Week 30 - ITF($50,000) - Kentucky Bank Tennis Ch., Lexington, KY (USA) - Hard

christ · Futures level

Week 30 - ITF($50,000) - Kentucky Bank Tennis Ch., Lexington, KY (USA) - Hard

Helen40 · Grand Slam Champion

Yeah, a player with a ranking!

Yes report would be gratefully received Paul, pretty please.

wimdledont · Challenger level

Laura wins.

This is exactly what she needs - what she needed a year ago - lots of long matches in a week, making a lot of errors, but gradually ironing them out. Playing through qualifiers, against weak opposition where she'll get lots of second chances, and just as many hours as possible on court.

murrayman650 · ATP level

Laura wins , if you could call it a victory

6-0 6-7 6-4

This is just not good enough and if she does not shape up soon, I fear that she may have to retire for her own good as she can not serve and she only won this match because she was facing a unranked player and how much patience can we give her before we finally scream enough. I think today may have been the limit on the rope that I will feed her.

murray_2k9 · Challenger qualifying

What exactly does Laura's progress have to do with us and how much patience we have with her? If anyone is going to be frustrated or scared at her perceived lack of progress thus far, it is her.

Clearly she is not at the level she once was, but that won't come back overnight. She is putting in the hours and I have nothing but the utmost respect for that.

PockyTastic · Futures level

Very very ugly by the stats but rather than slate her I'm going to say good on her for sticking with it and winning in the end. She toiled for over 3 hours in the heat which suggests she's physically fitter than might have been thought. The above post about this is what she needed a year ago is fair. Next match will likely be too tough if she's giving away so many free points, but we shall see.

scottie1 · Futures level

Freya leads 4-1 second set Katy 5-1 second set

the addict · Tennis legend

wimdledont wrote:
Laura wins.

This is exactly what she needs - what she needed a year ago - lots of long matches in a week, making a lot of errors, but gradually ironing them out. Playing through qualifiers, against weak opposition where she'll get lots of second chances, and just as many hours as possible on court.

I think she needs to build her confidence as well, and not only does she need to play through qualifiers, but she needs to pick tournaments where she can win successive matches and get a run going. Maybe drop down and play some $25k's.

Oh, and get her coach to sort out what was once a pretty potent serve !

DF · Tennis legend

Katy wins 7-6(4) 6-1

wimdledont · Challenger level

Yep, I was getting short on time for Laura towards the end of her SR period, and during the grass season, where she was taking opportunities from other players who might have been better prepared to take those opportunities, in my view. But if she's going to slog her way through the ITF circuit, she will emerge as a better and fitter player, and she'll regain a lot of respect from me, and perhaps even eventually become a better player than before her injury.

Katie has just missed a couple of MPs, and Freya leads by a set and a break, so we could still have a chance of 4 qualifiers of 4...

scottie1 · Futures level

PockyTastic wrote:
Very very ugly by the stats but rather than slate her I'm going to say good on her for sticking with it and winning in the end. She toiled for over 3 hours in the heat which suggests she's physically fitter than might have been thought. The above post about this is what she needed a year ago is fair. Next match will likely be too tough if she's giving away so many free points, but we shall see.

Yes I agree it is frustrating because she is not at the high level she was a couple of years ago and it will take time! Laura has guts to stay out in 90 degree heat a year ago she would have folded in a similar match so good on her.

murrayman650 · ATP level

murray_2k9 wrote:
What exactly does Laura's progress have to do with us and how much patience we have with her? If anyone is going to be frustrated or scared at her perceived lack of progress thus far, it is her.

Clearly she is not at the level she once was, but that won't come back overnight. She is putting in the hours and I have nothing but the utmost respect for that.

Look I get that, but there has to be a thought that this is nowhere near good enough, with other losses that she has had I could at least see areas where If she should a little bit of improvement in she would be back to somewhere near her old self, but this was basically all the progress that she made in the past six months was gone as far as I could see. If i came off as harsh then I apologise, its just when you see someone who had so much potenial play like this it makes me sad about what could of been especially when you see Konta win yesterday and you know that it could of been Laura if her wrist never got injured.

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Laura's match was pretty torturous to follow and must have been much worse for her to play in. Pretty crazy to have a match last 3 hours 13 mins when her opponent held serve only twice. Laura obviously has some major problems with the serve, and I think it's probably psychological more than anything but I'm just guessing. If you take the half of the match where Laura was receiving then she did pretty well.

Has there been a longer or shorter GB women's match this year than Laura today and Emily yesterday - quite a contrast!

Speaking of Emily, another good win today - she has had a break with the draw but taking full advantage. With Katy winning and Freya ahead there could be GB interest in all four qualifying matches tomorrow.

DF · Tennis legend

Freya wins 6-4 6-2

the addict · Tennis legend

Freya wins 6-4 6-2 :)