Week 4 - ITF ($50K) - Maui, Hawaii, USA - Hard

insomniacfolder · Challenger level

Week 4 - ITF ($50K) - Maui, Hawaii, USA - Hard

vohor · Grand Slam Champion

Here's hoping Auckland Naomi returns to the fray: if she could lift the title for a net gain of 68 points she'd be right on the fringe of the top 100 :)

McHale ranked 65 has been parachuted in as top seed though in Naomi's half of the draw...

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

Naomi under way, 1-0*

indiana · Tennis legend

Naomi entering a first set TB.

Grachka · County player

Naomi looking pretty frail off the ground, so serve kept her in it at

Broady 6-6 (5-4*) Kichenok

Grachka · County player

Couple of errors from Kichenok and the set is hers!

(3) Naomi Broady GBR 7-6(4) 0-0* Lyudmyla Kichenok UKR

Edit: typo

-- Edited by Grachka on Tuesday 26th of January 2016 09:34:30 PM

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

GSM Naomi 7-6(4) 6-4

Seems like a decent all round performance - serve % down a bit, but both 1st and 2nd serves effective, 14 Aces, 7DF.
One hopes the is also more to come.
R2 opponent either WC or Q

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Just watched 2nd set. Serve dominant apart from one shocking service game from both players featuring 2 dfs. Naomi took her 2nd bp with a forehand winner and managed to survive her own poor service game as Kichenok twice failed to return 2nd serves.

indiana · Tennis legend

Got the win if not at Auckland levels. Hopefully will step up.

No net ranking points addition so far since her lowest counter is 12 points, but hopefully a staging post to much more significant points.

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Nice win - hopefully now Naomi can kick on and get some incremental points towards the top 100.

vohor · Grand Slam Champion

Yes, that'll do; keep going please Naomi :)

wolf · Tennis legend

Naomi will probably have to face world #93 Magda Linette next who was a late entry who came through qualifying and thus didn't get seeded, so that's a bit rough.

wolf · Tennis legend

R1: Naomi BROADY/Paula KANIA (GBR/POL) [3] 206 beat Jennifer BRADY/Christina MCHALE (USA/USA) 490 6-0 3-6 10-3

R2: (3) Naomi Broady WR 111 v (Q) Magda Linette (POL) WR 93

wimdledont · Challenger level

Naomi will be second on Stadium in several hours time, when I hope to be asleep, but others might appreciate the livestream...

www.usta.com/Pro-Tennis/Pro-Circuit/2016_pro_circuit_womens_live_streaming/

I do think that the USTA's policy of free livestreaming a lot of ITFs is the way to go. Such a good idea for players, spectators, tournaments, sponsors.

The USTA now have 22 players ranked between 101-300, who are regularly competing at this level, and benefiting from the exposure. We have one. Hope she wins.

wimdledont · Challenger level

A note in passing, especially in the hope that Fitzy might visit here...

With apparently less ITFs to go around this year, some of these top-tier tournaments seem to have highly stacked fields.

Next week, for example, Naomi's down as entry 10 for the 100k at Midland - unseeded.

It's a shame she's not also entered the WTA 500k in Taiwan the following week which, other than Venus, seems to have a weaker field. Second seed will be somewhere round WR65.

After most of a decade studying and gaming the ITF entry lists as best she can, I hope she'll also now be keeping an eye out for upcoming WTAs as well. My impression would be that she's much more likely to break into the big time after one week of quixotic brilliance, rising to a big occasion when she's theoretically out of her grade, than by methodically and reliably stringing together a good sequence of consistent results at a median level.