Gabriella Taylor

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Gabriella Taylor

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Wow! That's an alarming incident on several different levels. Glad she got through it, no doubt with a lot of medical help at the time.

indiana · Tennis legend

Coup Droit wrote:
There's quite a lot of talk about Gabi in the Launceston thread, week 5, 2019, for those who want to cross-reference.

Don't know if this article in the Telegraph, from July, got posted in other threads at the time but just in case it didn't:

www.telegraph.co.uk/tennis/2018/07/01/rising-star-gabriella-taylor-left-poison-plot-past/

Really felt for Gabi re the poison incident.

But rather surprised that the Telegraph wanted to remind people of its OTT front page story at the time by someone called something like 'chief crime reporter', with a big picture of poor Gabi in her hospital bed, a bit out of it.

Think many other people always thought Scotland Yard looked at it as a matter of routine, I believe pushed by the family, and that there were always rather more likely and prosaic possible explanations than skulduggerry.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Yes, this is really The Telegraph at its tabloid worst.

The 'incident remains a mystery' ?

Is that because it practically never 100% known how any of us catch a disease, when we get one out of the blue, therefore it's a mystery?

She got Weil's disease - it was horrid, and nearly tragic, but - as medical experts said at the time - it was practically impossible for it to be a 'plot' - there are lots of means of sabotage that people could use to hobble a player but Weils isn't one of them (for all the reasons given at the time, and the list was long).

Oakland2002 · All-time great

Ah, I think I can expand on CDs credentials as a tabloid journalist although he has brought this thread back to its tabaloid best.

Lots to like about Gabby on court hopefully that is exactly where she will keep her focus.

All that said I understand Gabbys mums paranoia about poisoning, Bulgarians have never been safe in South West London. Gregori Malkov was assisinated in Balham! one would expect a more sophisticated approach in SW17.

If you really wanted to kill somebody using a bacterial bio weapon undoubtedly Weils disease would be on your list and fairly close to the top (indeed the top, other bacterial agents that are more effective are pretty blatant, anthrax, botulinum, plague, in terms of plausible deniability. Not that hard to contaminate drinks and pretty difficult to get to the bottom of ie evidence could easily be quickly removed. In my opinion the Telegraph were quite right to print and indeed reprint the story as it gives me another reason, along with their Boris sponsorship deal, and failure to report on things that really matter lik every county cricket match, schools football and cricket never to read it.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

"If you really wanted to kill somebody using a bacterial bio weapon undoubtedly Weils disease would be on your list and fairly close to the top"

I assume this is tongue in cheek, at least as regards Gabi, as opposed to a movie script

But just for any of the uninitiated conspiracy theorists out there......

You can't just 'buy' leptospira bacteria, unlike a lot of other 'easy' poisons. Amazon don't have it on offer with overnight delivery. Not to mention that presumably nobody was trying to kill Gabi, just make her lose a match, and infecting someone with Weils would be an extremely ineffective way to guarantee a loss as the incubation period is about 7-21 days, and the effects very varied, from absolutely negligible to death, so that trying to target it for a 2 p.m. match slot with would be, er, tricky? impossible? and with no guarantee that it would affect you anyway.

But, yes, the Telegraph can recycle its stories like any other journal. And as long as one doesn't pay any good money for the thing, I'll look at it from time to time.

And it's great to see Gabi, get some news, and let's hope she's firing on all cylinders in the next few months.

RedSquirrel · Satellite level

Further to the conversation about Gabi's coach on the Launceston thread, Paula Badosa has tweeted a photo of her team which includes David Sunyer. Don't know what that means for Gabi.

https://twitter.com/paulabadosa15/status/1093485432766169088

Michael D · All-time great

RedSquirrel wrote:
Further to the conversation about Gabi's coach on the Launceston thread, Paula Badosa has tweeted a photo of her team which includes David Sunyer. Don't know what that means for Gabi.

https://twitter.com/paulabadosa15/status/1093485432766169088

David Sunyer's own twitter page suggests that he is indeed now coaching Paula. So we don't know what Gabi's current coaching arrangements are. She certainly needs someone good around her at the current time, and some improved performances over the coming 6 weeks or her ranking is going to take a huge hit. I hope she is ok.

Ace Ventura · Tennis legend

Things do seem to be going against here. Just 10 months ago she was in Japan with the Fed Cup team as GB #3 or at least the largely considered #3 even if not official, and there were even some calls that she should have played Nara instead of Heather. For whatever reason it's just not happened since then, obviously there was some retirements around the US Open period, but she's hardly been able to get any consistent runs going and there's been some poor defeats.

Seeing Katie B and Harriet firmly pass her since the grass season and all the Fed Cup success this week is surely not going to help, nor are these coach changes, unless it was her decision, which seems unlikely.

I haven't properly worked it out, but if she doesn't win many points these next few weeks, she will drop to roughly to where Katy and Naomi are now, but, apart from likely not playing French Open quals, she could spend more time in Asia around that period to hopefully put a few wins together and she only won 2 of her 7 grass matches last season, so there are 4 events where she went out in the first round and, while maybe not as much choice as last year, she'll still get the opportunities that most girls circa 250 would get to hopefully get were firmly established in the top 200 and US Open quals.

I don't think she is playing these next 2 weeks after withdrawing from a few events, but I see she is down for a Japan 25k after that, so hopefully all is ok.

Michael D · All-time great

Yes, it's good to see that she seems to be focusing on Asia still. After Japan there are a series of Australian 25ks, the level she did so well at last year, so would be good to see her getting her mojo back by playing those events, and with luck, regaining some of the huge ranking points that will be coming off soon. Hope most of all she can stay healthier this year, as that in itself will help her a huge amount. Not a good start for her, but plenty of time now to turn things around...

RedSquirrel · Satellite level

I think I heard Laura say in commentary a couple of days ago that Esteban Carril was working with Gabi last week. From what I understood Laura to say Esteban works with the players when their regular coach isn't available and he had worked with Katie Swan the previous week.

LordBrownof · Futures level

She also worked with Esteban during the offseason too. It looks like her traveling coach is a guy named Juan-David Cano-Carrillo. From what I can find her played at Futures level but didn't pull up any trees.

ROSAMUND · Futures level

Esteban Carril worked wonders for Johanna Konta.

Oakland2002 · All-time great

Thats encouraging, although she has a very different game to Jo, I feel it is based on her mental strength and technically similar in terms of strengths to Hev, ie mobility and athleticism. Hopefully Gabi will get some stability around her coaching set up which will allow her to regain the consistency of last years run of 25Ks in Australia which allowed her to dominate them. Hopeful that she will be able to flip this little blip round by the grass court season.

ROSAMUND · Futures level

It must be par for the course with our players. Back in October 2018, Gabi beat Astra Sharma in Bendigo. Move forward just over 5 months and Sharma is reaching a WTA singles final something Gabi may or may not ever achieve. About the only thing that has happened to Gabi since then is a big fall down the rankings.