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Post Info TOPIC: Week 4 - ITF M25 - Sunderland, Great Britain (indoor hard)


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Week 4 - ITF M25 - Sunderland, Great Britain (indoor hard)


Hi guys I'm a long time lurker that has taken Jaggy's bait but what a snobby and elitist comment to make. Sunderland is not unlike a lot of places across the post-industrial north - it has nice areas and not so nice areas (like everywhere). Yes the town centre isn't great partly due to a lack of investment over many years and partly due to a downturn in footfall that's been seen across many towns and cities caused by a rise of online shopping, as well as out of town retail parks. Sunderland has many lovely neighbourhoods with nice parks, old pubs and it benefits from being by the sea with a couple lovely sandy beaches, so to generalise it as 'a bit of a dump' is really unfair and quite rude. The city has hosted an ITF tournament at least since 2002 with many of the players having competed here in the past couple of years so if it was such a bad venue presumably their license to host the event wouldn't be renewed and players wouldn't return. Of course there are far more glamorous and tropical places to be playing but I suspect the majority of people are happy to see a series of high level UK tournaments with the opportunity to earn bigger points instead of having to venture abroad for those points and likely spend much more money (especially those not funded by the LTA) etc.

Sadly there has been leaks on and off in the roof for at least 3-4 years although I'm not sure who would be responsible for fixing this, the local council or the LTA? Regardless, it's not ideal for the athletes or the casual players that play there week in week out but the tournament organisers seem to be managing. I can't imagine leaks being in the roof this long on had the centre been in London or the home counties (maybe I'm wrong) but there's obviously a lack of investment there. Echoing Coup's comments in the women's thread - it's normal for it to be cold inside during the winter, just wear an extra base layer and you soon warm up once you get started (or there's a gym to use to warm up). Yes it may not have top notch facilities akin to the national tennis centres or alike but it's nice for the region to host the tournament and promote the sport especially in an area where there are so few courts/tennis centres. Apologies if this comes across as a bit of a rant but I've just been a bit shocked at the level of vitriol from a number of users jumping on the Appleton's comments when I'm sure all the staff involved are making the best of the situation with the resources they have. On another note it is lovely to see 5 of our lower ranked players come through qualifying and win a round, fingers crossed they can keep going and win a few more.

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Tennis legend

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Hi Nimble. Welcome to the board and glad that you have finally 'unmasked' and joined us in the open.

We love a good rant on here from time to time so no problems on you expressing your opinions. I have been neither to Sunderland, nor more specifically to the venue, so I will refrain from comment although from what you say about the roof etc, it doesn't sound as though 'leveling up' hasn't reached Sunderland yet. Perhaps best to leave the political stuff for the 'Chat Section' so I will say no more about that here.

Looking forward to hearing your comments on the players and matches though. Are you at the tournament ? We love a good match report.

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Just to echo Bob, great to welcome you on board, nimble

I've also never been to Sunderland (which is not a downer on Sunderland at all - I've never even been to Manchester or Newcastle )

Love to hear the inside bits and pieces about the facilities (I would be pretty sure that it's the council who are responsbile for upkeep and maintenance, although I don't know if the lTA have a fund to help in such cases, would seem not unreasonable).

And, again as Bob says, any ringside reports would be great !

But even if not, welcome whatever



-- Edited by Coup Droit on Thursday 26th of January 2023 08:24:01 AM

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Looking forward to seeing how the Brits do here today - 5 of our 6 left are qualifiers and generally stepping into new territory - great opportunity for at least one of them to make a name for himself!

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Hi Nimble - cant really comment on the details but just wondered what other venues exist in the North East? Im from Harrogate and many years ago used to play indoors once a week up at Teesside, there was an indoor facility at the airport- it may no longer be there? But in general , are there indoor facilities in places like Teesside, Gateshead, Newcastle and could they stage events like this one?

Yorkshire has the Ilkley outdoor event on grass, quite a few big clubs and centres like Armley in Leeds and Sheffield hosted one of the ITF events in this series - I think its great to see these events in the North.

When the Leeds First Direct arena was built it specifically sold itself on being able to stage big tennis events, meaning Davis Cup, but nothing has ever come and probably wont, now the format has changed

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QF:  Clément Chidekh & Luca Sanchez (FRA/FRA) CR 1357 (1141+216) "defeated" Ewan Moore & Hamish Stewart CR 2221 (1231+990) by a walkover  cry

 



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Probably no bad thing for Hamish - has singles to concentrate on - hope Ewan gets better soon

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L16:  Tristan McCormick (USA) WR 602 defeated (Q) George Houghton WR 1507 by 1 & 4



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Coup Droit wrote:

Probably no bad thing for Hamish - has singles to concentrate on - hope Ewan gets better soon


Of course!  I'd forgotten that Ewan retired in the second set of his match against Sascha Gueymard Wayenburg yesterday. 



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Stircrazy wrote:

L16:  Tristan McCormick (USA) WR 602 defeated (Q) George Houghton WR 1507 by 1 & 4


L16:  (7) Gianmarco Ferrari (ITA) WR 417 defeated (Q) James Davis WR 1507 by 3-6 6-2 6-3



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Falling like dominoes. British tennis has definitely had better weeks.

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Another walkover in the doubles, though this time in the Brits' favour:

QF:  Anton Matusevich & Joshua Paris CR 960 (617+343) "defeated" (4) Federico Arnaboldi & Gianmarco Ferrari (ITA/ITA) CR 911 (446+465) by a walkover  smile

 



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L16:  Anton Matusevich WR 703 defeated (Q) Hamish Stewart WR 1424 by 6-3 7-6(4)

*****

QF:  (1) Edan Leshem (ISR) WR 355 vs Anton Matusevich WR 703

 



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Stircrazy wrote:
Stircrazy wrote:

L16:  Tristan McCormick (USA) WR 602 defeated (Q) George Houghton WR 1507 by 1 & 4


L16:  (7) Gianmarco Ferrari (ITA) WR 417 defeated (Q) James Davis WR 1507 by 3-6 6-2 6-3


L16:  (3) Antoine Hoang (FRA) WR 360 defeated (Q) Ali Habib WR 1944 by 3 & 3

L16:  Martin Damm (USA) WR 462 defeated (Q) David Quayle UNR by 7-6(5) 6-3

So Anton's the sole survivor in the singles & I can't see him getting past Leshem.  cry



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Stircrazy wrote:

Another walkover in the doubles, though this time in the Brits' favour:

QF:  Anton Matusevich & Joshua Paris CR 960 (617+343) "defeated" (4) Federico Arnaboldi & Gianmarco Ferrari (ITA/ITA) CR 911 (446+465) by a walkover  smile


And the beneficiaries of the two walkovers meet in the semis:

SF:  Anton Matusevich & Joshua Paris CR 960 (617+343) vs Clément Chidekh & Luca Sanchez (FRA/FRA) CR 1357 (1141+216)



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