Bodo on Britton in Spain; Watson's Future; Qualifying Nears End at All-American Tournaments

Back in June, Tennis.com's Peter Bodo watched 2009 NCAA champion Devin Britton play in the Wimbledon Junior Championships, and wrote this post, entitled "Rod Laver Don't Fish". In his Tennis World blog today, Bodo looks at the USTA and Britton's decision to train this fall in Spain, where he's been for a week or so now. (I believe Bodo has also written a story on Britton for an upcoming issue of Tennis magazine). Today's post, "Three-Headed Calf", is a reference to the freakish nature of Britton's serve and volley game, which Bodo discusses in some detail. He also writes about the entitlement culture in this country in particular, contrasting it with Spain's (not sure about that myself, having no familiarity with that culture) and how differently excellent players are treated here compared to elsewhere. That's not my observation--and why would it be that way, with Federer and Nadal, two Europeans, at the pinnacle of the men's sport? Granted the next U.S. male Grand Slam winner is considered important from an endorsement perspective, but the past decade has proven that fan bases no few borders. I do know that 13 months ago, Devin Britton was being fawned over by absolutely no one in the U.S. tennis infrastructure. And the "hype machine" in the U.S., which I agree was well-oiled in the Donald Young instance, is pretty tame compared to what goes on in other countries where tennis is much higher in the sports pecking order.

But aside from these minor quibbles, it's an interesting read, and I'd love to hear your views on the entitlement premise. As coaches and parents, is that an obstacle?

Speaking of advance publicity, US Open girls champion Heather Watson has received a boatload of it recently, prior to her opening round match Wednesday in the $50,000 challenger in Barnstaple, England. A wild card, Watson has drawn No. 2 seed Melanie South, also of Great Britain, and Watson will be playing doubles with Laura Robson. Watson has apparently not yet officially signed with a management company, although she declared her intention to turn pro a couple of weeks ago. It looks like IMG is likely to represent her, according to this story in the Guernsey Press. For more on Watson and her family, see this story in the Daily Mail.

Qualifying for the All-American tournaments ends on Wednesday, when eight women and 16 men will advance into the draws at Riviera and Tulsa respectively. One match away from qualifying are freshmen Lauren Embree of Florida, pre-qualifying lucky loser Allie Will, also of Florida, and pre-qualifying freshmen Danielle Lao of Southern Cal and Aeriel Ellis of Texas. For complete results of both singles and doubles qualifying, see the ITA tournament home page.

In Tulsa, several freshman are also one match from the main draw, including Vanderbilt's Ryan Lipman, Duke's Henrique Cunha, Oklahoma's pre-qualifying freshman Costin Paval and Ole Miss's Adrian Skogeng Forberg. Two other Rebels have reached the final round of qualifying. For more see olemisssports.com.

For singles and doubles qualifying draws see the ITA tournament page.

Tags: college tennis, junior tennis, Devin Britton, Heather Watson, Peter Bodo, ITA All-American Championships, Colette Lewis

New Ratings Revealed on Tennis Recruiting Network; So. Alabama's Jack Baker Wins 100K in Table Tennis; Radio Tennis Covers A-A Tues.; Kubler = Nadal?

It's a big day at the Tennis Recruiting Network, with their annual release of the ratings for the 2009-10 school year. Blue chips from last year may fall to five-stars, while those who just completed excellent seasons may add another star or two, or reach the top 25 heights where blue chips reside. For a complete list of all the blue chips, see today's release.


Last week I read this espn.com story about former University of South Alabama's Jack Baker reaching the final four of the hardbat table tennis tournament in Las Vegas. Although the competition was taped back in June, it didn't air until yesterday, and it was Baker winning the $100,000 first place prize money. Great Britain's Baker, who finished the 2008 season ranked 27th in the country, and was a quarterfinalist at the 2007 All-American in his junior year, was obviously an excellent collegiate player, but he was unlikely to win that much playing on the professional futures circuit, with most events paying barely $1000 to the tournament's winner. How likely are former college stars, reluctant to undertake that grind, to instead take up hardbat table tennis? And how much do those two skill sets overlap? I guess we'll find out next year. A press release on his victory is available here.

Ken Thomas of radiotennis.com announced Monday that he will be at the Riviera on Tuesday to cover the qualifying for the ITA Women's All-American before heading to Troy, Alabama for next week's Pro Circuit challenger. To listen to his webcasts, which are free, go to radiotennis.com. The women's qualifying draws are available at the ITA tournament website.

The first round of men's All-American qualifying is still in progress in Tulsa. Click here for the ITA tournament website.

I received this interesting bit of news from Andy Yanne, writing for the Hong Kong Tennis association, who discovered that 16-year-old Jason Kubler of Australia is the first junior boy since Rafael Nadal in 1991 to lead his team to both World Junior Competition and Junior Davis Cup championships as the No. 1 singles player.

Tags: college tennis, junior tennis, Tennis Recruiting Network, Jack Baker, University of South Alabama, radiotennis.com, Jason Kubler, Colette Lewis

Australia Wins Junior Davis Cup, Russia Takes Junior Fed Cup; Harrison Wins Second Futures Title; Pre-Qualifying Complete at All-American Tournaments

Third-seeded Australia has won the Junior Davis Cup title for the second time in three years, defeating Great Britain 2-1 in Sunday's final in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. Australia's Bernard Tomic, Mark Verryth and Alex Sanders won the 2007 16-and-under ITF competition in Italy; this year it was Jason Kubler, Luke Saville and Joey Swaysland bringing Australia its fifth Junior Davis Cup championship. Kubler and Swaysland were on the Australian team that won the ITF 14-and-under World Junior Tennis Competition in 2007.

For the second consecutive day, Great Britain played without its No. 1, Oliver Golding. No. 3 Andrew Bettles beat Australia's No. 2 Saville, but No. 1 Kubler defeated Great Britain's No. 2 George Morgan to even it, then Swaysland and Kubler won the doubles in straight sets over Bettles and Morgan. For more on the Australian win, see this foxsports.com story.

The seventh-seeded U.S. team of Marcos Giron, Hunter Harrington and Bjorn Fratangelo finished fifth, defeating unseeded Korea 2-0 to go 4-1 in the competition.

The top-seeded Russian girls claimed their second title, needing only two singles matches to defeat fourth-seeded Germany. Germany again did not use No. 1 player Anna-Lena Friedsam, and although semifinal heroine Stephanie Wagner, at No. 3, put up a battle against Russia's No. 2 Ksenia Kirillova, she lost 8-6 in the third. Russian No. 1 Daria Gavrilova then defeated No. 2 Annika Beck 6-0, 6-3 to assure the victory, Russia's first since 1997.

The ITF junior website has photos, results and a story, although no mention of why the finalists did not have their top players on the court on the weekend.


Seventeen-year-old Ryan Harrison won the $10,000 Pro Circuit Futures tournament in Laguna Niguel today, coming back to defeat No. 5 seed Richard Bloomfield of Great Britain 4-6, 6-3, 7-5. It is the second Pro Circuit title of his career, both coming this summer, and he was a finalist last week. Harrison and partner Michael Venus, the fourth seeds, won the doubles title, defeating unseeded Denis Kudla and Raymond Sarmiento 6-2, 6-4. For the second straight week, the doubles champions won all four of their matches without needing a match tiebreaker.

Harrison has a wild card into the main draw of the $50,000 Sacramento challenger next week. Later this month, he will join Yuki Bhambri, also an IMG client, at an exhibition in Macau featuring Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi. Bhambri won his fifth Futures title this past week, but has decided not to play this week's event in Pune, India due to fatigue and injury, according to this story from the Pune Mirror.

For results of the Pro Circuit events, including qualifying for this week's Sacramento challenger and two women's tournaments, see the Pro Circuit results page.

The women's Riviera All-American pre-qualifying is complete, and there were plenty of surprises. Of the 14 seeds (the No. 5 & 6 seeds were elevated to qualifying) only two made it out of pre-qualifying, both of them 9-16 seeds: Kristina Nedeltcheva of UNLV and Nina Secerbegovic of Baylor. The unseeded players taking a berth in the 64-draw qualifying are: Zara Harutyunyan of Akron, Danielle Lao of Southern Cal, Stephanie Hammel of UC-Irvine, Lutflana Budiharto of Wichita State, Kayla Duncan of TCU and Aeriel Ellis of Texas.

The women's qualifying begins on Tuesday. See the tournament page for that draw and Sunday's singles and doubles results.

For the men in Tulsa, there are 16 qualifiers for the 128 qualifying draw, so I won't name them all. Ole Miss put four players through to Monday's qualifying, Mississippi State had two, and the other ten were from ten different schools. For complete results from the pre-qualifying, see the ITA tournament home page.

Tags: college tennis, junior tennis, Daria Gavrilova, Junior Davis Cup, Junior Fed Cup, Ryan Harrison, Pro Circuit, ITA All-American Championships, Colette Lewis

Great Britain Surprises France In Junior Davis Cup; Harrison Reaches Second Straight Futures Final; All-American Pre-Qualifying Underway

Sixth-seeded Great Britain upset No. 1 France 2-1 today in San Luis Potosi, Mexico and will meet No. 3 seed Australia on Sunday for the Junior Davis Cup title. With No. 1 Oliver Golding sitting out, 2007 Junior Orange Bowl 14s champion George Morgan stepped up for Great Britain. Trailing 1-0 after No. 3 player Andrew Bettles had lost to French No. 2 Mick Lescure, Morgan beat French No. 1 Cedrick Commin 6-3, 6-3, then teamed with Bettles to take a routine straight-set win in doubles. It is the first time the boys team from Great Britain has appeared in the finals. The British girls lost in the final to the U.S. last year in the Junior Fed Cup.

Australia also took a 3-0 win, with the No. 3 seeds not threatened by the No. 2 seeds from the Czech Republic. Australia has won the Junior Davis Cup five times since its inception in 1985, the last time just two years ago. Former USTA National Coach Ray Ruffels is coaching the Australian boys team.

The Junior Fed Cup will feature top seed Russia against No. 4 seed Germany, with both teams taking 2-1 semifinal decisions. Russia beat No. 3 Japan, winning the singles before dropping the doubles, while Germany, like the British boys, did without their No. 1 singles player, but still advanced over No. 2 Slovakia. Germany's No. 3 player Stephanie Wagner was the heroine, winning her singles match over Slovakia's No. 2 player Vivien Juhaszova. When Annika Beck at No. 2 singles lost to Slovakia's No. 1 Jana Cepelova, it meant the doubles would decide it, with Wagner and German No. 1 Anna-Lena Friedsam taking it 6-3 in the third.

Surprisingly, Russia has only one Junior Fed Cup title, back in 1997, when Anastasia Myskina and Elena Dementieva led them to victory over France. Germany has two world titles, in 1989 and 1991.

The U.S. boys defeated Mexico 2-1 to reach the fifth place match on Sunday, where they will meet unseeded Korea.

For complete results, see the ITF junior website.

Ryan Harrison reached his second straight Futures final today, defeating top seed Lester Cook 7-5, 6-1 in the $10,000 tournament in Laguna Niguel. He will play No. 5 seed Richard Bloomfield of Great Britain for the title. Bloomfield prevented a rematch of last week's final when he beat No. 2 seed Michael McClune 7-6(3) 7-6(4) in today's semfinal.

The pre-qualifying for both the women's Riviera All-American and the men's D'Novo All-American are underway. The smaller women's field makes even the pre-qualifying a tough tournament. Women's seeds already gone include Morgan Frank(9), Lauren Lui(10), Alexandra Walters (16), Lauren McFarlane (12), Joanna Mather(8) and Martina Pavalec (2). Florida freshman Allie Will is the top seed in pre-qualifying. For complete draws, including doubles pre-qualifying, see the ITA tournament page.

The men's pre-qualifying is a 256 draw. For today's results, see the ITA tournament page.

Tags: college tennis, junior tennis, Junior Davis Cup, Junior Fed Cup, Pro Circuit, Ryan Harrison, ITA All-American, Colette Lewis

Anderson, Peliwo Win Montreal ITF; Other Canadian Tennis, Pro Circuit News

Two unseeded players, 16-year-old Robin Anderson and 15-year-old Filip Peliwo, won the ITF Grade 3 singles titles in Montreal today.

Anderson, from Matawan, NJ, beat fellow American Leyla Erkan 6-1, 6-2 to collect her second ITF singles title, both in Canada. Anderson also reached the semifinals of the New Jersey International Hard Courts in August. Canadian Peliwo rolled past Mitchell Krueger of Texas 6-2, 6-0, a result that I found surprising given that the last time I had seen the two boys play, in the round of 16 in Eddie Herr 14s last year, Peliwo had won 7-5 in the third set. According to this story from Tennis Canada's website, Peliwo has just begun training at the National Tennis Centre. Americans Katie Goepel and Jessica Wacnik won the girls doubles title. For complete draws, see the ITF Junior website.

Stephanie Myles of the Montreal Gazette posted a synopsis of the recent results of young Canadians Milos Raonic, Vasek Pospisil and Philip Bester on her blog Open Court.

The Junior Davis and Fed Cup action today was confined to teams in the bottom half of their round robin groups; I think I had said the the U.S. would be playing Mexico today, but it's Saturday. For the results of today's play, see the ITF junior website. For Hunter Harrington's blog at usta.com, click here.

On the Pro Circuit, Ryan Harrison advanced to the semifinals of the $10,000 Men's Futures in Laguna Niguel, defeating No. 4 seed and UCLA Bruin Haythem Abid 6-3, 6-1. Harrison will play top seed Lester Cook again on Saturday. He defeated Cook in two tiebreakers in the second round of the Costa Mesa Futures last week. The doubles final will feature three 17-year-olds, with Harrison and partner Michael Venus, the former LSU star, playing Denis Kudla and Raymond Sarmiento.

For complete draws, see the Pro Circuit page at usta.com.

Tags: junior tennis, Filip Peliwo, Robin Anderson, Ryan Harrison, Colette Lewis

September Aces; Warburg Retires; Cecil Signs; US Boys Fall Short in Junior Davis Cup

Prior to last weekend, I didn't think I was going to have enough aces to fill my monthly quota at the Tennis Recruiting Network, but thanks to wins by several former college players in September's last weekend, I came up with a very respectable number. Click here for a review of those who excelled last month.

Sam Warburg, the former Stanford All-American, who won the 2004 NCAA doubles title with KC Corkery, announced his retirement from the tour. When he spoke to Ken Thomas of radiotennis.com after his US Open first round qualifying loss, Warburg sounded weary of the grind, and ready to start another phase of his life, so this news isn't really surprising, and having a Stanford degree probably makes it a lot easier. In the Sacramento Bee article announcing his retirement, Warburg said:

"Some people are cut out for the tour, and some aren't. It involves a lot of time alone, a lot of traveling and the ability to channel everything else out. It toughens you up, and I learned a lot, but I learned I don't want to live like that. It's not conducive to a happy lifestyle."

It was announced today that 2009 NCAA champion Mallory Cecil has signed with Lagardere Unlimited, the management agency of Andy Roddick, Tommy Haas and Justine Henin, and many others. For the complete release, click here.

The semifinals are set for the Junior Davis and Fed Cups in Mexico, and there will be no second straight title for the U.S. The seventh-seeded Amerian team was defeated by second-seeded Czech Republic 2-1, splitting the singles matches, but losing the doubles in three sets. The top seeded team of France will play No. 6 seed Great Britain in one semifinal, and the Czech Republic meets Australia in the other. The U.S. will play unseeded Mexico in the 5-8 playoffs Friday.

The top four seeds advanced to the semifinals in the Junior Fed Cup. Top seed Russia plays No. 3 Japan and second-seeded Slovak Republic faces No. 4 Germany.

For more on today's action, see the ITF junior website.

In Las Vegas today, Asia Muhammad reached the singles quarterfinals and doubles semifinals. Ryan Harrison is also in the singles quarterfinals and doubles semifinals in Laguna Niguel. Denis Kudla and Raymond Sarmiento have also reached the doubles semfinals in Laguna Niguel. For all results, see the Pro Circuit page at usta.com.

Tags: college tennis, junior tennis, Sam Warburg, Mallory Cecil, Junior Davis Cup, Junior Fed Cup, Colette Lewis