Weeks 3-4 - Australian Open, Women's Main Draw - Melbourne, Australia - Hard

ROSAMUND · Futures level

RE: Weeks 3-4 - Australian Open, Women's Main Draw - Melbourne, Australia - Hard

seagull · Hall of fame

Well I'm glad they had veterans mixed doubles at my local club last year so I finally got my name on the honours board. Not sure it means much to the tennis world though!

indiana · Tennis legend

ROSAMUND wrote:
I bet Laura Robson is glad they had mixed doubles at the Olympics.

That we have won medals at it doesn't change anything about how appropriate it is an Olympic sport.

I was pleased they did well but in all honesty couldn't fully empathise when Laura said she was devastated not to win an Olympic gold medal.

ROSAMUND · Futures level

It's worthwhile remembering that Laura enjoyed the most succesful spell of her career after partnering Andy at the Olympics I.e 4th round of US open beating Kim and Li Na and runner up in Gangzhou followed on soon after..

indiana · Tennis legend

True but ...

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

indiana wrote:
True but ...

Ha!

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Being frank, I think the emphasis on singles makes tennis too one dimensional. In badminton, which is possibly the closest sport to tennis ( am sure someone will correct me there) doubles is taken very, very seriously and all 5 forms of the game seem to carry equal weighting, I am sure i am correct that all 5 appear in their form of a year end Tour finals event and GB has a strong pedigree in mixed. But from what I know, all countries do take all forms of doubles seriously and equally to singles. table tennis ditto takes it seriously but I would say singles is more dominant in that sport. Squash, doubles is a joke and not really a form of the game to be taken seriously.

In tennis, I think mens and womens doubles are serious events, it is the tours and the then the players, and probably the TV moneymen that have forced doubles to become less and less relevant - but I for one think that when we see it played well (ie in the team events, in the end of year champs, at the latter stages of the Slams) then it is clearly a really interesting and valuable event. It is because the top players want to focus in singles and the ATP and WTA have let them (which is fine, but they have) that doubles has become less important , because the big names and the top players ended up focusing on the main event. But doubles is still valid and should be more valid.

Mixed - ok, fair dinkum.

flamingowings · All-time great

ROSAMUND wrote:
seagull wrote:
JonH comes home wrote:
Surely doubles is a valid and worthwhile sport, in the Olympics a tennis doubles Gold medal is every bit as valuable as a singles gold medal and that includes mixed. Personally I am a big, big fan of doubles overall, although to be fair it is mens in general that I follow more frequently. So although the main concern should be singles, I agree, I also think doubles should be taken seriously and as we have a Olympics Gold medal event with no participation likely from the GB (ie womens doubles) I think this is something we probably should be concerned about.
Tennis is a sport - not doubles. Don't get me started on tennis in Olympics!!
Obviously Johanna Konta regards playing in the Olympics as a priority over the Fed Cup. In interviews she has said that participating in the Rio Olympics is one of her greatest experiences in tennis.

As she is allowed to. Olympics comes around every 4 years, this may be Jo's last one realistically. Fed Cup is every year and Jo has done her fair share of playing for her country and promoting Fed Cup.

ROSAMUND · Futures level

The point I was trying to make was not whether doubles are important or otherwise but simply we have no representative.I don't care if they are not playing with a fellow Brit but surely we should have at least one player out of 128.It's perhaps no great surprise that while we've had mixed doubles and mens doubles winners/-runners up in recent times you'd be hard pressed to name the last British woman to play in a Grand Slam ladies doubles final. I think it's Virginia Wade even before she won Wimbledon. As for our female representation at this year's Australian Open all interest could be over by tomorrow.One hopes Harriet can manage her first win and Heather seems in good form. . But we might be holding one's breathe for Jo and Katie.

foobarbaz · Strong Club Player

Doubles play should bring out a wider range of shots from the players. Unfortunately, singles-minded players bring a fairly one dimensional game plan to the doubles court. A repetitive pattern of power-driven cross court shots played between the two back court players, until one fluffs it and the hovering opponent at the net steps in to ettempt the winning interception. All that space, behind the net player is often ignored, because the shot is deemed too risky, ... but if you never play the shot, you'll never be any good at it. The idea in doubles is to get the opponents moving, to move them into the same court space, so they fluff the shot, and you've got an open court to aim for. Doubles should be great to watch, if it's played the right way.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

ROSAMUND wrote:
The point I was trying to make was not whether doubles are important or otherwise but simply we have no representative.I don't care if they are not playing with a fellow Brit but surely we should have at least one player out of 128.It's perhaps no great surprise that while we've had mixed doubles and mens doubles winners/-runners up in recent times you'd be hard pressed to name the last British woman to play in a Grand Slam ladies doubles final. I think it's Virginia Wade even before she won Wimbledon. As for our female representation at this year's Australian Open all interest could be over by tomorrow.One hopes Harriet can manage her first win and Heather seems in good form. . But we might be holding one's breathe for Jo and Katie.

For what it is worth, anne hobbs reached the 1983 Australian open final and 1984 US Open final with Wendy Turnbull, Jo Durie between 83 and 85 reached 4 slam semis and the WTA Tour finals in 1985 , that was with ann Kiyomura, an American.

emmsie69 · Top national player

The men are benefitting from a few guys that specialised quite early at doubles, our women, with the exception of Heather and Jo are still early 20's so not quite ready to give up the singles dream and consequently are still in lower level tournaments with few points on offer. Looking at the doubles entries its a mixture of top singles players benefiting from the quality of tournament they qualify for as singles players and adding the doubles in those tournaments with higher points on offer and players that pretty much dedicate themselves to doubles so again are able to accumulate decent points. I suspect Eden may focus on doubles soon and hopefully a couple of others will join her and we can then start to see similar success to the men.

the addict · Tennis legend

Tuesday's order of play

Konta v Jabeur 23:30 (GMT) 1573 Arena
Boulter v Svitolina 4th 1573 Arena
Watson v Kr Pliskova 6th C10
Dart v Doi 6th C11

Strongbow · All-time great

the addict wrote:
Tuesday's order of play

Konta v Jabeur 23:30 (GMT) 1573 Arena
Boulter v Svitolina 4th 1573 Arena
Watson v Kr Pliskova 6th C10
Dart v Doi 6th C11

Maty thanks for some actual tennis info - OER hint was brilliant biggrin

the addict · Tennis legend

wink I try and be helpful

Jo underway - on Eurosport 2