Thursday 13th October – Friday 14th October 2011
So . . . it was all down to the doubles and Mia and Angelina Skidanova would have to really be on their game to take down the no.2 seeds in their first round match.
We were on court warming up at 9.15am before Mia and Angelina starting hitting against Anais and Julia at around 10am. It was really good to have the 4 girls warming up together especially as it meant they could hit next to their doubles partner – that’s something that might seem small but it gives the players a chance to get used to their partner being right next to them before they play the match. Unfortunately the session didn’t last very long as after 10 minutes the rain came down (at least the rain kept up its 100% record!) and we had to escape to an undercover parking area for some shelter. We thought it would only be a quick shower but in the end it rained for 4 and a half hours!!
We went back to the hotel for some lunch and it gave Mia and the other girls a chance to catch up on some school work while Pierre and I went for a bit of a stroll around the riverside. You rarely get a chance to explore the town much when you’re away at these kind of events and often you get a misconceived impression of how poor some of the places really are, after all we go from a nice hotel to a tennis club and back each day and maybe venture out to the supermarket! We spent about 30 minutes walking around, chatting with some of the locals and seeing how they live their lives:
The waterside houses just metres from our hotel and locals selling Chickens, Ducks and Rice.
The rain eventually stopped around 2.30pm but as they still had to dry the courts we didn’t end up going over to the club until 3.30pm. We watched the match before Mia and Angelina’s and as it was getting to the middle of the second set the girls warmed up before I sat them down to go through the tactics for the match.
It was always going to be a tough match against the 2nd seeds especially as Ah Song from Korea had won the doubles the week before but Mia and Angelina started well despite going a break down at 2-1. At this point they were actually playing better doubles than their opponents but just missing once they had set the point up and the older, more experienced pair knew they just needed to stay solid and take their chances. Song and Phakamad then took the next 4 games to take the first set 6-1 and continued their solid level to go on to take the second set 6-2. I was really pleased with how positive Mia was when she came off court; we both agreed that it was a good performance especially from her and considering Mia and Angelina are the youngest players in the draw they showed they they’re both capable of competing well in doubles.
After the match we headed back to the hotel to get some dinner and then, while Mia went with Julia and Stephanie to get a massage, I tried to change our flights. The problem was that the Singapore Air offices in Vietnam were all shut but thankfully my wife came to the rescue and did all the hard work for us in changing the tickets from the UK. Unfortunately the flight we wanted for the next evening wasn’t available so we had to opt for the 1.10pm flight which meant we had to get an overnight bus to Ho Chi Minh! Mia got back from her massage at 9.45pm and that’s when I told her she only had 1 hour and 15 minutes before we had to leave! Luckily she hadn’t really unpacked so she was ready before me!
We said goodbye to everyone and got a taxi to the bus station at 11pm before boarding the bus at 11.30pm. The next 20 hours looked something like this: 6 hour bus journey to Ho Chi Minh, taxi to the airport, 5 hour wait at the airport, 2 hour flight to Singapore and then a 7 hour wait for our final flight to London. It’s now 9pm and we’ve still got another couple of hour before we board!
Overall the trip has been very positive and a complete success; yes we came here to pick up some points and unfortunately we didn’t quite manage it but the training, competition and all round experience has developed Mia as a person and as a tennis player and it’s something that can only be achieved by being on the road at these type of events.
