British Tennis Forum - Celebrating 20 Years!

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Week 22- WTA 125 - Birmingham UK - Grass

Peter too · Tennis legend

Mika has a step up in her next match from someone ranked 136 to someone ranked 135.

PaulM · Tennis legend

Coup Droit wrote:
Oh Lord, that was Harriet's match

It was. If I'm scrabbling for a positive, it's that she's clearly still capable of taking out chunks of the lower end of the top 100 on the surface.

Jajon · Club Coach

Mika the first GOOD win of the grass court season for anyone? The scraps we shall be having this year I fear

Var · Challenger qualifying

Great Mika, taking advantage of the opportunity offered. Well done! If she can get in another round I would be tempted to give Mika a MD WC for Wimbledon. After her exploits in Oz and her performance so far, early days but she is doing better than the rest and deserves one. Im not sure about the others.

-- Edited by Var on Tuesday 2nd of June 2026 02:22:34 PM

Peter too · Tennis legend

PaulM wrote:
Coup Droit wrote:
Oh Lord, that was Harriet's match
It was. If I'm scrabbling for a positive, it's that she's clearly still capable of taking out chunks of the lower end of the top 100 on the surface.

Harriet probably did well to get that close, after all her opponent was not just higher ranked than her but also higher ranked than Harriet has ever been. It did look as if Harriet could have won that match and it would have been a good win but her opponent held her nerve better in the last few games.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Peter too wrote:
PaulM wrote:
Coup Droit wrote:
Oh Lord, that was Harriet's match
It was. If I'm scrabbling for a positive, it's that she's clearly still capable of taking out chunks of the lower end of the top 100 on the surface.
Harriet probably did well to get that close, after all her opponent was not just higher ranked than her but also higher ranked than Harriet has ever been. It did look as if Harriet could have won that match and it would have been a good win but her opponent held her nerve better in the last few games.

I'm sorry but thay doesn't cut it with me

Rankings are an overall thing, not particularly valid on the day or match in question

Harriet could have and should have won that match

She'll lose , quite fairly, to people lower ranked than her

Which is why you have to close out the higher ranked ones when you get the chance

indiana · Tennis legend

Not saying Harriet shouldn't have won today, well for a start I didn't see any of the match.

But rankings are most certainly valid yesterday, today, tomorrow. They generally indicate coming into a match how much better one player has played compared to another over the last 12 months. That disparity re general level is unlikey to just disappear ( though of course it can some days, or tennis life would be very boring ). As a generality though ' not particularly valid' is just codswallop

I wss thinking that more pertinently here grass may have been the real leveller but I see that Bartunkova was a Wimbledon girls' RU in 2023 so has proved adapt on the surface.

-- Edited by indiana on Tuesday 2nd of June 2026 02:06:58 PM

sammmm · Improver

It feels harsh to say but it seems like a familiar story of Harriet struggling under pressure and her mentality not being strong enough because she could and in all honestly should have won today but when things started going against her she struggled to recover

PaulM · Tennis legend

That's the rain. They've got through much more play today than I had expected, but still starting to look a bit clogged up.

miriam abc · Club Coach

It's stopped now in Birmingham I live about 2 miles from the Priory Club.

sammmm · Improver

How much more play is there likely to be today? Katie is next on and Im not sure she wants a backlog of matches

JonH · Tennis legend

sammmm wrote:
How much more play is there likely to be today? Katie is next on and Im not sure she wants a backlog of matches

Id be surprised if they started any new matches after this. It would be after half seven before anyone got on court to knock up let alone start, and theres only Oli T who is reasonakly close to finishing. Id imagine that will be it- might be wrong

JonH · Tennis legend

And Im wrong as always as Katie is warming up

JonH · Tennis legend

And just started