Friday 1st November 2013
The first day of a trip is always an exciting one, whether it’s with players I’ve travelled with before or new players that I’ve never met, but one of the most exciting parts of my job is going to a tournament for the first time. The last time I was in Norway was in 2005 and despite a fantastic tournament the week will unfortunately be remembered for the London bombings. This week our hotel is in Oslo but the event is in the small town of Stabekk just on the outskirts of the capital city.
I met Alex Hagon early this morning on the 6.42am train from London Bridge to Gatwick airport and then when we arrived at Gatwick we met Zeki Horoz at the Norwegian airlines check-in desk. Zeki does some training at the same venue as Alex and I so even though we had already met, I’d never been on court with him.
I think Alex had already warned Zeki about the rules of no junk food on the trip, but over breakfast at the airport Zeki came out with a classic – “Rob, can I get a pain au chocolate?” After a moment of shock where I wasn’t sure if he was winding me up, I responded with a “No . . . you’ve got a match tomorrow!” to which he replied “Oh yeah!!”
The 2 hour 10 minute flight went quite quickly and then, after we collected our bags at Oslo airport, we were straight on the express train through to the city centre which the boys were very impressed with – “Rob, why don’t we have trains like this in England?” – with questions like this it could be a long week!! It was then a short walk (once we worked out which way to go!) to our hotel for the week.
At 2.30pm we headed over to the tennis centre which involved a 20 minute bus ride and then a 5 minute walk at the other end. Even though the centre was very busy with its own coaching programme we managed to get on court for 30 minutes indoors, then we hit some volleys and serves outside on the clay before returning indoors for another 10-15 minutes so that Zeki could hit some returns and play some points.
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Zeki and Alex training on the indoor courts this afternoon
Both boys adjusted well to the fast and dusty indoor courts and were very professional when I said we would continue the session outdoors so that Zeki could hit volleys and serves.
At 5pm the boys cooled down and stretched out before Zeki singed in for the tournament. He then booked a practice court for tomorrow and, after making sure we had done everything we needed to, we left for the bus ride back.
As I hadn’t been to Oslo for quite some time I asked the receptionist at the hotel to recommend a good place for dinner and they came up with a great choice! The boys weren’t a fan of the 10 minute walk (or maybe it was the pace I was walking at!) but as soon as we walked into ‘Vapiano’ we knew it was going to be good! It’s basically an Italian restaurant where you go up to one of the three chef sections (Pizza, Pasta or Antipasti & Insalate), order your food, charge it to a plastic card and then when it’s ready you go and collect it. Then you pay for everything you’ve had on your card on the way out of the restaurant. Well, the food was amazing, the only mistake we made was that we ordered everything at the same time and then, because it was so nice, we ate it all too quickly!!
Having already purchased a bus / train / tram ticket for the week we decided to make the most of it and get the tram back to the hotel – nothing to do with the fact we were all too full to walk up the hill!!
After a long day of travelling, training and eating we all had an early night to get ready for Zeki’s opening qualifying match tomorrow.
Boy’s Qualifying Draw
Schedule for tomorrow:
Anders Mannerak (NOR) (UNR) vs (8) Zeki Horoz (GBR) (2286) – 3rd match after 9am (not before 11am)
