Week 18 - ITF $25K - Phuket, Thailand - Hard

blob · All-time great

RE: Week 18 - ITF $25K - Phuket, Thailand - Hard

Peter too · Tennis legend

R2: MOORE, Tara (GBR) 2 200 v BORECKA, Martina (CZE) Q 591

Tara won their previous meeting in Sunderland 2011 in three sets.

murray_2k9 · Challenger qualifying

Im sure the girls will still hang around and support Tara (Mel will, of course, with the dubs)

Tara should be looking to live up to her seeding at least IMO.

paulisi · Tennis legend

Tara has tweeted that she lost

Tara Moore@TaraMoore927m
Lost 6 in the third with no backhand, no serve and no return #thailand #getmehomeasap

steven · Tennis legend

Tara tweets again: "These two weeks have been excruciating both physically and mentally.. #thailand #NoRelief"

Difficult to guess exactly what's wrong, hopefully it just means she really hates the conditions out there and will be back to being happy, winning Tara before too long.

blob · All-time great

Two close, tough losses

R2: MOORE, Tara (GBR) 2 200 lost to BORECKA, Martina (CZE) Q 591 6-1 1-6 6-7(4)

Doubles:
QF: Tara MOORE/Melanie SOUTH (GBR/GBR) [3] lost to Alexandra ARTAMONOVA/Martina BORECKA (RUS/CZE) 4-6 7-6(2) [8-10]

korriban · Challenger level

steven wrote:
Tara tweets again: "These two weeks have been excruciating both physically and mentally.. #thailand #NoRelief"
Difficult to guess exactly what's wrong, hopefully it just means she really hates the conditions out there and will be back to being happy, winning Tara before too long.

I also hope everything is OK off the court, and that she gets back her form on it. It must be a little hard for her twitter followers to be overly sympathetic having seen the paradise conditions in Phuket, and wishing they were in Tara's place. Probably better than Tyomen in Winter. These oppressively hot and humid conditions are the same for everyone, and crop up regularly on the tour in bigger events, which is why the very top players train specifically for them. Noone will "enjoy" playing when its that hot, but some cope better than the rest. I hope Tara takes inspiration from these 2 difficult weeks longer term.

indiana · Tennis legend

Pity.

Yes, difficult to be clear what's so wrong. Does seem to have really disliked the conditions, presumably weather, though one tweet is much more technically related re backhand, serve and return ( which doesn't leave a huge lot else ! )

Unfortunately, nothing gained ranking pointswise out here, already having 8 points as her 16th counter ( a sign of her consistency ).

I hope she can get back in good swing quite quickly in more pleasant conditions for her. But as korriban suggests, testing conditions are the same for all ( though yes maybe better suited to some ) and are something that a player has to try and embrace and try to learn from, possibly more than Tara has.

murray_2k9 · Challenger qualifying

I'm becoming more and more against these kind of trips in all honesty. It seems everytime a player goes out there all we here about is how awful the conditions or courts are. Surely our girls have come to realise that the reason these events have weaker fields is for that exact reason? With the exception of Mel doing the Australian 25k swing years ago to get DA into the AO, I cant think of any players who have ever benefited from choosing these sorts of blocks.

blob · All-time great

Well, although only for a single event, Tara's excursion to Kazan last year was a very profitable one for her.
Amanda Carreras' South American trips also yield regular returns.
To some extent you could also argue the case for Laura in Guangzhou, and Heather in Osaka last year.

Peter too · Tennis legend

Emily has in the past collected useful numbers of points from tournaments in India and Elena had successful runs in in the Far East in 2007 and 2009 when she was recovering from injury.

Ratty · County player

Yes, but what's the endgame?

Surely one becomes a pro to make a living playing tennis. And you certainly can't make a living scratching around Futures and Challengers in far-off places with weak fields, no matter if you manage to scrape your way up through the rankings.

You make a living by GETTING TO BE WORLD CLASS. And I can't see how deliberately seeking out weak opponents achieves that goal.

steven · Tennis legend

I got the impression the main reason they went to Thailand was to escape the clay rather than seek out weak opponents.

Anyway, as we have seen, even if the field is a bit weaker than it would be in Europe, that can be more than made up for by them being more used to the playing conditions out there.

indiana · Tennis legend

Seemed to me on the face of it a perfectly reasonable enough trip to make, especially going as a group.

And I really don't think in their cases it was particularly seeking out weak fields, though maybe was some element, but probably more, as Steven suggested, finding hard court competition at at least 25K level. Also good training facilities with say Tara tweeting about the track work they were doing before she went into "I wanna come home" mode.

It hasn't totally worked out in Thailand, though Lisa got very good points last week. But I still don't even retrospectively see it as such a bad idea.

korriban · Challenger level

I agree with you Indiana. If Tara attempts RG qualies, she will want to practice on clay on her return, but it's not 100% certain she will go to Paris (even though her ranking is good enough). Continuing on hard courts seemed an eminently sensible move in April. Same for the other girls, who likely will avoid the clay court season all together. Perfectly reasonable 2 week tour, with the location a "bonus". the girls all sounded quite keen before they left!

I don't think there are too many "easy" tournaments at $25k level anywhere. The fields in Phuket weren't particularly weak, or rather the weather conditions made first and second rounds a potential lottery against local players - so in many ways there is high risk involved, with no easy points.

Tara is the first to mock herself about her food obsession, loathing of track/endurance training, core fitness etc - although she's certainly has in my opinion much more balance, natural speed about the court and athleticism than the likes of, say, a Laura........but in exceptionally hot and humid conditions, over 3 set matches, anyone less than super-fit is bound to suffer in the end.......and I imagine a lot of the Europeans, not just ours, will have been at or beyond their physical limits