Week 35: US Open (women's main draw) - hard

steven · Tennis legend

Week 35: US Open (women's main draw) - hard

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Not a great draw by any stretch of the imagination. Heather gets an opponent on the rise and full of confidence, and Laura's draw while not terrible could have been a lot better given her seeding. Would be a great result for Hev to win, and Laura's match will depend on her fitness/match sharpness as we know Dominguez Lino won't be troubling the winners & unforced error scorer much.

R3 rematch with Li Na would be interesting to say the least.

-- Edited by tony_orient on Thursday 22nd of August 2013 11:17:54 PM

paulisi · Tennis legend

ouch - will really struggle with those matches....

philwrig · Hall of fame

Robbo v LDL is an interesting matchup.
First match in their H2H was played when Laura was heavily fatigued after her Shenzhen heroics, and LDL had a great tournament.
Second match of course saw Robbo missing a MP before being hammered in the final set when neither player was playing particularly well.

My guess is that assuming Robbo is 90% fit she will most likely win as LDL is not in form.
Hev would have found Halep difficult if 100% fit and in form so it will be tough.

What price Bally makes it the farthest of the GB ladies.

Spectator · All-time great

Bother.

Priesty · Challenger level

Hev gets some rotten luck with GS round 1 draws cry

philwrig · Hall of fame

Laura has been doing pre tournament interviews and explained the nature of her wrist injury. I'm no doctor but if this was a normal tournament I doubt there would be any chance of her playing.

She 's torn the sheath part of the tendon in the wrist, has only been able to start practice in the last couple of days. Has needed a cortisone injection for it to really feel alot better. No doubt she will have further injections when she plays( don't like the sound of that ).

I did a google search and found a baseball player with a similar injury who's recovery time was put at 8-10 weeks.

Just worried that if she plays and does somehow get thru a couple of rounds, all she will do is do more damage to the wrist and probably be out for the rest of the season.

www1.skysports.com/news/12040/8885580/

Her opponents will surely just hit to her backhand, it sounds like madness to me to even play.

-- Edited by philwrig on Friday 23rd of August 2013 09:02:06 PM

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

I think we will have only a good idea of Laura's game really is in respect to the injury after the first few games of her 1st round match. Dominguez Lino will make her play a lot of balls, mainly on the backhand so Laura will need to be able to play her backhand with 100% conviction. The media articles are putting a very positive spin on Laura's interview, which is either reflecting Laura's positive frame of mind or just wishful thinking.

I would be very surprised if she hasn't been assured that playing the US Open won't cause further problems, but equally it doesn't sound like she is 100% ready. The injury certainly came at a really bad time for Laura with lots of big tournaments in a short space of time and with her confidence high of the back of Wimbledon.

-- Edited by tony_orient on Friday 23rd of August 2013 10:38:38 PM

indiana · Tennis legend

Yes, Phil, the more I hear about this wrist the more concerned I ger.

The timing is unfortunate, and she has a lot of ranking points to defend. But the most important thing is that it heals properly and is not a longterm problem.

Bob in Spain · Tennis legend

Every time I hear about Laura's injury, I think "DelPo".

He was out for a long time with (I think) a wrist injury. No way would I take a risk if it is not 100%.

philwrig · Hall of fame

I think if you do the rehab properly, I don't think there is a problem, but playing before it is properly healed with the aid of cortisone injections just doesn't sound good.

Delpo was the classic example of him playing through the pain during his run to the US open win, but then paying for it afterwards by being out for such a long time.

I suspect the lure of it being a GS,and the need to defend all those points has been too much to resist.

I'm just hoping that the medical people have given her reassurance that she can't do any long term damage by playing next week.

philwrig · Hall of fame

I think its more that Laura's putting a positive spin on it.

LordBrownof · Futures level

Halep beat Woz to make the finals in New Haven. I think all we can hope for is for Heather to play well and Halep to show signs of fatigue. She plays Kvitova in the final.

korriban · Challenger level

LordBrownof wrote:
Halep beat Woz to make the finals in New Haven. I think all we can hope for is for Heather to play well and Halep to show signs of fatigue. She plays Kvitova in the final.

Halep is an interesting player for Heather watchers to consider. She's probably the same height as Heather, perhaps even slightly smaller, and seemed to have plateaued at about #50 in the world for a year or more. I'm not sure she was ever considered to be a world-beater, but a very solid counter-punching player (in fact until recently she was probably best known for taking the extraordinary step of having a quite dramatic breast reduction operation at the age of 17 or 18, because she felt it was the only way she could become a top player).

Gradually she seems to have bulked up her upper body, improved her endurance, but more significantly she has become much more aggressive in rallies (not borderline reckless a la Kvitova/Robson, more controlled - aggressive forcing shots more than outright winners), rather than being a more traditional counter-puncher. I suspect it's been something she has been working on for quite some time, and it has taken quite a while for her to get the balance right. Hope Heather can do a Halep soon.

korriban · Challenger level

Watching Simona Halep on BT Sport. Borderline flawless. Absolutely sublime tennis. Good luck Hev!!!!!

From *1-2 15-40 down first set, that's just about as perfect a womens' performance as I've seen for some time on a tennis court. The speed and athleticism of a Henin to be in position all the time, even for the wide balls, great serving that belies her size, brilliant and aggressive control of the points without any stupid Hollywood shots, brilliant DTL shots on both wings, excellent decision-making on when to come forward and above all an amazing serenity and calmness at all times.

Kvitova went from being excellent to being awful very quickly as it became clear that all her power was being absorbed, allowing Halep to take control of every single point once the ball was in play......Kvitova's only hope was to go for it on serve and take wild risks on winners. Above all, it exposed Kvitova's poor footwork, consistency and athleticism (she was running aimlessly from side to side, puffing and blowing, going for winners far too early).......in this type of match-up, I fear Laura Robson would have barely won a game.

This girl has got a real chance of being top 10, maybe even top 5 on this evidence. Suspect there hasn't been much of a focus on big marketing and sponsorship deals while she's putting in all the hard graft to transform her game over 18 months - others might learn from this. Feel very sorry for Hev, but tennis is so bizarre sometimes that you never know!

-- Edited by korriban on Sunday 25th of August 2013 11:32:09 AM

-- Edited by korriban on Sunday 25th of August 2013 11:35:27 AM