Monday 26th November 2012
It was a tough day for the girls today as they both suffered 1st round losses but with every loss comes some positives and some learning points which will definitely help to develop their tennis.
Our normal timetable of breakfast at 8am followed by warming up at the club at 9am remained unchanged this morning but due to the crazy way that the referee decided to arrange the practice courts it meant that we then had to go offsite to hit.
The Mvita Tennis Club is only about a 5 minute Tuk Tuk ride away and yesterday we didn’t have any problems getting there but today we had 2 drivers who did not have a clue where they were going! After 10 minutes of driving around we eventually went back to the tournament site to get a local to come with us and show the drivers where to go! We had plenty of time though as our court wasn’t booked until 10am and once we got there Holly and Mia had a good 30 minute warm up while Mason and I trained for almost an hour next to them. It was then back to the tournament site to change and get prepared for the matches.
Mia was first up against Oleksandra Shkorupeyeva from Ukraine. We didn’t know a lot about her except that her backhand was the stronger side and she had lost in the Quarter-finals of the singles and Final of the doubles last week. Mia played the first game of the match very well; her level of hitting was aggressive, patient and very consistent and she looked as though she would be in full control of the match. At *1-1 Mia played a poor service game and that really seemed to knock her concentration as the patience and control she showed in the first game was soon replaced by harder, flatter hitting which the Ukrainian seemed to enjoy. Mia held serve at *1-3 but that was the last game she won in the set as she went down 6-2.
Mia in action today
The level in the second set was similar to the first with Mia hitting more than twice the amount of winners that her opponent managed but at the same time she hit almost 6 times the amount of unforced errors too. Mia was finding it difficult to find the balance between hitting too soft, which wasn’t hurting her opponent, to hitting too hard and making mistakes. In the end Mia went down 6-2, 6-0 but there are always positives to take from matches and the experience of playing your first ITF as a seeded player at 14 years old will put her in good stead for next week.
Holly was next up but the court she was scheduled was moving incredibly slowly – the first two matches had very long 3 setters and fellow Brit Hannah Brett, who was scheduled the match before Holly (3rd match after 9am), still hadn’t gone on at 3pm! We thought that Holly would be moved as she was the last match scheduled on that court and after confirming with the referee she went off to go through her pre-match warm up.
Just after 4pm Holly went on against Alena Mashtakova from Russia who just happened to be part of the same group as Mia’s opponent! Holly looked really up for it from the start and the nerves that hindered her at the start of the match yesterday were replaced by confident, clever tennis against a good player. The first set went with serve until 2-2* when Holly raised her returning level and played a very solid game from the back of the court to break the Russian and take a *3-2 lead. Unfortunately Holly was broken straight back and then the set went with serve until *4-5. Up until this stage Holly had looked confident in her service games but her serve let her down while she was serving for the set which resulted in too many 2nd serves and her opponent took advantage to take the set 6-4.
Holly had played a good 1st set and most players might think that things needed to change after losing a set like that but they didn’t and Holly stuck to her plan in the second set too. Her level was good, she was working and fighting hard in each and every point but the only difference was the Russian was just a little more experienced on the bigger points. Holly was broken in the 2nd at *1-2 and then again at *2-5 to eventually go down 6-4, 6-2.
It was a very positive performance from Holly and despite being disappointed by the loss she immediately knew that she had played well and had put up a very good fight against a tough opponent.
After the match Holly went off to cool down and stretch out while Mason and Mia checked out the doubles draw and organised practice for tomorrow.
It had been a long day at the club today and we finally left site at 6.45pm when we went straight back to the hotel to shower and change before heading off to the Royal Castle Hotel for dinner.
Mason is scheduled for singles tomorrow and Mia has doubles but due to bad light Holly’s doubles partner has to finish her singles match tomorrow so they will not play doubles until Wednesday.
Boy’s Doubles Draw
Girl’s Doubles Draw
Schedule for tomorrow:
(q) Rahul Somani (IND) (UNR) OR Felipe Cunha Silva (POR) (1497) vs (15) Mason Recci (GBR) (1019) – 4th match after 9am, not before 1pm
Habiba Shaker (EGY) & Shannon Wong Hon Chan (MRI) vs (2) Nikita Dawda (KEN) & Mia Smith (GBR) – 6th match after 9am
