Odd how Lily comes through qualifying and gets a kinder draw than Katie or Jodie.
Yes, the 'luck of the draw' - it's one of the things I rather like about tennis - its randomness and how it all works out
After all, in the Premier League for football, you just play everyone - twice. Simples. And it really doesn'matter if you play Man City in week 1 or week 10.
But a knock-out draw is great (or two in this case) - so many possible hiccups - go Lily !
And if she wins that one only another 6 matches to go.
Pretty cool to see Fiona Crawley come through qualifying. She did very well. And good use by the USTA of the doubles wildcards too, good mix of juniors, college players and established pros. Obviously the NCAA and USTA 18 winners are guaranteed.
Nice that Lily is giving us some interest on Monday!
Worth noting that Betova is entered using her protected ranking, which I believe is 100. The actual ranking wasn't noted previously (and took me a while to find it)
Not British players but Venus Williams and Alize Cornet are in the draw to continue setting these Grand Slam appearance records. Venus is playing in her 93rd Grand Slam singles tournament. She debuted back in 1997 at the French Open and played her first US final in 1997. Alize is playing in her 67th successive Grand Slam singles tournament. That run started at the 2007 Australian Open.
One of the few players available with a high enough singles ranking to make the cut ? I haven't checked to see what the rankings were, but it must have been close.
R1: MIYAZAKI, Yuriko Lily (GBR) 199 (CH=169 2023) v BETOVA, Margarita ( ) 1039 (CH=41 2016) R1: BOULTER, Katie (GBR) 60 =CH v PARRY, Diane (FRA) 73 (CH=58 2022) They met in Indian Wells earlier this year with Katie winning 4 & 2 R1: BURRAGE, Jodie (GBR) 96 (CH=94 2023) v BLINKOVA, Anna 39 (CH=34 2023)
What a great achievement for Lily to qualify. I'd have said that she should be satisfied with doing just that but this draw gives her a fantastic chance to advance to round 2, earn some serious cash and a decent points return to help her ranking.
I'd make her favourite to win the match as Betova can hardly win a set let alone a match right now.
Very decent draws for both Katie and Jodie as well. As long as Katie is fit and healthy I'd be quite disappointed not to see all three GB women progress though Jodie's match is perhaps the trickiest but she has the game on hard courts to beat Blinkova.