June's Aces; Wednesday's Wimbledon Report
I'm still without power at home, but I've found refuge at the Kalamazoo College-tournament office to post my Tennis Recruiting Network June Aces link and this report from Guy McCrea from Wimbledon:
(NOTE: Quicktime, a media player available via a Free Download, is required to hear the audio clips.)
Third round time at the Junior Wimbledon singles events, with the boys and girls forced to dodge the showers for the first half of the day. Once the great British weather relented though, there were a number of high-quality matches on offer. In the boys singles, the big shock came on court 7, as Andrew Thomas produced an excellent all-round display to dump second seed and reigning French Open champion Tsung-Hua Yang out 6-3, 6-2. The Australian was, shall we say, ‘modest’ about his performance!
CLICK HERE FOR THOMAS AUDIO
Thomas will now play Filip Krajinovic in the last eight, after he beat Jared Easton with the loss of just three games. Joining those two will be boys’ top seed Bernard Tomic, who got past British number one Marcus Willis on a jam-packed court 14. Tomic was just too classy for his opponent in the opener which he took 6-3. But after a lengthy rain break at five games a piece in the second, Willis came back on court a different player and easily broke the Australian's big serve to win the second 7-5. The Brit was well-placed in the decider too, until Tomic repeated what he did in his previous round with Christopher Rungkat, and just found enough to take the decider 6-4. The top seed again was not at his best but worryingly for the rest of the boys left in the draw, he's still in the tournament. The next young man charged with trying to derail the Tomic bandwagon is sixth seed Henrique Cunha of Brazil.
The other British boy still involved also went out at the third round stage. Dan Evans lost a tight opener to Australia’s Dane Propoggia on the tie break but fought back well from 0-3 down in the second. Serving to stay in the match, Evans’ concentration faded badly as he crumbled to lose it 6-4. Propoggia will now meet Henri Kontinen of Finland.
Elsewhere, third seed Cesar Ramirez is still to drop a set in the Junior Wimbledon singles. The young Mexican's victim this time was American Bradley Klahn in a meaty contest on court 16. Despite a tight opening set, Ramirez continually created opportunities on the Klahn serve and finally began to convert them in the second to see off an opponent he knows well.
CLICK HERE FOR RAMIREZ AUDIO
Ramirez’s next opponent Grigor Dimitrov ended American hopes of holding onto the boys’ title won by Donald Young last year. The Bulgarian crushed Ty Trombetta for the loss of just one game in what was the first junior match to finish on Wednesday.
Let’s look at the girls' singles now, where two home players are into the last eight. The current talk of the All-England Club, Britain’s Laura Robson, was not as impressive as in her previous round hammering of Melanie Oudin, but she still managed to do enough to beat unseeded Lesley Kerkhove. The fourteen year old seemed to have few answers as Kerkhove produced some terrifically struck winners to take a 5-3 opening set lead. But Robson responded well to force a breaker that she edged by 8 points to 6. The second set proved to be just as tight but Robson broke late on to set up a meeting with ninth seed Bojana Jovanovski. The other Brit in the last eight is Naomi Broady, who once again beat a player ranked well above her in the ITF combined list. This time, twelfth seed Nikola Hofmanova was stunned in a match moved to court 15 because of the rain. Broady failed to serve out the first set, but was the more consistent player off the ground, especially in the second, as she won through to the quarter finals. Broady meets Thailand’s Noppawan Lertcheewakarn, after the third seed easily beat Australia’s Tyra Calderwood 6-2, 6-2.
Meanwhile, second seed Aranxta Rus continued her serene progress through the draw. The second seed just looks so solid from the baseline, and that was the case again as she crushed Hungary's Zsofia Sunsanyi 6-0, 6-4. Rus has only dropped 11 games in her three singles matches so far. She'll now play Belgian starlet Tamaryn Hendler who upset sixth seed Jessica Moore 6-3, 6-3. The fifteen year old Bolettieri-trained Belgian has a poor record in junior Grand Slam play, but she is trying to change that here in South-West London.
CLICK HERE FOR HENDLER AUDIO
Polona Hercog is also through, after she ended Johanna Konta’s hopes in three sets. The fifth seed meets Slovakia’s Romana Tabakova in the remaining quarter final.
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