Week 35 - US Open Singles Main Draw - Hard

DF · Tennis legend

RE: Week 35 - US Open Singles Main Draw - Hard

DF · Tennis legend

and they succeed, winning 6-4 6-4

PaulM · Tennis legend

Great effort but missed opportunities. Fantastic they got in the draw, and with such little time to prepare.

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

Decent showing, especially considering the short, uncertain and fractured schedule.
Hopefully the ~$14K can help them get out to some tour events later in the year that they might otherwise have missed - Linz, Luxembourg etc.

indiana · Tennis legend

Very decent showing ( maybe a bit unused to Ad points ! )

Hope their first foreign Slam experience was still positive and of course the money helps !

Now just need to have a fairly good end to the season to remove any doubts about their Aussie Open participation.

They will be unchanged for now, each on 973 ranking points ( women's doubles doesn't have compulsory counters ) with just a 60 pointer in October to defend for the rest of the year. That can currently be replaced by a 25 pointer so only a net 35 points to defend before the Aussie Open.

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

So Joss and Anna are out even before I found out they were in cry

Decent effort though considering they haven't been in great form and such short notice. Prize money is useful as it's not great in doubles away from the slams.

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Jo is first on again tomorrow at 4pm BST - should be a good match, no pressure on her but she knows she can beat Muguruza too.

Helen40 · Grand Slam Champion

insomniacfolder wrote:
So, how do we decide? What should the expectation be?
Well, one way could be to look at players who are of (verrrrry) broadly similar levels, who also had time out commensurate with Lauras, and look at how long it took them from when they started to play again until they got back to where they were, or thereabouts.
So, here's a selection:
Player Time to regain
~Position Notes
Petkovic 18 months
Zvonareva 36 months *Still not yet got back into top 100
Kirilenko 13 months *before declaring her pregnancy, never got back into top 100
Bacsinszky 30 months
Vaidisova 12 months *still not yet back inside top 200
Robson 02 months *still not back inside top 500
There are other examples, but these are all very good players who have surpassed anything Laura has achieved to date and who spent a long time out for injury or otherwise.
Players in this list approached the comeback in a variety of ways, from the PR/SR/WC dependance, to climbing back from $10K up.

Very Crude Conclusion: No matter the method, it's going to take time, and to talk about anything absolute or being a crucial juncture at this point seems demonstrably premature and probably says more about us than it does of Laura's potential or expectations.

PS: did I mention... JOKO!!!

Thanks IF. It is what I suspected but didn't do any research on. I was gutted she lost from 4-0 up, but in a way not surprised and pleased she can already almost beat a tour level player.

I was listening to the R5LSX commentary on the match and they said that Laura is really feisty off court, and more importantly pretty negative. Being a similar person who can talk herself out of stuff myself, my heart goes out to her. I only hope her team can get her to see a sports psychologist and it'll help her as much as it did Andy.

As for my expectations of her at the moment. They haven't changed before and after injury. She still has the game IMHO, but can be mentally frail. If she can sort that out, I think whe can rocket up to where she was and beyond pretty quickly.

LordBrownof · Futures level

I feel very much in the minority but I'm very positive about Laura at the moment. No interest in entertaining any negativity for losing in 3 sets this week or against McHale. As it shows above, it takes a significant amount of time for a player to get back to where they were and even then much of the data doesn't take into account the seriousness of a wrist injury. (btw, be interested to see these stats for Sharapova post shoulder surgery).

After the McHale match my first thought was - if she'd lost in three sets to Christina McHale PRE surgery, would I be that surprised? Not really. So why so much negativity two months into her comeback after 18 months out? Bizarre. No matter the circumstances of the loss - her level, while fluctuating, is fine. As long as she has a long term game plan (which she does, she's apparently keeping one of her PR's (or maybe it's a wildcard) for next year, i hear?) and she's improving with every match, that's pretty great.

LordBrownof · Futures level

PS - And although this is all masking my general pessimistic outlook on life, I'm super excited about the way Jo is playing! Go JOKO!!

TennisLover · Strong Club Player

Jo is the real deal now. We should be happy that she is really pushing onwards and upwards. Laura should be given some slack to go through the difficult process of getting back to a decent level as her system can handle. Don't force it, don't rush it, don't be desperate, don't be disheartened. Take it as it comes. It's never a smooth path.

indiana · Tennis legend

TennisLover wrote:
Jo is the real deal now. We should be happy that she is really pushing onwards and upwards. Laura should be given some slack to go through the difficult process of getting back to a decent level as her system can handle. Don't force it, don't rush it, don't be desperate, don't be disheartened. Take it as it comes. It's never a smooth path.

I suspect that that is a message for one or two posters rather than Laura On her comments since she came back, she knows the deal ( though I must admit that I wasn't aware of an inherent negativity that Helen alludes to being commented on earlier ).

PS : I'm not suggesting TennisLover meant that, so I'll take any flack ...

PPS : though that said, LordBrownof, I don't believe that you are very much in the minority, indeed maybe not in the minority at all. I certainly don't see a negativity about Laura from the manority of posters, who have commented on Laura's comeback.

-- Edited by indiana on Thursday 3rd of September 2015 12:08:33 PM

nicofrance · Strong Club Player

I think Jo has a chance today but much depends on which Muguruza turns up. She does play a high risk game so it depends on her winners unforced errors count. Regardless of what happens it's been a great summer for Konta , hopefully she can build on this in the autumn.

indiana · Tennis legend

Looks like Jo's form has been well noted. I see she is far from a huge outsider with bet365.

Muguruza 2/5, Konta 7/4 for WR 9 playing WR 97.

That equates to roughly Muguruza having twice the chance Jo has.

The betting margins, meaning they are tighter than 1/2 and 2/1 respectively leaves odds that I wouldn't take about either though ( disgracefully but honestly ) I'd maybe be a bit more tempted by Muguruza's odds.

Julia Carrot · All-time great

Laura's dubs and Joko's match both about to start, and both streamed