Top Seeds Advance in First Round Action at Junior Orange Bowl; Exsted Survives Stern Test in B12s

©Colette Lewis 2019--
Coral Gables FL--

The weather appeared excellent for the opening day of the 2019 Junior Orange Bowl, but with high humidity delaying play in the girls 14s, and an abundance of competitive matches it was still 9 p.m. before the last first round concluded Tuesday.

Courts damp from dew led to a two-hour delay in starting the girls 14s matches at the Kerdyk Biltmore Tennis Center, but all eight of the top seeds reached the second round, including No. 1 Kayla Cross of Canada and No. 2 Nikola Daubnerova of Slovakia.

The boys 14s lost their top seed in Kyle Kang, who withdrew and was replaced by a lucky loser. No. 2 seed Nishesh Bassavareddy and No. 3 seed Rashed Naif advanced in straight sets at Crandon Park.

All the top 8 seeds in the girls 12s reached the second round at Crandon Park, including No. 1 seed Mingge Xu of Great Britain and No. 2 seed Alina Korneeva of Russia, the Eddie Herr champion.

I spent the day at Salvadore Park, getting acquainted with the field in the boys 12s.  No. 5 seed Oliver Narbut fell in a match with fellow American Calvin Baierl 7-5, 6-4. Normally players from the same country are separated from one another in the first round (unless they are qualifiers or lucky losers), and I was told there was a mistake made in this case.

Top seed Alejandro Arcila of Colombia, No. 3 seed Changmin Ryu of Korea and Eddie Herr champion Manas Dhamne of India, the No. 4 seed, lost only four games between them. But No. 2 seed Max Exsted had to fight for his life against qualifier Kohshi Ishibashi of Japan, coming from a break down in the third set to earn a 6-3, 6-7(7), 6-3 win in three hours and 15 minutes.

Exsted had two match points in the second set tiebreaker, at 6-5, when he made an unforced forehand error, and at 7-6, when Ishibashi snapped off a perfect forehand volley winner. Ishibashi followed that winner with a backhand on the line to earn his first set point, and he converted it with a forehand swing volley, sending the match, which had started under bright sunlight at 3:35 p.m., to a third set played under the lights on court 1.

The standard 10-minute USTA break between sets did nothing to stop the momentum of Ishibashi, who lost only six games in four qualifying matches. He broke and held for a 2-0 lead, but Exsted came back, winning the next four games. Ishibashi broke back for 4-3, but couldn't pull even, dropping serve again to give Exsted the chance to serve for the match. Getting his first serve in, Exsted closed out the match without much drama, as Ishibashi couldn't find the consistent aggression that he had displayed throughout the match in the final game.

Exsted admitted to a drop in his level early in the second set, but he gave credit to Ishibashi for pressing him throughout the match, with his ability to close at the net particularly impressive.

"My dad told me to just stay calm and just play," said Exsted, who reached the Eddie Herr final two weeks ago. "He was really good. I didn't really expect it. In the second set, in the beginning, I stopped playing a little bit and he just started being more offensive. He got every ball back and he can play offense too, so he was good all around."

There is a good chance of rain in Wednesday's forecast, but if it holds off, second round play begins at 8 a.m. in all four divisions.

For all results and Wednesday's times, see the TennisLink site.