Bob in Spain wrote:

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philwrig wrote:

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Thanks for the reports Bob, also now following you on twitter !

Kyle continues to impress which is no surprise to me, can't see any downside to his potential development. Pretty confident we're looking at a solid top 50 player within the next 5 years.

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Saw you had joined my list on Twitter.

I have a free pass to go and watch tomorrow so hope to come back with another (winning) report.  Kyle's fan club is growing over here.  Took a couple of friends with me on Monday and they enjoyed it so much, they are going again tomorrow.  Also our local club coach is joining us.  If he makes the final, I may have to hire a minibus

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 Since I spent a bit of time with Kyle and his dad last year at Newcastle, I have been even more interested in his career development. Let's hope the locals get to see plenty more of Kyle in action this week.

I was looking earlier at Jack Sock's patterns of play, figuring that he was an interesting parallel in age and junior experience to some of our players. He essentially stopped playing futures just after turning 18 (well at about 18.5 .... beginning of 2011) and went on to Challengers and ATPs, undoubtedly benefiting from WCs along the way. He didn't always do well in 2011/12. Indeed, he had streaks of 1st round losses at times ... not a bad thing to be reminded that it's true of many players! But when he won, he got good points. Clearly that's one person ... and one can't generalise. But it's interesting that that's the way he and his coaches chose to go.

I, too, would like to see at least one or two non-grass Challengers in the UK. Agree on the nature of the grass-court Challengers and tournaments.

-- Edited by Spectator on Wednesday 27th of February 2013 10:14:13 AM

-- Edited by Spectator on Wednesday 27th of February 2013 10:15:44 AM

Good morning tennis fans. Off in a while to hopefully see Kyle reach his first QF of the season. That in itself seems a remarkable fact given the number of matches he has won so far. Oh the joys of 128 player qualies.

But before you all get too excited, a word of warning. There is rain in the air and has been plenty of it overnight. Yes. There you go. I said it. Rain in Spain !!

In fact it does seem that "the rain in Spain stays mainly on the...tennis court where Kyle is playing". I can only remember about 4 days of rain in since October last year and two of them have been in this last fortnight on Kyle's match days. Having said that, he played pretty well through the rain in his 1st round win in Murcia.

The sun is trying very hard to break through but there are still a lot of dark and threatening clouds hanging about.

Watch this space.

Phil. "Buster" is playing this afternoon.....next up in fact.

I'm going for 5 games to his opponent tops.

If anyone wants to play along with a guess of how easily he wins, or for those radicals out there, that he loses........ probably about 5-10 mins before the match starts.

-- Edited by korriban on Wednesday 27th of February 2013 04:48:08 PM

korriban wrote:

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Would be interesting if you DO get the chance to have a chat about tournament choices. Noticed Nick Kyrgios rack up another CH QF overnight, to add to his CH SF a few weeks back. Today he beat an opponent in the 400s, but notches up 15 points, a few weeks back he earned 29 points (I think) for 3 matches won. In both tournaments, he's done VERY well, but the draws were very weak in the main. As you pointed out, Kyle has twice won 5 matches in a row this year against decent opposition, probably not dissimilar levels, for 1 point a pop. I know Australia has some unique advantages here, but for many of Kyle's rivals, they will have some juicy challenger or Atp WCs to enjoy through the season. Kyle doesnt need to obsess about his ranking, but equally he can't ignore it either, especially if he wants to enter a few big qualies later in 2013 without WCs. I'm increasingly uncomfortable about the LTA paring back its WC gifts to a smaller and smaller number of significant tournaments over a smaller and smaller time window, on grass only which is a 1 month a year surface on the tour. God forbid you are out of form in June, dont like grass, or get a poor draw: then what?!

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I doubt the opposition in those Futures qualies was similar to that in Challenger main draws (even relatively weak Aussies Challenger draws!) but yes, I get your point.

While it may still be true that the Brits who get wild cards for Challengers, ATPs & Wimbledon get some advantage from them financially compared to players from non-slam countries (or at least, they would if Wimbledon actually gave as many singles WCs to home players as the other slams do), as far as realistic potential points from WCs go, I would say they're at a disadvantage compared to countries that run a few bog-standard Challengers each year.

The problem with grass court Challengers is that they tend to be ridiculously strong because for many players in the 100-200 range intending to play in Wimbledon qualifying, that's the only way they can get some matches in on grass beforehand. Add to this that even if a British player does qualify and/or win a round of two at Queen's, the points on offer are derisory relative to the standard of the opposition (because it's usually ridiculously strong for an ATP 250 and because of the way the points work when there are more than 32 players in the draw) and that Eastbourne clashes with Wimbledon qualifying and the realistic chances of Brits getting significant points from wild cards above Futures level look very slim indeed.

In Cartagena today, Kyle Edmund beat Oriol Roca Batalla by 6-4 4-6 6-4.

I highlight the word "Batalla" because translated into English, it means "Battle", and that word sums up perfectly today's match. Kyle was forced to battle his in-form opponent, the cold and blustery conditions, but most of all, himself.  Today was by no means his most accomplished performance but again, he found a way to win.  On the brief occasions where Kyle managed to raise his game, most obviously in the middle portion of the 3rd set, the difference in class was clear, but this didn't really happen too often.

Roca Batalla has a style similar in many ways to Sorgi, whom Kyle beat in the 1st round.  He heavily favoured his forehand which was a potent weapon but having been brought up on clay, there was more variety of pace and angle to his game, and a well disguised dropshot which he used to his advantage on several occasions in the first set.  However, his single handed backhand, whilst solid enough, did not have the pace to trouble Kyle in baseline rallies.  Despite his short and stocky stature, his served packed quite a punch, on the rare occasion that it found the service box.

Up to 4-4 in the first set, there was very little to choose between them with only one break point - against Kyle - which was duly saved with a big kicker serve out to the backhand from the ad court.  This was a tactic that Kyle used to great effect against the less potent backhand of his opponent.  The first set was decided more than anything on each players ability to cope with adversity when the moment arose.  Each had one such moment to deal with.  Serving at 4 all, 40-15, Roca put his first serve long but whilst preparing for the second serve, was interrupted by a ball coming over from the adjacent court.  He demanded to repeat the point thereby having another first serve, on the grounds that he had entered his service action.  The umpire refused stating that he hadn't "tossed the ball" and called "second serve".  Roca demanded the tournament referee and a lengthy delay ensued.  Eventually, the referee ruled in Roca's favour and the point was repeated.  However, having won the argument, Roca quite simply lost the plot.  He dumped the repeated first serve into the bottom of the net and a woefully short second serve was dispatched by Kyle with a winning forehand return.  Next came a wild double fault and more shouting at the umpire.  Kyle went on to take four points in a row from 40-15 and broke for the first time.

Then, when serving for the set, Kyle had his own moment to deal with.  Having already saved two break points from 15-40 - the first with a heavy service winner and the second with a surprise "serve and volley" tactic leading to another error on the return - he found himself at deuce. Another good first serve saw Roca's return hit fractionally long.  The umpire called let and nobody knew why.  Kyle pointed out the mark showing the return was out but the umpire insisted the point was replayed.  What had happened was that the umpire had accidently dislodged a couple of balls from his "bag of spares" on the umpires chair whilst Kyle was serving.  Nobody had noticed except the umpire but Kyle was denied the point.  However, unlike Roca, he kept his cool and went on to save two more break points before serving out the set.

The second set was a war of attrition with each player trying to nullify the other's strengths.  Kyle was constantly hitting crosscourt wide to the Roca backhand, whilst Roca was hitting heavy slice to take the pace off the ball - pace on which Kyle would usually thrive.  It became a bit of a stalemate, punctuated by the occasional flash of brilliance from each player.  Kyle tried to change tactics at times by coming to the net, invariably approaching on the Roca backhand and did so with some success.  But without a single break point, we reached 4-5 with Kyle to serve.  At 30-0, he looked comfortable and was controlling the next rally when he attempted a drop shot from behind the baseline.  It fell well short of the net.  This lapse in concentration seemed to affect him and he quickly lost the next two points.  At 30-40 he again came to the net, only to be met by Roca's best backhand of the day - a passing shot down the line.  A set that had seemed destined for a tiebreak from the first point, was gone in a flash.

Bouyed by equalising the sets, Roca raced to a 2-0 lead in the final set with Kyle struggling to find his form.  I have to say that at this moment, Indiana's comments about recent 3rd set capitulations sprung to mind and I was thinking "here we go again".  But suddenly, Kyle kicked into gear.  His frustration in his own performance seemed to turn to anger, which he in turn converted into "intensity" (coach Beechy's buzzword for the day) and during the next four games he showed his true abilities.  Attacking at every possibility there were a string of winners and dominant rallies. 2-0 down soon became 4-2 up and if he could maintain the momentum, the result seemed inevitable.

Roca, to be fair, held a very solid service game with some big serves and then Kyle simply went back into is shell and became defensive.  He lost his service game to love and was then 40-0 down on the Roca serve.  By this time Kyle was shouting at himself with "rubbish" being his favourite adjective.  It was "go for broke" time and that is exactly what he did - the aggression and intensity returned along with 3 well played points.  On the second deuce we saw the point of the match.  Kyle again came to the net and played a great drop volley from below the height of the net.  Roca managed to race in and pick up the low ball and both players found themselves face to face at the net.  A quickfire exchange of 5 or 6 volleys, reminisent of the best doubles matches, ended up with Kyle "killing" a high backhand volley.  The body language said it all as Roca's shoulders dropped while Kyle turned to Beechy with a fist pump and a roar.  Roca immediately followed up with a double fault and Kyle had his break of serve.

He duly served out the match to battle home in 3 sets.  The overiding emotion was relief, both for Kyle and those of us "suffering" courtside.  For the most part, he had played a solid but unspectacular game, punctuated by occasional lapses and brief periods of pure quality.  Roca had played his socks off but it wasn't quite enough.

At times, I have to remind myself that Kyle is only 18 and that we shouldn't expect him to be at his utmost best every day.  But today, his "average" was marginally better than his opponents "best" and that is what got him his result.

 

-- Edited by Bob in Spain on Thursday 28th of February 2013 09:30:14 AM

Hope there aren't too many discrepancies between my report and Tennis36's running scoreline commentary. Trying to do these reports from memory isn't easy, so if my sequences are a bit out at any point, put it down to old age. 

Note to self : take a notepad next time. 

-- Edited by Bob in Spain on Thursday 28th of February 2013 09:30:57 AM