Tuesday 5th April 2011
Tough day at the office today as all three main draw players took tough losses and all felt as though they should have come out on top.
We started the day with pre-match warm ups for the main draw players so I warmed up with Sam from 8.15am until just after 9am and by this time Clint had arrived on site with the girls. While Nicole and Anouska took advantage of the indoor courts I took Frankie outside on Centre Court to get used to the windy conditions. We trained for around 40 mins and then went indoors to work on her serve alongside Clint and Claudia. By 10.30am everyone had gone through their warm ups and it was just a case of waiting for matches to finish. Normally in ITFs there are quite a few first round matches that are over very quickly but today that was not the case and it seemed as though every court was going to three sets.
Eventually Sam got on and he was followed almost straight away by Frankie. They were on the same block of courts so I could watch and stat Frankie’s match while still keeping an eye on what was happening with Sam. Frankie had a solid start to her match and exchanged early breaks with her opponent but at 4-4 Keolliker stepped up her game to break Frankie and serve for the set. Frankie responded well to break straight back but it was taking a lot out of her to win each point as she was hitting quite straight and not moving her Swiss opponent that wide. Frankie was then broken again and Koelliker held to take the first set 7-5. Once that set was over Koelliker grew in confidence and raced to a 4-1 lead. Frankie then reduced her unforced errors and increased her winners to take the next 3 games in a row (7 winners and only 4 unforced in the three games!). Unfortunately Frankie’s consistency decreased and Koelliker upped her game again to take the next two games and the match 7-5, 6-4.
While this was going on Sam was in a right battle with Tommy Bennett. From a distance it looked like a great game with both players giving it their all and fighting very hard throughout. Sam struggled with his serve today and despite hitting better than he had in practise he still found it hard to finish off his opponent once he had built the point well. Sam lost the first set 6-2, responded very professionally to take the second 6-1 but was broken at 4-5 in the third to eventually go down 6-2, 1-6, 6-4.
Claudia was last up and found it very difficult to impose her game on her opponent who always made her play one extra ball and made life very difficult. Claudia worked hard and maintained her professionalism throughout but went down 7-5, 6-4.
Three difficult matches today where each player had their chances but failed to capitalise and in not doing so they allowed their opponents to either work their way into the match or increase their belief that they could win.
To end the day I teamed up with Frankie and we drilled against Nicole and Anouska to get them ready for their doubles first round match tomorrow. We worked for around an hour on setting up plays, making sure they worked as a team and making sure they had an understanding of what they needed to do when applying their serve and return tactics. It was a great session and all three girls were very positive so let’s hope for some Ws on the board tomorrow.
We’ve now moved hotels and are right in the middle of Nottingham which was ideal for a great dinner tonight at ASK!
Schedule for tomorrow:
(6) Filip Karlsson (SWE) & Sam Matheson (NZL) vs Harry Burley (GBR) & Ravi Patel (GBR) – 3rd round, N.B. 12pm
Nicole Daisley (GBR) & Anouska Newman (GBR) vs Anna Brogan (GBR) & Alessandra Gisonna (ITA) – 4th round, N.B. 1pm
Inge Hendrikz (NED) & Roos Van Der Zwaan (NED) vs Francesca Faulkes (GBR) & Grace Lymer-Sullivan (GBR) – 4th round, N.B. 1pm
