commin (FRA) & Richard Gabb WR 2786 by 4 & 3

*****

A double(s) helping of Koolhof for Oli:

SF: (1) Stephan Fransen & Wesley Koolhof (NED/NED) WR 833 vs (3) Oli Golding & Maximilian Neuchrist (AUT) WR 856

They would be appear to be quite closely matched...

steven · Tennis legend

The BBC are reporting a kind of truce today http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-20077408

SMC1809 · All-time great

Maybe our guys are keen to get out before the truce ends.

Richard trails 1-5* and Oli 2-3*

steven · Tennis legend

Richard lost the 1st set 6-1, Oli had bps v Koolhof but failed to capitalise - *2-4

steven · Tennis legend

QF: (3) Oli Golding WR 433 lost to (6) Wesley Koolhof (NED) WR 701 (= CH) by 2 & 0 bleh

steven · Tennis legend

Difficult to know whether Oli just wanted to get out after that 1st set, was a bit injured or just had a nightmare day - in his 2nd set service games, he:

- df'd, went 30-15 up, then lost the next 3 points
- served 3 dfs in a row and got broken to love
- got broken to love with a df to finish

steven · Tennis legend

QF: (7) Richard Gabb WR 761 lost to (1) Pierre-Hughes Herbert (FRA) WR 306 by 1 & 4

indiana · Tennis legend

Hmm, pretty awful result for Oli, but I'd like to know his thoughts on it. Maybe for nstance he was serously spooked by yesterday's missile events and say hasn't slept all night or whatever.

steven · Tennis legend

indiana wrote:
Hmm, pretty awful result for Oli, but I'd like to know his thoughts on it. Maybe for nstance he was serously spooked by yesterday's missile events and say hasn't slept all night or whatever.

Either that or they were able to redeploy the "Iron Dome" to intercept his serves ...

The Knight · Challenger qualifying

indiana wrote:
Hmm, pretty awful result for Oli, but I'd like to know his thoughts on it. Maybe for nstance he was serously spooked by yesterday's missile events and say hasn't slept all night or whatever.

or even tanked to get out of there?

korriban · Challenger level

Don't know if Oli has tweeted yet with an explanation. Should be very revealing.

Conditions (missile attacks) clearly appalling, but it's the same for everyone, and he presumably would have come straight home if safety was a concern. Once you decide to play, you can't complain (well you can and should complain, but you get on with it anyway).

Thinking back, there was a VERY very long pause in points updating at 2-3* 0-30 in the first set, whilst other matches seemed to be moving along fine. Next point went to Oli, (0-40), but he then went on to lose the next 14 after this, and effectively went to pieces. Wonder if he hurt himself at that point? The collapse was so sudden and spectacular, that it would make most sense, but he carried on playing so I'm a little baffled. This wouldn't be the first time this year there's been a sudden reverse.

Anyway, given the missile situation, the sooner all our players are home the better.

Good fighting effort from Richard, however.

korriban · Challenger level

Which scuppers my injury theory about Oli's singles.

His thoughts WILL be interesting indeed. Got a bad feeling about this one....

indiana · Tennis legend

Oli's played a lot of tournaments this year, more particularly in the last 5 months when he has competed in 17 out of the last 21 weeks. Maybe often not played as many matches as he would like, but that's a lot of weeks on the road.

So, I do think it makes sense now for some rest, recuperation and then hard training before 2013. And take time to learn some of the lessons from his first really full year as a tournament pro.

I had thought he might play Loughborough since he does seem to rise to the occasion. But now, appreciating more just what his schedule has been ( I had thought he had seemed to have played a lot, but hadn't actually counted it up ) his plans do make sense and certainly a good close season is more important than defending points from November / December of last year.

Re his attitude on court, yes he clearly gets frustrated ( very likely to his detriment ) in some matches. Maybe Andy could be some lesson to him. To my mind it took Andy far far too long to markedly improve some of his attitudes ( if maybe certain different issues in that he's never really been a racquet thrower say ). OK, Andy was still managing to sompete pretty successfully at a very high level, but I do think his negativity at times was distinctly unhelpful.

Oli did indeed, early in the year, set himself WR 350 as a target for year end. I though that was a reasonable and realistic target. He won't make it, but he has clearly progressed a fair bit. What is now more important is how much he has learned, what improvements he can make to his game, both technically and matchplay attitude, and then what progress he can make in 2013.

-- Edited by indiana on Friday 26th of October 2012 01:01:07 PM