Week 51 - ITF ($25K) - Navi Mumbai, India, Hard

Michael D · All-time great

Week 51 - ITF ($25K) - Navi Mumbai, India, Hard

Babfive · Satellite level

Em has fought her way through to a great position: 4-6 7-6(2) *5-1

paulisi · Tennis legend

Great win for Emily, Beth is a set up.

Peter too · Tennis legend

Q1: WEBLEY-SMITH, Emily (GBR) 10 543 def BOGDAN, Elena (ROU) 668 4-6 7-6(2) 6-1

Q2: WEBLEY-SMITH, Emily (GBR) 10 543 v YASHINA, Ekaterina (RUS) 8 535 CH=376 2012

Peter too · Tennis legend

Q1: GREY, Sarah Beth (GBR) 14 604 def SHARMA, Nandini (IND) WC UNR 6-2 6-3

indiana · Tennis legend

Well done to Em. Although I have expressed doubts as to whether at this stage it will happen for her, re discussions about who will be our next GB woman into the top 500 it would be great to see it being Em back into the top 500 with others getting there for the first time fairly soon.

Well done Beth too.

blob · All-time great

Emily continues her pretty amazng record in tie-breaks in 2017.
The one ine the second set today was her thirteenth of the year, she's now won eleven of them (84.62%).
The average for Brits playing more than one TB this year is 47.30%, and for Brits playing more than 10 TB this year, is 48.47%.
Emily in a class of her own.
Special mention to Manisha, who played 5, and won them all.

indiana · Tennis legend

blob wrote:
Emily continues her pretty amazng record in tie-breaks in 2017.
The one ine the second set today was her thirteenth of the year, she's now won eleven of them (84.62%).
The average for Brits playing more than one TB this year is 47.30%, and for Brits playing more than 10 TB this year, is 48.47%.
Emily in a class of her own.
Special mention to Manisha, who played 5, and won them all.

Ah perhaps something to be said in that regard for experience and nous. I wonder if there is any particular correlation between age and TB success. It is possible though that some of the youngest players might have no fear.

blob · All-time great

indiana wrote:
blob wrote:
Emily continues her pretty amazng record in tie-breaks in 2017.
The one ine the second set today was her thirteenth of the year, she's now won eleven of them (84.62%).
The average for Brits playing more than one TB this year is 47.30%, and for Brits playing more than 10 TB this year, is 48.47%.
Emily in a class of her own.
Special mention to Manisha, who played 5, and won them all.
Ah perhaps something to be said in that regard for experience and nous. I wonder if there is any particular correlation between age and TB success. It is possible though that some of the youngest players might have no fear.

Sort of, but not really. More I think t be said for Emily's particular grit and 'little lion' qualities.

I display the trend, which is up as you get older, but it's not significant, and is skewed by Emily being such an outlier.
If I set the qualification to be at least 3 TB played, rather than just 2, then the effect is even slighter with the fewer data points.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

It's a gorgeous graph but all that really says to me, I'm afraid, is that we have no older players cry

(and that's not your fault, blob!)

For Indy's point, we'd really have to look at a bigger group of players (the top 100-200, say), as there will be a decent age range there and a large number of tie-breaks played, and not skewed by 'top-20-ness' brilliance or whatever, but more representative.

indiana · Tennis legend

Thanks, blob, I rather thought that you might produce some more data

So overall age not showing as significant in the GB women data and looking very much more about individual qualities in the player.

Of course some randomness involved in many of the low samples but Emily's own sample is relatively big and 11-2 certainly doesn't look random.

How much significantly so I am many years gone from retaining the tools or knowledge to test.

Edit: Re CD's cross-over post, it's a very good point that we simply lack data from older players when just looking at the GB crew. In truth we have that our one significantly older player seems to be very good at TBs.

So who wants to do the wider research ?

-- Edited by indiana on Saturday 16th of December 2017 10:31:39 AM

blob · All-time great

Yes, it's a fair point that you make.
I can only see good data for the YE 2017 top 50, without calculating each player individually
So, here's that:

This will be skewed by the few youngsters, and the genius of Serena & Venus, hardly typical of older players. (Edit: Serena also only played the one TB in her shortened year, and won it, which adds further distortion)
But, that's all I got! The effect is very slight. The trend is a bad fit to the data.

Edit 2: More interestingly, perhaps, the effect does not seem correlated with ranking, or a 'good year' defined by matches won, or absolute ranking movement YoY. It's probably fairest to say: some players are just very good in TB, and some of those also happen to be exceptional players.

-- Edited by blob on Saturday 16th of December 2017 10:50:59 AM

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Well done, Blob !

As you say, not a great deal to take away in concrete terms but it seems to me (or am I imagining it?) that the young end seem rather good at winning tie-breaks, as does the old end. And it's the middle section where tie-breaks are the main problem. Which would back up Indy's hypothesis that youngsters just go for it, with no real pressure, and oldies have experience and canniness on their side. And it's the ones in their 'prime' who really feel the pressure as they need to make each match really count and blow it (but I might be imagining a pattern into the dots that's not really there).

nickw811 · Social player

Great win for Emily! I've just interviewed her on her career and what she wants to achieve this year (thebigracket.org/2017/12/16/emily-webley-smith-still-striving-to-improve/)

Hope you enjoy! :)

blob · All-time great

nickw811 wrote:
Great win for Emily! I've just interviewed her on her career and what she wants to achieve this year (thebigracket.org/2017/12/16/emily-webley-smith-still-striving-to-improve/)

Hope you enjoy! :)

Really good, thank you
Underscores how lucky we've been to have Emily slugging it out all these years, and the amazing tenacity she's displayed throughout.

She always punches up, and if ( ) she ever retires she'll surely be a fantastic motivational coach if she feels that way inclined.