Week 40 - Hungary F1 ($15,000) - Budapest (Clay)

korriban · Challenger level

RE: Week 40 - Hungary F1 ($15,000) - Budapest (Clay)

Tennis36 · Masters Series Champion

kyle wins the first two points only to lose the next 4, set over, 6-1

korriban · Challenger level

Make that 1-6, with 6 games lost in a row.

Now at this point, someone's going to probably say "is he injured/unwell?" because it's a testament to how good he's become so quickly that this sort of spanking by a much lower ranked Pole on his beloved clay just doesn't feel right.

Tennis36 · Masters Series Champion

the thumping looks like continuing second set, btw this guy's ranking is made from the last 4 months only, hadn't played before that in the previous year, so may be heavily under ranked

Tennis36 · Masters Series Champion

big hold from kyle! saves a few bp's, 1-1*

korriban · Challenger level

Tennis36 wrote:
the thumping looks like continuing second set, btw this guy's ranking is made from the last 4 months only, hadn't played before that in the previous year, so may be heavily under ranked

That's a really good point. In fact he's been notching up some great tournaments - lots of SFs and even a win - only losing to top 200/300 type players really. Means that Kyle's draw was even more toxic than I had thought.

Up against it 1-6 *0-1 and BPs down Kyle rallied to 1-1. BPs faced every single service game so far bar one, which went to deuce. If Kyle can find a way through a match like this I would be amazed....Go On!

Miriambee · Futures level

let's hope this Pole goes on to win the whole thing, rather than destruct in the next match!

Tennis36 · Masters Series Champion

impossible to know what to make of that really

Bob in Spain · Tennis legend

Oh no ! Just got out of bed and the first thing I did was check the score. Think I might go back to bed !!

Who knows what happened today but if it was just a "bad day at the office", I think we can allow Kyle this one. After all, he doesn't have too many.

On to next week.

korriban · Challenger level

Bob in Spain wrote:
Oh no ! Just got out of bed and the first thing I did was check the score. Think I might go back to bed !!

Who knows what happened today but if it was just a "bad day at the office", I think we can allow Kyle this one. After all, he doesn't have too many.

On to next week.

After the progress he's made, Kyle's allowed a few bad days for sure!

It's just very unusual for any player of his level and obvious upside potential to be on the end of an absolute spanking like that from a decent but certainly not a noteworthy player, especially when we know Kyle will have been 100% professional both before and during the match. Kyle having an off-day would still probably beat most of the players below him on the GB ranking table, especially on clay. To lose 1&1 to a much lower ranked player for Kyle these days (and it could easily have been 0&0 - he had to really scrap for those too) suggests a problem to me......if it is, hopefully nothing serious......trust he hasn't been having Romanian food again like last month!

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

I've (obviously!) absolutely no idea but it's just possible that if, as Bob in Spain mentioned and Kyle's dad confirmed at the Davis Cup, that Kyle has bulked up quite a bit very recently then it may well take a little time for him to re-adjust.

I've seen a lot of youngsters completely floored (temporarily!) by having a little growth spurt, by adding weight (from the gym or other) etc.

One of the funniest was one top 17 year-old who completely lost his game and nobody knew why - coach, everybody, were perplexed - and no change in body shape or anything. Well, seemingly not . . . until his mum mentioned to me in passing that her shoe bill had gone through the roof because his feet had grown a whole size.

The poor lad was basically falling over his feet and in the wrong place the whole time but nobody (even him) had thought of that (because his height hadn't changed).

Anyway, maybe completely irrelevant and he'll be right on song next week, but if Kyle has physically bulked up a bit then it might be a factor.

indiana · Tennis legend

Kyle needs to get on twitter and gaming machines a lot more. Taking his tennis far too seriously.

Seriously, yes that's all very strange. Even allowing for the fact that his opponent is clearly substantially underranked after missing so much of the last year, it should at least have been expected to be a pretty competitive match.

Would be very interesting to know the whys and wherefores.

stevemcqueen · Futures qualifying

For sure everybody is disappointed, but in the overall scheme of things it is no big deal. His short term objective of AOQ is a very lofty one. I would tell him keep playing, keep training and don't be too despondent or stressed. Success will come with time.

indiana · Tennis legend

Yes, steve, Kyle has most certainly shown what he can do so if something was very wrong with his game today, one must assume it is just temporary. He of course remains a really good looking prospect.

Still rather intrigued as to why.

Bob in Spain · Tennis legend

Here is a quote from Azarenka after her defeat this week.

"It was an awful match and very bad performance from me, so not much to say," said Azarenka, "It happens once, twice a year to every player, and happened to me today."

Now I'm not saying that is what happened to Kyle today - after all, none of us know. But it is possible.

However, there is of course another possibility. Maybe his opponent just played a blinder. We tend to focus so much on own home grown players (quite rightly in my opinion) but I think sometimes we forget that the other player is just as capable of playing a "blinder" or a "stinker" as well.

For all we know, perhaps we should just be applauding Koniusz on a great performance by him and moving on to next week.

All-in-all, no big deal (providing it isn't an injury)