Mixed news from Bagneres-de-Bigorres:

Lee struggled to a 3 set win over Jouen, triumphing 7-6[4], 4-6, 6-2 in 2 hours and 24 minutes. He served 21 aces overall and it was his big 1st serve which proved to be the eventual deciding factor. In a patchy 1st set which last over an hour, both players exchanged breaks before it went into a tiebreak which Lee took on his 2nd set point. Both players had chances to wrap it up before then, Lee taking just 1 out of 5 chances and Jouen converting 1 out of 3. Lee won 71% points on his 1st serve in that set and 52% on his 2nd serve, Jouen won 79% points on his 1st serve and 44% on his 2nd serve. The Frenchman's 1st serve % was only 47 and Lee failed to take full advantage of the number of 2nd serves he got the chance to look at.

In the 2nd set, both players exchanged breaks early on before Jouen got a 2nd break and was able to wrap up the set with Lee missing a break back chance. Jouen's 1st serve % was just 40 but crucially he was able to win 55% of points on his 2nd serve and while Lee won 86% of points on his 1st serve he won just 31% of points on his weaker delivery.

In the 3rd set, Lee upped his level and made 70% of his 1st serves and powered down 7 aces in his 4 service games. Jouen missed all 3 of his break point chances while Lee broke twice on both his opportunities. Lee won 71% of 1st serve points and 67% of 2nd serve points and Jouen's serve stats dipped below 50% on both his 1st and 2nd serve as Lee started to get to grips with the Frenchman's delivery.


Unfortunately Ross Hutchins went down 6-3, 6-4 to the big serving Frenchman Alex Sidorenko. In the first set Sidorenko hit 8 aces in just 5 service games and served at 63%. Ross was unable to really read the Frenchman's 1st serve and Sidorenko dropped just 2 points on it. However, once Ross got a look at the Sidorenko 2nd serve Sidorenko won just 27% of points. Unfortunately a 2nd serve was all too rare and Ross was unable to create any break point chances. Sidorenko punished the Hutchins 2nd serve and took 1/4 bps and served out the set. The 2nd set was a similar story, but after being broken midway through it, Ross did have two chances to break back but missed both.

I'm surprised that Ross and Lee aren't playing doubles together !

-- Edited by UltimateFlemingFan at 20:15, 2006-09-05

A fantastic win for Lee Childs defeating the 4th seed in just over two hours:

Rd2: L Childs [GB] bt M Yani [USA][4] 6-7[5], 6-3, 6-3

Childs bludgeoned 22 aces to 10 from Yani and hit 3 double faults to the American's 6. Childs had a 1st serve % of 54 and Yani's was 55. Lee won 40/45 points on his 1st serve and 22/36 on his 2nd serve. Yani won 36/53 points on his 1st serve and 25/43 points on his 2nd serve. Lee converted 4/9 break points while Yani only had 1 in the 3rd set which he took. Overall, Lee won 97/177 points and Yani won 80/177.

Lee now plays Germany's Phillip Hammer in the quarter-finals. Hammer beat a qualifier in straights in rd1 and then recovered from a poor 1st set to defeat 6th seed Paul Baccanello 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 in rd2. Hammer is ranked 435 with a career high of 338 reached about a year ago. This year, his best result has been reaching the final of France F10 on clay in July. They've played twice before, both matches were in juniors. Hammer won in rd2 of the Roehampton International in 1998 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 and then in rd2 of the same tournament a year later, 6-3, 1-6, 6-4.
Hammer doesn't have a particularly big 1st serve, in both his matches so far, Lee has comfortably outaced his opponents and the number of cheap points he's been able to win has made the difference. Hopefully it'll be a similar story today.

imoen wrote:

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Well done Lee, that's an excellent result! Hopefully he can build on it and get even further today.

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double well done to Lee !!!!!!!!

-- Edited by Drew at 13:06, 2006-09-08

Lee is into the semis

QF: L Childs [GB] bt P Hammer [Ger] 6-3, 6-4

This wasn't such a dominant serving display from Lee, only hitting 4 aces. However, he was able to convert his chances and the German wasn't which was the difference. Lee took 1 of his 2 bp chances in the 1st set while Hammer missed all of his 4 chances. Lee took 1 out of his 3 bp chances in set 2. Lee served at 59% and Hammer served at 60%. Both players didn't win as many points as might have been expected on their 1st serves. Lee won 30/41 and Hammer won 24/32. Lee won 18/29 points on his 2nd serve while Hammer won 10/21. Lee won 19/53 points on the return and Hammer won 22/70.
Overall Lee won 67/123 points and Hammer won 56/123.

Lee now faces 8th seed and former world junior no 1 Sebastien Rieschick in Saturday's semis. Rieschick is ranked 400 with a career high of 312 reached in January this year. He's had a poor year up until this tournament, he reached the quarters of the Recanti challenger in Italy on hard courts in July but has done little else.

Lee will gain 4 points so far from this tournament [he's defending quarter-final points from a GB futures last year]. If he loses in the semis this will take him up to 397 approx, from his current ranking of 420.

imoen wrote:

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Excellent news!

How are you getting such detailed match reports UFF? Do you have a spy at the tournament? Or are you making it all up?

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Haha, no I'm not making it up, lol. The French futures are among the best in the world for fans as for each match they provide full stats which is fantastic for futures and satellites.

-- Edited by UltimateFlemingFan at 22:22, 2006-09-08

Can't remember whether I posted this before but last December Lee got married and it seems to have definately had a positive effect on his game, he's had some really good results this year. In the previous couple of years he said he'd been finding the hard slog of futures and satellites a bit tough and I was worried that he might follow Banks and Hilton out of the game.