Friday 30th May 2014
We had another good day at the Eminent Tennis Club today as Holly and Lauryn beat the number 1 seeds to advance to the Final of the doubles.
After having early starts for the last 4-5 days the team decided that they needed a lie-in this morning and so we met for breakfast at 8am and then got over to the club to warm up at 9.30am. The plan was to warm up on the indoor court and then train on there for an hour but once we’d completed our warm-up we lost the court to some private coaching! That gave Camille and I a chance to talk through her singles and doubles matches from yesterday before we managed to get on the clay to train at 11.30am.
We managed to get a full court to train on so on one half court Camille hit with Lauryn while on the other half court I hit with Holly. Once we’d warmed up everything we went into some doubles specific drills to work on a few areas that had been highlighted from yesterday’s ¼ final match and then we played a tie-break to finish off.
The girls then had a bite to eat and at just before 1pm they went on court to face number 1 seeds Wiktoria Kulik and Karolina Silwanowicz from Poland. Lauryn had lost to Wiktoria yesterday in a very close three sets and so today she was looking for revenge, while Holly was aiming for her first ever ITF Final.
Our girls started well and played a solid first 4 games, all of which went to sudden death deuce but went with serve. Then at 2-2* Holly and Lauryn took advantage of a poor service game from Wiktoria and got the very important break of serve. They then continued to play well and once Lauryn held (to another sudden death deuce) they took a 4-2 lead and ended up taking the set 6-4.
When the second set started both Holly and Lauryn looked very confident on the court and they both moved very well at the net to control most of the points in the opening 3 games. That resulted in them taking a 3-0 lead but at the start of the very next game the heavens opened and the first real rain of the week came down. During the rain delay we had a quick chat but the main message was to just keep doing what they were doing and dominate the points at the net. After a 15 minute break the rain stopped and the players went straight back on court. Lauryn was broken in the next game but our girls responded well to win the next 3 games convincingly to take the match 6-4, 6-1.
Both girls were pleased with the result as well as how they played but I think Holly was the most pleased as she finally broke her run of losing in semi-finals!!
Once Holly had cooled down and showered we headed back to the hotel to relax for the afternoon while the rain kept pouring down outside.
Dinner tonight was a rather long affair as one game of cards lasted almost an hour and a half! It was then time to pack up and get ready to leave the hotel in the morning as we have a flight home booked in the evening from Dubrovnik! Hopefully we’ll have the difficult task of trying to take a winner’s trophy on an easyJet flight!!
Schedule for tomorrow:
(4) Holly Horsfall (GBR) & Lauryn John-Baptiste (GBR) vs Oana Gavrila (ROU) & Nina Marjanovic (SRB) – 2nd match, time To Be Confirmed
