Weeks 27-28 - The Championships, Wimbledon (grass)

nicofrance · Strong Club Player

Weeks 27-28 - The Championships, Wimbledon (grass)

Var · Pro player

I think Emma had had enough TBH. She most probably had reached her target for Wimbledon. Now get ready for the US hard court swing.something is not quite right and she wont risk a thing. Maybe explains why she didnt play with Andy yesterday. Back problems.

She is doing fine. Could have done better today if fully fit but such is life!

-- Edited by Var on Sunday 7th of July 2024 07:00:13 PM

PaulM · Tennis legend

I quite fancy Lulu against Vekic if she plays like that.

nicofrance · Strong Club Player

Emmas back only started hurting because she was playing crap .

HarryGem · Club Coach

The better player on the day won and deserved to. Emma was feeble at times. Far too many half court balls for Lulu to attack. She will not win a major again unless she can get back to playing more front foot tennis. Just too passive.
A disappointing end to a decent tournament for the GB women but honestly that is a wasted opportunity form Emma. The draw is wide open but she couldn't take advantage.

MrTSymonds · Junior player

I think everyone underestimated Lulu Sun, and bizarrely, even after watching the game are still retrospectively underestimating her.

She was imperious today and very much deserved the victory. Even in the set that Emma won, half the points were achieved through unforced errors as Lulu tightened up.

While I am critical of Emma's tactics especially to where she was placing a lot of returns, the level that they were coming back was incredible.

Quite simply I think Lulu got in Emma's head early, she did very well to achieve parity, but ultimately on that performance Lulu would have beaten most players in the draw.

Var · Pro player

nicofrance wrote:
Emmas back only started hurting because she was playing crap .

Thats not right. Her serve wasnt firing.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

HarryGem wrote:
The better player on the day won and deserved to. Emma was feeble at times. Far too many half court balls for Lulu to attack. She will not win a major again unless she can get back to playing more front foot tennis. Just too passive.
A disappointing end to a decent tournament for the GB women but honestly that is a wasted opportunity form Emma. The draw is wide open but she couldn't take advantage.

Yes, this was sort of my feeling

Not the end of the world but Emma can't play that sort of passive tennis, it just won't work

Rich2310 · County player

Not the outcome any of us wanted and agree Emma did not seem the same player she was in the previous two rounds.
It's a disappointment for sure but let's hope Emma is alright and no serious injury.

Let's take the positives

Semi finals at Nottingham
Quarter finals at Eastbourne
Last 16 at Wimbledon
Back inside the worlds top 100 next Monday.

She has made big strides back and can now focus on the US swing and pushing that ranking even higher.

Peter too · Tennis legend

One question now is whether Lulu can repeat what Emma did in New York three years ago and win a Grand Slam as a qualifier.

jb288 · Satellite level

Yep, we started this grass swing with one top 100 player and we're ending with three, with Sonay i reckon a good bet to join them by end of year. I'll take that :)

Var · Pro player

Emma is currently now inside the top 00, but a few players in tournament in Gstaad, so might change. Doing well in the live race at number 44. Everything seems on track. All credit to Sun. For Emma she needs to build stronger foundations and is on the right trajectory. No more massive leaps which are so difficult to defend!

SuperT · Futures qualifying

nicofrance wrote:
Emmas back only started hurting because she was playing crap .

What a horrible comment. What was evident to me from the start of the match was the contrast between today's performance compared with that on Friday. She wasn't playing with the freedom she showed then, she wasn't attacking the ball and her whole demeanour and body language were completely different. I wondered at the time if she really did have some sort of niggle, and later on it became clear that was the case. The loss was obviously disappointing, but on the whole it's been a good tournament for her and there will be plenty of opportunities in the US to continue her climb up the rankings.

christ · Futures level

I have to say that it looks like when Ms Raducanu feels that she is the underdog, she hits with a carefree freedom that is a joy to watch, and she wins more often than not.

When she is the (overwhelming?) favourite, she seems to expect to be able to play pat-a-cake and win without trying - or she freezes with the burden of expectation that just isn't there when she is playing up. Watching her today, she wasn't smacking the ball to the lines and corners like she has I the last couple of rounds, she was allowing her opponent to do that to her, feeding her short ball after short ball. There were flashes where she forgot herself, and played "properly", but then she climbed back into her shell.

On the upside she didn't retire, wrist or no wrist.

Jeff Stelling · Club Coach

What a truly desperate performance from Emma.

To see her and Katie exit the tournament in such abject fashions leaves one feeling on a big downer about the 2024 grass court season. Shame.

I have seen comment in some quarters that Darts anti-tennis win over Boulter was a pernicious and deleterious act of sabotage to the best interests of British tennis. In my view, while it was clearly frustrating to British tennis fans, you cannot knock Harriet for giving her all, even if it was to scrape past an opponent playing at about 20% of their usual level. I suspect some of the comments are borne of frustration at the inevitability of Harriet failing to really make the most of the opportunity, whilst Katie could well have done.

-- Edited by Jeff Stelling on Sunday 7th of July 2024 11:31:15 PM