Patricia Mayr-Achleitner and her truth about the tour

When we think of Austria and sport, it is a natural association to think of winter sports, especially Alpine skiing. But the nation we all should be eternally grateful for the invention of some of the most amazing desserts ever created (Sacher and Linzer torte, Krapfen, Strudel and croissants!) has had a good tradition of tennis not to be forgotten. Thomas Muster is the clearest example, but other good players like Barbara Schett, Sybille Bammer and Tamira Paszek are all Austrian.

Today, the number one of this nation in the WTA tour is Patricia Mayr-Achleitner, even if the rankings have her second, but Yvonne Meusburger has recently retired. 

The 26 year old athlete from Tyrol has always been a strong character in the tour, well known for her sincerity, the kind of person that does not restrain her opinions. I could come to appreciate this quality in an interview I have done with her only a few days ago.

After many years spent looking for clay events all around the world, in this 2014 she has reached three times the last eitght at a WTA event (Shenzen, Kuala Lumpur and Luxembourg) and all of them were on hard courts. She has also won an important ITF for her, as it is only the second and first in six years, on the same surface in Winnipeg. I was wondering how this transformation came to happen and so this was my first question. That was the moment I immediately realised and appreciated her honesty.
 

“I started to play more on hard courts two years ago, because it's useless to count on the clay season,” she said. “Because the clay court season is too short at WTA level. Also this year I missed most of the clay court tournaments because of an injury.
 

“I also never played on hard court before the age of 22, so I am happy that I am playing better now on Hard Courts and maybe I can improve more and can reach three semifinals next year!”
 

Mayr-Achleitner would be no new to the later stages of a WTA event, as she reached the final match once before, like she told me: “It was nice to play pretty well at a home tournament in 2011, but I am always playing well in Bad Gastein. Of course I believe that I can win a title, but more important for me is to stay fit. This year I played some really good tennis until Madrid and then I got an injury and I have been hampered for three months. So the most important thing for me is to play a whole season fit.”

The Austrian’s game is a solid baseline game, her backhand is her best shot, but the quality that strikes the most of her tennis is the ability to lean easily on her opponent’s power. I personally was stunned when I saw her playing and upsetting Sabine Lisicki on the fast indoor conditions of Linz.

“Difficult to say (how I play),” she told me. “I started to play more aggressively this year and my service is now also better. So I think I want to try and play a more active game.

“Against opponents like Lisicki it's easier for me, because I tried to make less mistakes than them. And it worked out well.”

Even before her new focus on hard courts, the Tyrolese played many good matches in the indoor conditions, testified once more this year when she challenged Genie Bouchard in Linz.
 

“I don't know why my game works indoor,” she admitted. “I just play two tournaments indoors and mostly it works good. Maybe I am used to it, because in Austria you have to practise 6 months indoor cause of the snow.”
 

And about that match with the Canadian, Mayr-Achleitner was very vocal on social media when, after the first round win against the Austrian, Bouchard retired from Linz and saved some energy for Singapore (even though it must be said that she looked far from her best there.)

“Of course I am not happy with this, because it's unfair...” she told me, reinforcing the words she posted on her Facebook profile when this incident happened.
But she is not the kind of girl to live for the past and I had another reason to believe in that when I asked her about her favourite win of the career (she has wins over Yanina Wickmayer, Simona Halep and Elina Svitolina).
 

“I don’t really have one,” she said. “I am happy about every good result. We are all very close.
There is not a big difference among players from WTA 20 to 100. Some of them just play on tour, so they focus more on ranking. For me, I play more league matches ( Austria, Germany, France...) and Fed Cup, because there you can make more money for your future. I played now 6 of 7 years in the Top 108, so this is the most important thing.”
 

Nonetheless, she is a frequent flyer and has travelled many countries and continents for tournaments, so I asked her about this new wave of Chinese tournaments and her answer had no political correctness.
 

“I don't like to play in China,” she admitted. “It's pretty far for the European players and there are a lot of tournaments there nowadays, so it's tough for us to stay a long time there: different food, different culture. Not easy. And of course it's very expensive to stay a long time there. That’s why I prefer South America and Europe.
 

As my home country is just southern from the border of the Alps, I asked her about Italy.
 

“I like to play in Italy and Italy is one of my favourite countries,” she said. “I am a big fan of AC Milan. So I would prefer to play more there, but there are no more higher tournaments and so it's difficult to play more there.”

However, she sees little hope for the tennis movement in her home country too: “Austrian tennis has a poor future. Hopefully Dominc Thiem is doing well at ATP for a long time and maybe something changes for the Austrian tennis.”
 

The woman from Rum is one of these players that ended up in a relationship with their coaches. In her case, the two happily married four years ago, but she does not rely on her husband only as a coach.
 

“My husband (Michael Achleitner) is still my coach,” she said. “But Vladimir Platenik (former D. Cibulkova's Coach) is also working with me 25 weeks. I always need new impulses...”
 

So, as she admitted that she does not know what her life will be when she retires from tennis, all I can wish her is the best for the next season.

(originally written by me in Italian for SpazioTennis www.spaziotennis.com/2014/12/mayr-achleitner-patricia-intervista-wta )

I am still alive

Yes, I know, this blog has seen better days. I have not put any new entry since July, which is a hell of long time ago, however, I think I have never been more productive than in the past few months.

Truth is that in the past year I started writing for a few Italian and international tennis websites and this is taking a lot of time. Come to think that during the WTA Finals, I was writing some four articles every evening in two different languages...it is quite a challenge, though I love it.

In the time between my latest post and this one, I have done lots: I finished my MA in sports journalism in London at the Saint Mary's University of Twickenham, with a final project which was a documentary on the media pressure on the growth of a sports talent. Here's a sneak peek of the final work on Alessia Trost (athletics):

I have also attended WTA Linz, where I had the chance to interview a few players, including Camila Giorgi and Karolina Pliskova. With that, I got accreditation for four events this year, with another event coming up next week in Brescia, a number I will try to improve in 2015!

I promise I will try to keep up with the Alpine skiing on this page, for which I have not started writing on any other publication, but I am basically full time busy writing about tennis nowadays, which makes it quite hard to come back here and write about tennis more.

If you please to keep up with my writing, however, you can follow me on twitter here @GiulioGasparin and/or keep an eye on the other publications I write for. For the international readers of this page, I write often on the English page of ubitennis.com and here you can keep track of my latest pieces: http://www.ubitennis.com/english/author/gasparin/

For the Italian readers, well, I picked up my Italian after a whole year in London and increased the number of articles in my native language, so you can read my pieces on www.ubitennis.com and www.spaziotennis.com

Tamarine Tanasugarn: "I want to be top 100 again"

Thirty-seven years of age and still the smile of a newbie at her first event, Tamarine Tanasugarn has never lost her joy on the tennis courts, even during the difficult past seasons of injuries, and now she is planning to comeback as strong as ever.

In 2008, at the age of 31 she amazed the world with one of her best seasons, capturing her first grand slam quarter finals’ appearance at Wimbledon, right after winning a title on the Dutch grass of Den Bosch beating the world number 1 Dinara Safina in the final.

Six years later, she dropped out of the top 450 in the world, but she still enjoys every moment out there and she said not to be ready for calling a career.

“I guess it’s me, I like to challenge myself, you know, and especially now at my age, right now, it’s more challenging with my body,” she told me. “You know, the girls right now are a lot stronger, physically as well… it’s really more challenging and I like to do that. So, I keep enjoying the challenge and, you know, see how can I cope with this, you know.”

“Right now I’m just enjoying my tennis, but I don’t really plan, like, two or three years ahead,” she admitted with an excited voice. “So, most important thing, I hope I’ll be injury free… so right now I’m kinda like enjoying it all… but you know, every day has to be ‘improve, improve, and doing better’.”

At the age of 37 and in a sport where girls are often breaking through in their teen years, she often plays against opponent that can potentially have half her age.

But she takes even this detail with a relaxed and positive attitude.

Ⓒ Robbie Mendelson

“When that happens, actually, I am, you know like, ‘wow! She’s young’,” she said with a warm smile. “But luckily I don’t really pay attention to the numbers of the age, because, you know, I like challenging with their styles, you know, cause every girl has a different style,.

“I’m looking more at the game instead of, you know, who I’m playing or something like that, so I think it feels good for me if I don’t concentrate on their age but enjoy the tennis.”

Having been for many years one of the few faces of Thai tennis, she is now enjoying the company of up and coming girls.

“It’s good, you know, they are such amazing girls, both of them, like Noppawan (Lertchewakaarn) and Kumkhum,” she said. “They are very nice girls and we are in the same FedCup team together. They are great and they are fun, you know, and I’m kind of happy because during my time I was the only one, me  and also Paradorn (Srichapan), one of each side, you know, women and men, so it was kinda like not fun to travel alone with none speaking the same language, from the same nation.

“But now we are more girls with talent, so it’s kinda more fun, we hang out together, go out for dinner. It’s more fun and they are nice, you know, we are like sisters and we are pretty close, yeah.”

Tammy has been a very accomplished player on grass and fast courts in general, thanks to her flat strokes and low balls, she welcomed very positively the news that from 2015 the grass season will be one week longer.

“Definitely it is very good to have a longer grass court season,” she admitted. “And I was like ‘well, I wished that it could have been earlier, when I was, you know, like in a good shape’.

“But anyway, it’s very great for tennis cause we have longer clay courts’ season and longer hard courts’ season, so it should be longer on grass to be, how to say…equal. I know it’s kinda tough because French Open and Wimbledon are close, but it’s a good news, so, you know like, it’s a beginning to have one week longer grass season.

“It’s already, you know, a good start, so I don’t know maybe it might have more longer season or maybe more tournaments in those three weeks before.”

It comes as no surprise then that her favorite tournament of the year happens at the end of these soon extended three weeks, in London.

“Wimbledon. Yeah, because I’ve always kinda done well there, in that Grand Slam,” she added trying to contain her smiles. “I think the organizers and the people… it’s very very nice. They don’t really go for the big names, you know, they look for the tennis game, they cheer for underdogs.”

“I love that atmosphere because some places are just like, you know, ‘oh, big names’, so they go for the big names.

“Anyway, it’s overall great as in London there is summer-sale as well and there’s good shopping in the city, so it’s everything in the same week. So I think I’m always enjoying Wimbledon for different reasons.”

Ⓒ women's tennis blog

This year she did not manage to enter the Wimbledon draw, but this is only a motivation to try harder for the next season.

“For sure, you know, because at the end of last year I didn’t play much in singles, so I dropped my rank a bit, so my next challenge is, you know, to be back to the top100 again with my singles.

“I know it’s not easy but it’s really challenging and it is exciting to do that again, yeah, of course, you know, either way, singles and doubles, cope with my rankings in top100 again.”

It is an ambitious goal for her, when her best ranking, at number 19 in the world, arrived 12 years ago. But she is not afraid of trying.

“Just don’t underestimate me with the age. The age is nothing so I try to enjoy and have fun in the court though. But actually I have Kimiko Date as my idol so… if she is still fighting I can still play too!”

The Ethics and Hard Work of Sharon Fichman

While most tennis fans are probably associating Canada with the rising star of Eugenie Bouchard, the Canadians are witnessing the constant improvement of a former very promising junior, who is now proving herself in the big tour: Sharon Fichman.

The 23 year old girl from Toronto has this year reached her career’s best ranking at world number 77, confirming once again her constant improvement over the years.

She made her top 100 debut during this 2014 and she clearly means to stay, as her results keep improving week after week. In a lovely and relaxed chat, she explained me how this all could happen:

“It’s a lot of things, you can’t just pin point one thing,” she said. “You know, I work really hard and I know a lot of girl on tour do too, but I just try to be one of the hardest workers and every day I like to look back and make sure that I did my absolute best with whatever I had and I think that’s probably the biggest factor in the way my tennis is going, in my attitude.

“My team is great, you know, I love working with my coach: he is fantastic, he believes in me, I believe in him and, you know, he is not here with me this week, I have someone else with me and he is doing a great job. You just plan you work and work you plan and that’s it.”

Fichman has a great defensive game, characterized by a remarkable footwork and fast movements, but what has improved a lot over the years is her anticipation and how much flatter her shots are.

Despite being 1.63m tall (5ft4), her serve has improved dramatically and so the power of her groundstrokes.

This combination of defensive and offensive abilities has led to results equally as good on all surfaces and against a variety of opponents.

“The biggest thing for me is that, you know, I have my game style, I have my objectives and my goals when I’m playing, no matter the surface,” she explained to me. “You know, you still stick to your core values when you are playing; of course you have to make some few adjustments, a few tweaks, that’s natural, and I do that at the best of my ability.

“But in the end I focus on myself because that’s all I can control, that’s really all I can ask out of myself today.”

Earlier this spring, as an epitome to this improvements, she won her first $100,000 event in Cagnes-sur-Mer and then came very close to upsetting Jelena Jankovic at Roland Garros.

Despite the loss, she took lots of positives out of that match and, like you would expect from such a fierce personality, an additional motivation for the future.

“It’s great to have had that experience, I’m very disappointed still, that I lost, I thought that it was close and I had my chances,” she admitted. “At 3-3 in the third, I had a break point I didn’t convert, I learnt from it and next time I’ll just be more prepared, be ready.

“I look forward to playing her and other top players again and learning from my mistakes and correcting it.

“I’m always looking forward, how can I get better, how can I improve and I know that one of the things that comes along with improving is you have better opponents. Obviously every single person you play on every given day, you know, anything can happen, everyone is out there to win and compete hard and fight, but of course as you play bigger events you’re gonna play players that are more accomplished in their careers and I expect a tough battle every time I’m gonna play such players.”

 Despite her lovely Canadian accent when speaking and her undeniably big love for her home country –as much as she named “making history with the Canadian team” as one of her best memories on a tennis court-, if you happen to follow one of her matches, you will soon realize that her way of cheering for points comes from somewhere else.

“My family, my background is eastern European: they are Romanian and Hungarian, so “haide” is “c’mon” in Romanian, so… I don’t know, it’s something that, growing up with my parents coming to matches supporting me, sometimes they would just say something in another language and I guess it just stuck with me.

“I don’t speak other than English, well, my French is decent, my Hungarian is decent, you know, my Romanian ehmmm…” and she paused herself with a funny face.

So where does she go from here?

“I don’t like putting numbers on things because you can’t control numbers,” she said. “You know, it’s such a cliché-answer but I just want to keep improving every day and I want to get more confident.

“I’m confident on my ability but I just want to keep doing it every time I’m on court and keep pushing myself, you know, and put myself in tougher situations and come out of it the best I can.

“I just want to keep playing bigger tournaments and improving and learning and getting better and I think that, at the end of the day, it is the most important thing. I think that is gonna get me to the numbers and, you know, the ranking and the seeding and all that stuff that comes with them.”

Surely tennis fans will look for her names during the American summer on hard courts, including the home event of the Rogers Cup in Montreal. But, as she said, there is one event that cannot compare with others for her:

“I love playing at home, but I think my favorite, the one that I enjoy, you know, I always look back on - and I think it’s just the city and everything - I love the Us Open, I love New York City. It’s super fun, it’s just a great place."

The most remarkable aspect of this tenacious girl came about in the very last question I asked. There are lots of players that have great work ethics, but it is not as frequent to see such a great passion for the sport and yet respect for the opponents as she honestly expressed.

She named many girls when I asked about her best friends on tour: Maria Sanchez, Johanna Konta, Olga Savchuk.

Then she added: “I mean, let me be honest with you, this is such a tough career path and I respect everybody that chooses to do it. You know, because it is such a difficult career path, you needs some remarkable people along the way and I’m fortunate to know a lot of people that kinda are on the same path as me.

“I hope they see me in that way too and it’s hard to just pinpoint a handful of people, but overall there are great people on tour, guys and girls.”

Christina McHale's way back to the top

After a difficult 2013 when injuries and the recovery from mononucleosis held her back, Christina McHale is finally bouncing back in this 2014, looking as determined as never before.

A small injury slowed her preparation for Wimbledon, as in the last training session before the ITF event of Nottingham, she slipped during sprints, falling heavily on her hand, which did not let her play for a couple of days.

The healing took a few days, but she managed to compete the following weeks, coming to Wimbledon with a bunch of matches played on green.

“It is definitely going in the right direction,” she said: “I think it was the right decision to pull out of Nottingham, because I was in quite a lot a pain, but I think it’s slowly getting better again.”

Having proved to be an all-round player with several good performances in each slam and on every surface, the girl from New Jersey has her worst wins-losses ratio on grass.

 

© Carine06

“I mean, I think part of the reason is ‘cause there are not many tournaments on grass,” she explained: “So I feel like by the time I get really used to it, it’s over.

“But, well two years ago, I did make a third round in Wimbledon, so I do feel I have had good matches on the grass, probably just not enough matches.”

Since that 2012 when she reached the third round in three consecutive slams, she had been struggling with a serious form of mono, that seemed to arrest her improvements.

“It was tough…it’s really like something some people don’t really realize, that once you actually get over it, then the time you need to get back in full strength takes a long time,” she said with a slightly trembling voice, a sign of how hard it has been for her.

“So, I think I’m so happy to be over that and I think also I’m back now working with my old coaches again it is making many differences as well.”

And the difference is that this year she came very close to capturing her very first WTA title, as she reached her first final in Acapulco, losing in three sets to Australian Open runner-up, Dominika Cibulkova.

“ I think I’m getting closer, that was definitely a very close match, it was a really good week for me,” she acknowledged.

“And then, you know, like in Strasbourg, I made the semis and almost made the final as I had a match point. I’m putting myself in more opportunities and I think the more I’ll do that, it’ll just naturally come on its own.”

Not only the first title is coming closer, but her old habit of upsetting big names –she has wins over Victoria Azarenka, Caroline Wozniacki and Svetlana Kuznetsova- is about to come back too, as testified by her match against Maria Sharapova in Madrid, when she was a break up in the decisive set.

“I definitely took a lot away from that match even though I lost,” she admitted: “It was disappointing. But it reassured myself that I can compete against the top girls, and it gave me confidence and in my next matches in Rome I carried that over.

“So I took a lot from that and hopefully, yeah, I can just keep building and improving my game and hopefully get there, one day.”

After her big battles this year and the surprising results of many up and coming youngsters at Roland Garros, more and more players believe that beating the top names is not impossible after all.

“I think, when you see someone, you know, like the top seeds pulling out against players that are around my age or that I’ve played against. So you think, if they can do it, then I can do it too. So it’s really inspirational to see them doing such things,” she said.

 

© Christian Mesiano

Moreover, the new wave of American youngsters doing well is a great support.

“I definitely think so, there is a lot of us, who are trying to push through right now,” she admitted: “A lot of the Americans girls we practice together in Boca, in Florida…so it’s really a competition, we push each other every day, so I think that has really helped us and, yeah, I think especially Sloane, she is really doing well a lot, Madison, Lauren, me… so I think it’s like kinda pushing each other.”

But it is not just a matter of training, there is also a good relationship that grew stronger with the years.

“I think that American girls in general get along really well,” she said: “I think we, you know…obviously if we play each other it’s a different story, we are rivals. But I think that off the court we get along pretty well, I mean, we see each other all the time, so it’s nice to have, you know, friendships with them.”

Having achieved the same success in all the slams and so in all surfaces, one would expect her to find it hard to pick a favourite one, but she has no doubts about it:

“It’s hardcourt. I just feel the most comfortable on it cause I grew up playing on hardcourt. But I mean, yeah, I’d say clay it’s my second and then maybe grass is my third for right now, but it could change.”

Also tournament wise, the choice was easy:

“The Us Open! Yeah, I don’t have to think about it. I actually live really close to that, like 20 minutes away. So I used to practice there all the time, so for me it’s like my home tournament. I really love it.”

Around the world is very common for players whose native language is not English to communicate with coaches in that language, but not so for the 22 year old, who speaks a beautiful Spanish during the changeovers.

“My mum is Cuban,” she explained: “My physio is Argentinean and my coach is also Argentinean, so yeah, I speak Spanish a lot to them and to my mum.”

She also told me that speaking Spanish, even in the world of tennis, can come in hand very often:

“Yeah, I mean, it was useful in Madrid, like, I just communicate in Acapulco and Mexico, like I just communicate with everyone and all the people there or also many players speak Spanish, so that’s really helpful and all in that aspect.”

Despite the young age, she has had a great deal of experiences, but there is one that so far is her most memorable.

 

© Aleksandr Osipov

“I would say I go with the Olympics. That was really really cool, like nothing has compared to that, like the opening ceremony and just being with all the other athletes, it was unreal, yeah.”

So after a look back, it is time to look ahead and what lies in her future plans.

“I mean, I definitely would… I want to try and win a WTA tournament, that would be a good goal for me.” She admitted: “But I mean, if I just keep on working on the same way I’ve been working, just really focus on what I need to improve and get more power in my game, things like that.

“I feel like naturally the results will start coming. So, yeah, that would be like my tournament-wise goal, but on a more day to day basis it is just doing the right things, my fitness, my tennis every day.”

Postmatch interview with Marcos Baghdatis - Nottingham QF

-How are you feeling today?

Great, I mean, I’ve had to good matches today, the first was not as good, but the second was the one that I have got the rhythm after the first one. So now I am feeling great.

- Is everything alright after your fall in one of the last few games? You slipped on the grass and then hold your thigh…

I was only scared a bit, but nothing serious and now I am feeling good, so that is the most important thing.

- After going through many physical problems in the past few years, how are you feeling right now?

Great, you know, I’ve had some troubles lately, in the past year…and a half I can say, you know, some health problems, but now I am feeling good and you know, what is in the past is in the past, so I am looking forward to the future and I am feeling everything is fine with my body, so it is great!

-How does it feel to be back in the ATP Challenger tour after having been at the top of the game?

Well, you know, matches are matches. For sure this is a tough challenger, one of the toughest, but I decided to come here at the last minute, just to play matches, especially because on grass we don’t really have that many tournaments on grass. So, I can’t but say I am happy because I am winning matches.

-So what is coming next for you?

Queens!

Post-match interviews with Melanie Oudin and Michelle Larcher de Brito

 

Post match Interview with Melanie Oudin

-Congrats for your win today! How does it feel to be back on grass, where you have done so well in the past?

It’s good, I mean, I love the grass. Obviously I’ve done well in past but every year it is tough…this is the first tournament of the year on it and I have never done well here actually. I had some tough rounds here in the past, plus I played Heather (Watson) last year in the first round.

I think I’m really solid so far, I’m serving really well and returning well, I mean that’s the most important thing on the grass. I’m so far so good, I mean, I’m really happy with how I played my past two matches, so hopefully I can get some momentum and be able to play the same again tomorrow.

- Obviously it is not easy for you after the bad injury during the off season. How are you feeling right now?

Good, I mean, it was a long time out so I just need to play a lot of matches. I mean, this is the best consistent I have played, these past two matches, like I just need the match to play, you know, I mean for being out for so long, I mean, everyone is playing the whole year so I’m pretty fresh and I’m definitely looking forward to playing a lot of matches in this grass season.

-What is next on your schedule now?

Birmingham and then Wimbledon in the qualies, so, you never know, I mean if you win this tournament or you do well on the grass, like I know Wimbledon has WCs to give away. So yeah, I mean, it would be awesome if I could do well enough to get one maybe, but if not playing Wimbledon qualies is fine, like I said, I just need the matches.

-What about the goals for the rest of the season?

Right now I just need to be patient with myself and, you know, getting into tournaments, like really get my focus back, because I played so up and down lately, but, yeah I mean, my goal is to get back in top100 again, you know, I want to try by the US Open to be top100 again.

 

-Are you optimistic about a WC for the home slam?

I don’t know, last year I didn’t get one, so I’m not sure, I mean, I think honestly for me right now it’s better to play qualies, like I need to earn my way again and just get those matches, you know, and might be ready for those top players in the main draw.

Post match Interview with Michelle Larcher de Brito

-Congratulations for such a big fight today, how are you feeling?

So far so good. I’ve had two tough matches and I am just glad I’ve past two rounds and, you know, it gets better every day and I start feeling more comfortable on the grass.

- You have done well on this surface in the past, do you like it a lot?

Yeah, it’s nice and fast, so it really suits my game, you know, I play very flat and it helps me, playing on the grass. It is little tricky obviously cause you are kinda nervous about falling and getting injured. I once fell and I was out for three months, so it’s a little scary to play but it’s very nice surface and I think it suits my game.

-After breaking through so young, like you did, how hard it is to confirm your status and stay on the top of the game?

I don’t know, it’s like, you come out and you are the underdog, nobody knows you and it’s kinda easy, you know, to win few matches because nobody really knows you at first, but once people get to know you, they study your game, they get to know you better so then obviously players come up more prepared knowing your weaknesses.

But you know, it’s ok, I mean, it’s part of tennis, a lot of people have ups and downs, and you know, I’m just trying to keep my best and stay happy . I’ve just got to stay positive and keep going and stay happy no matter what happens.

- The match was very tough, you’ve been up 5-2, Coco (Vandeweghe) seemed out of the match, but on every match point she came up with stunning winners. How hard is it to stay focused when such things happen?

I’ve just tried to stay as calm as possible, it was really hard at one stage. You know, even though you’re winning, you know, it’s tough to close it out, it’s always the hardest part of the match, the end, you know.

I’ve got really nervous but I’ve just tried to stay as calm as possible and keep fighting. And it was very nerve wracking but, you know, I’ve just wanted things start working, you know, tried to stay calmer. Sometimes you let out the frustration a little bit but, you know, I’m glad, I’m very glad… you know, I’m not happy that happened but sometimes I’m glad that such things happen because I’m teaching myself to remain calm, I don’t need to freak out ‘cause, you know, I’m in the winning end, so stay calm and walk through.

-What are your goals for this season on grass then?

I don’t know, you know, just win as many matches as possible, I was here trying to get as many points as possible before Wimbledon, also because I have so many points to defend there. So, you know, I’m just trying to get confident on the grass and feel better about my game and just do my best.

-What about the rest of the season?           

You never know what is gonna happen, I’m just trying to work on my game and trying to do my best,. You know, I’d love to… I’m really close to be in the top 100 so it would be nice to get back there but, you know, I’m just trying to work on everything and just, you know, do my best.

There’s nothing else you can do, you know, tennis is such a tricky game, so you have to just get, you know, remain as confident as possible and get out all you can do and that is it all.

The ITF Nottingham experience: Day 2

My second day at ITF Nottingham was absolutely great: a lot of action, some nice interviews and a bit of drama.

If by any chance you can read Italian or trust google translate for the job, you might find a more serious and longer piece on the day here.

Moore vs the rain

To summarise the day quickly, because it is well past midnight and tomorrow I have another long day to cover, the day was smashing. It started with the weather being a bit dodgy, but it definitely improved later on.

As for me it started with a nice chat-interview with Christina McHale, which will be out soon –I’ll keep you updated with that-, who told me that she had finally started hitting again and despite the pain, she is happy and confident for the upcoming weeks.

I then watched Madison Keys hitting with Lauren Davis and it was nice, though Keys was not very centred, but her forehand was absolutely stunning at times. Davis is also nice to watch as her shots seems to be always landing in the last 20cm of the court.

Cox has some great game for grass!

That was on some hardcourts, funnily enough, on the courts next to them, British Tara More was trying to dry the concrete with not much success, so that after some nice 15 minutes of work she gave up.

From actual tennis matches, I watched the first set between Daniel Evans and Daniel Cox. Though Evans won in two 7-5 sets, I was not very impressed by his game, not as much as Cox’s at least.

Cox could be the unknown underdog to make a (small) surprise if he is given a WC in one of the next grass events, including Wimbledon. Nice solid from the back, good serve and obviously very used to the surface.

Who really needs a lot more training on grass is Nick Kyrgios, who lost to Australian qualifier John-Patrick Smith in straights, looking completely unable to move nor adjust to the low bounces.

Johnson vs the net

Thumbs up for Steve Johnson instead. He won his opening match in two comfortable sets against crowd favourite James Ward.

The American has a massive serve, good forehand and his backhand slice works perfectly on grass, his movements need some work on, as he kept slipping and once even crashed into and almost over the net trying to get to a dropshot.

On the women’s tournament I will give just a few flashes for each of the match I followed.

Kristyna Pliskova is clearly finding wins again on grass because it is the only surface where she does not have to move much, nor use her backhand a lot. She generally needs to hit her first serve in and she can definitely do that.

Dunne and her Vika-vibe

Her opponent, the young Katy Dunne was a nice surprise: despite looking 15, she actually is 19. She reminds me of a young Azarenka, because of her look, her game and her on-court tantrums. 

Her biggest problem is that she is some 20cm shorter and way thinner, she has a nice game and could develop in the future.

Both Melanie Oudin and Sharon Fichman impressed me in a positive way: they both won their matches easily against good grass-courters and they both played some very inspiring tennis.

Oudin was radiant as we talked after her match. After the physical problems she is truly enthusiastic of winning matches again, playing some nice too.

“I think I’ve been really solid so far,” she said: “I’m serving really well and returning well, I mean that’s the most important thing on the grass. I’m so far so good, I mean, I’m really happy with how I played my past matches so hopefully I will be able to play like this again tomorrow.”

Fichman, who is the highest seed left, played very well as well and it looked very confident out there in dealing with the powerful shots of Vesna Dolonc.

The Canadian closed in two showing how her flat strokes can do a lot of damage on grass, despite their speed may not be as high.

Fichman vs  Dolonc

The lowest quality, but one of the greatest intensity was reached by the match between Irina Falconi and Eleni Daniilidou. The American easily got the first set for 6-0, then she suffered the return of the Greek and finally disappeared mentally especially. 0-6 6-4 6-0 the final score for the former champion.

The last match of the day for me was an epic three set battle between Coco Vandeweghe and Michelle Larcher de Brito.

I did not write that, but Kontaveit looks like young Masha!

It was epic in many senses, but ultimately for the horrible and yet entertaining attitude showed by the New Yorker in the third set, when things were going in favor of the Portuguese.

Let’s make it clear, I like Vandeweghe and I do believe that her strokes are genuinely among the most beautiful of the WTA tour in terms of smoothness and aesthetics. But in the third set, she would have got a good use of a cold shower or alike.

She played very erratic and brainless points just for the sake of implementing her negative aura, just to save several match points with sensational winners.

very nice to see Mel back!

She came back from 5-2 down despite throwing tantrums including a smashed chair, a flying visor and a out-of-the-blue second serve ace probably faster than any other serve of her match, just after she had netted the slowest of her second serves.

As said above, she came back to 5-5, but then surrendered again, this time for good, especially in the last service game, where she hit two double faults and basically refused to chase the other two returns.

Massive credits to Larcher de Brito though, she was the only one believing she could turn the match around after the first set and so she did, playing a very solid and yet aggressive game.

Larcher de Brito

After the match she said: “I’ve just tried to stay as calm as possible, it was really hard at some stages. You know, even though you’re winning, it’s tough to close it out, it’s always the hardest part of the match, the end, you know.

“I’ve got really nervous,but I’ve just tried to stay as calm as possible and keep fighting. And it was very nerve wracking but, you know, I’ve just wanted and tried to stay calmer.”

Tomorrow it will be a big day with both the quarters and the semis being played. Stay tuned!

A nice tantrum by Coco