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US Open - ROBSON
STAYS ON TRACK Barbara Wancke rounds up the junior event at the US Open.
Chatting to Courtney Dolehide, Heather Watson’s opponent on Wednesday, as Oudin slew another giant taking the form of Nadia Petrova on Arthur Ashe Stadium, it was clear her following is great. We were checking the score on the bus via the US Open’s handy little app on an iPhone when Oudin secured her third match point. “That’s amazing,” Dolehide shrieked. “Just awesome!” The personable young player from Illinois is having a great time in New York, after having been wild carded into and playing through the qualififying for the US Open Junior Girls Singles Championships on Sunday and then disposing of Romanian Crisitna Dinu in three sets on Monday. “I’ve been a couple of times to Time Square and walked around a bit but mostly I’ve been concentrating on my matches. New York is just great!” It’s pretty well the view of most who get to play here because the US Open is pretty well an epicentre of their tender ambition. Dolehide plays the leading British girl Hannah Watson, seeded 11th in a second-round match Wednesday.
Leading 3-2 in the first set, the British girl who is only 15, blew five break points. After Embree held, she broke serve when a clearly frustrated Robson missed a down-the-line backhand. |
The American, 18, saved four more break points in the eighth game before clinching the first set by stepping inside the baseline to put a short forehand away. “It was disappointing when I got broken, but having the break points didn’t really affect me,” said Robson. Though she dropped the second set in 25 minutes, Embree appeared to regain momentum when she raced to a 4-1 third set lead. Then Robson’s confidence returned and she held for 2-4, striking a crosscourt forehand winner from beyond the baseline. She hit two more forehand winners to break for 3-4, and then drew an Embree error with a penetrating forehand for 4-4. “Her forehand definitely was on towards the end,” said Embree. “She got the ball deep to my backhand or my forehand and I hit a little bit short and didn’t come up with the rest of the shots.” Embree lost the final 10 points of the match, watching helplessly as her own forehand flew long on Robson’s first match point. Robson, who reached the final round of qualifying for the main women's draw in the final grand slam of 2009, next plays Tamaryn Hendler of Belgium, victor over Russia's Yulia Putintseva 6-4 6-4, for a place in the quarter-finals. The 15-year-old returned to action later in the day alongside Anna Orlik of Belarus in a first-round girls' doubles tie against Japan's Miyabi Inoue and Risa Ozaki, which they lost 2-6 6-3 [10-5]. While Robsons’ singles result is not generally considered an upset, she nevertheless disposed of a seeded player. Two other seeded girls fell Tuesday. The Russian Yana Buchina knocked off 5th seeded Ajla Tomljanovic from Croatia, 3-6 6-2 6-3 and Romania’s Elena Bogdan crushed the 13th seeded Japanese girl, Miyabi Inoue, 6-0 6-0. Gianni Mina, the 4th seed from Guadeloupe, who looks a lot like Gael Monfils, came a step closer to capturing the only junior Grand Slam that Monfils never won, defeating Jozef Kovalik of Slovakia, 5-7 6-2 6-4. The 6-foot-2 Mina (two inches shorter than Monfils) broke Kovalik in all of the Slovak’s service games in the second set. He also broke his strings when he ran around his backhand on one return, and still had so much spin and pace on his forehand that Kovalik couldn’t handle it. |
Serving at 4-3 in the third set, Mina passed Kovalik from close to the backdrop with a down-the-line forehand on the dead run. The 17-year-old clinched the match when Kovalik missed a return long, advancing to play Christian Lindell of Sweden in the round of 16. “A lot of people believe that I am Gael Monfils,” said Mina, whose English is improving with every interview. “I am black. I have a backhand like Monfils. I run like Monfils. It’s so cool, but now I am so bored about this.” On neighbouring Court 14, Jack Sock, from Nebraska, punctuated his 6-1 6-4 win over Ukrainian Stanislav Poplavskyy with a slam dunk overhead on his fourth match point. Though Sock, 16, had never won a match on the ITF Junior Circuit prior to the US Open, he’s won 17 gold balls at USTA national junior tournaments and now plays the world number one Yuki Bhambri of India in the next round. “It’ll be tough, obviously,” said Sock, a versatile baseliner with deceptive slice and a good drop shot. “He’s a good player so I’m going to play my own game, stick to the game plan I get from my coach and just see how it goes.” Chicago native Evan King, who will play tennis for the University of Michigan this season, enjoyed the biggest upset of the day in boys’ singles, defeating 5th seeded Argentine Agustin Velotti, 7-6(4) 6-4. Auckland teenager Sebastian Lavie advanced to the third round of the US Open tennis junior boys tournament. Paris-based Lavie, 17, needed tie breaks in both sets to edge out the American Tennys Sandgren who put out the 2nd seed in the opening round, 7-6(4) 7-6(5). Earlier this year, Lavie made the second rounds of the junior boys competitions at the French Open and Wimbledon. Middlesex's Oliver Golding was due to be in doubles action with Sweden's Tobias Blomgren against the Argentine second seeds, Facundo Argüello and Agustín Velotti, while the 16-year-old Dubliner John Morrissey partnered India's Sudanwa Sitaram against the US pair Gonzalas Austin and Bjorn Fratangelo and won 4-6 6-3 [10-5]. |
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September 9 - Everyone is being
inspired by the Cinderalla story unfolding stage centre of the tennis world, particularly
in the junior ranks because Melanie Oudin (left) is still technically one of
them.
Laura
Robson, left, junior Wimbledon winner in 2008 and a finalist in the junior
Australian Open final in January, was in action Tuesday against the 7th
seed, Lauren Embree, from Florida.