Tuesday 15th October 2013
It was a day of completely mixed emotions today as Alex started the day with a loss, albeit a close one, then Holly played a superb match to take out the number 2 seed and then the day ended with a disappointing doubles result.
When we woke up this morning the weather was not looking good and more overnight rain left the court at the hotel completely soaked – that meant the clay courts at the club would be in a bad way! As we were up early we decided to have breakfast at 6.30am but we didn’t end up leaving the hotel until just after 8am. When we arrived at the club we were told that the clay would not be ready until 10am but the hard courts were drying out, so we warmed up straight away. Alex and Holly then had a good hit for just over 30 minutes where they not only warmed up for their matches but also spent some time on working on their volleys while moving forwards from the baseline. That was a tactic that both of them wanted to implement in their matches so it was good to spend a little time practising it before they went on.
Alex went on court at 10am to face Phillip De Bruyn from South Africa who he lost to last week in the first round. The boys completed their 5 minute warm up but then had to wait a further 15 minutes due to a patch of the court that still wasn’t dry enough to play on. Eventually they started the match at just after 10.20am and Alex came out of the blocks well breaking Phillip in the opening game. Unfortunately Alex was broken straight back and then it took a while for both boys to really get going in the set as they exchanged a further break of serve each. Alex was playing at a good level from the back of the court but wasn’t always taking his chances and couldn’t create enough opportunities to close points out from the net. Despite this he was still staying close to Phillip until *3-4 when we was broken for the 3rd time in the set even after he had a game point. Alex managed to break Phillip as he served for the set but again struggled with his own serve and eventually went down 6-4.
Alex’s hitting level had been high throughout the first set, probably the best I’ve seen him hit the ball during the whole trip, but when he was broken at *1-2 in the second set his head started to drop and Phillip took control. Alex had more opportunities to get games on the board but couldn’t convert the big points which led to Phillip taking the second set 6-1. One big positive in the second set was that Alex managed to move forwards and finish 9 points at the net compared to only 3 in the first set – unfortunately the scoreline doesn’t say that though!
Alex and I talked through the match while he had some lunch at the onsite Italian restaurant and then Holly joined us to complete her pre-match sheet and talk through her tactics for her singles match. She then went on at 1.20pm to face number 2 seed May Wanvisa Thurakitseree from Thailand.
We knew that Holly had been playing well over the past couple of weeks, both in England where she made the final of a British Tour and out here in her matches last week. However, she wasn’t feeling well during the event last week and she felt she should have done a lot better – today she certainly found her form!
From the start of the first set Holly was on fire; she hit 4 winners in May’s opening service game to get the early break and then she didn’t once take her foot off the gas as she stormed through the set 6-0. The scoreline was impressive against a good player but the stats are even more impressive – 18 winners and 12 unforced errors to finish with an aggressive balance of +6.
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Holly preparing to serve at the start of the second set
Holly continued to produce a high level at the start of the second set but as it went on she started to find it more difficult to put together a run of quality points. May’s confidence also increased as she got a couple of games on the board and that caused Holly to start to force her shots a little. At *5-2 up Holly had the opportunity to serve out the match but a few too many errors resulted in her being broken for only the second time. In the next game Holly raised her level again to hit 3 winners and break May’s serve to close out the match 6-0, 6-3. It was all over in less than an hour and it was great to see Holly walking off the court with a huge smile on her face. The most impressive part for me though was not just beating the number 2 seed 6-0, 6-3 but also producing such a high level in doing so.
After the match I joined both Hollys for some lunch and then it was time to turn our attention to their first round doubles match. They had a tricky draw against two good girls from Taipei, but after they had both won their singles matches today I expected their confidence to be very high.
The girls went on court at just before 4.30pm to face 3rd seeds Pei Hsuan Chen and Fang-Hsien Wu but after Holly Hutchinson was broken in the first game I knew it was going to be a lot tougher than I originally thought. The first set was very close and in total there were 5 sudden death deuce games, unfortunately 3 out of the 5 went against our girls as they went down 6-3.
The second set was even closer and even though it seemed as though the girls from Taipei had the momentum, the “Hollys” continued to fight hard. They started to fight back from 1-4 down but yet again they couldn’t convert the sudden death deuce game at 2-4*. The best game from our girls was at 3-5* when they broke serve but Holly Hutchinson was broken in the next game and we eventually went down 6-3, 6-4.
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Holly Hutchinson returning during a tight first set
It was a disappointing end to a day where both Alex and Holly had played well in their singles matches but you can’t win them all and now Holly’s focus can be 100% on her singles ¼ final tomorrow.
After the match we returned to the hotel where both players had a long stretch out before we headed down to dinner at 7pm.
Alex will be leaving tomorrow as he heads back to England with Kerim from the Win Tennis team but for Holly it’s her chance to get through to the semi-finals and guarantee herself the dessert I promised her at the start of the week!!
Schedule for tomorrow:
Xeniya Prokopchuk (UKR) (1876) vs Holly Horsfall (GBR) (1460) – 1st match at 9am
