Week 34 - WTA Premier ($761K) - New Haven, USA Hard

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Week 34 - WTA Premier ($761K) - New Haven, USA Hard

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Glad I saw this post so won't get caught out by the Friday start.

Have to be happy with those draws too, especially Naomi.

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

A very stacked qualifying & MD here this year.

Hev's opposition, Maria Sakkari, is 21, currently at her CH of 96, Qualified and won a round at the Australian open before losing to Carla in three sets, beat Schmiedlova in Istanbul, Goerges in Madrid, and Zheng Saisai at Wimbledon.

Naomi's opponent, Kayla Day, is 16, currently at her CH JWR5, lost in the final of this years Orange Bowl, and is the player against whom Gabi Taylor had to retire in alarming circumstances at Wimbledon.

wimdledont · Challenger level

Hev's up

DF · Tennis legend

Not a good start. 0-3

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Heather lost opening set 1-6 (though did manage to get 24 points to her opponent's 36). Previous two matches both finished in under an hour so perhaps Heather found herself on court earlier than expected.

Heather broken to love at the start of the 2nd set 0-1*

Heather breaks back to 30 for *1-1

Watson holds to 30 for 2-1*

Sakkari holds for *2-2

Maria breaks after Heather was 40-15. Heather finding it difficult to win 2nd serve points in this set 2-3*

Sakkari with another comfortable hold *2-4

Watson holds to love 3-4*

Sakkari holds *3-5

Heather saves one mp before losing 3-6

-- Edited by kundalini on Friday 19th of August 2016 05:49:29 PM

PaulM · Tennis legend

Rubbish

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

Poor Heather. She's in a protracted, full on slump.

Her last dozen matches, she's 3-9, including 4 losses to players ranked below her.
The Wimbledon title papers over the cracks.
Perhaps post-Olympic exertions explain part of it, but surely it's time for some sort of a change or new strategy, because the malaise has been around for a much longer time.
Her points are now perilously concentrated in the points for her Monterrey win, which represents fully a third of her points. On the positive side of a negative, she has two 1 point counters that any win will immediately supplement a little; even at Internationals, she doesn't need to reach QF or SF to start to upgrade her scores.

I think now that, if Naomi is buoyed by her deeds in WTT, and can qualify and reach R2 MD, she would become GB #2.

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

Nightmare draw for Johanna - although to be fair, in such a stacked field, there weren't many good ones other than against a Q or WC.
R1: Johanna KONTA (GBR) [5] 13 v. Daria KASATKINA (RUS) 24 (=CH)

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

Naomi under way, *0-1

PaulM · Tennis legend

Jo shouldn't be playing this week. Bonkers.

AliBlahBlah · All-time great

First set did not go to plan. No WTT bounce so far, 2-6

PaulM · Tennis legend

To be fair Day is already a more complete player than Naomi (and a number of other girls in the draw). She's great. Naomi just needs to hang in, try and get some service rythym and hope her experience can help her prevail.

Up a break in the second. If she stays positive and keeps plugging away she can turn it around.

brendan · Strong Club Player

there are no words

PaulM · Tennis legend

Broken from 40-0 at *3-4

Nowhere near enough first serves landing and well beaten.