©Colette Lewis 2007--
London--
The skies opened as predicted Thursday afternoon at The All England Lawn Tennis Club, leaving the boys one match short of completing the second round. But in the five hours of play that did take place, American girls Madison Brengle and Gail Brodsky survived championship tiebreakers to reach the final 16.
The tiebreakers took place simultaneously at courts nearly a kilometer apart, but thanks to the wonders of the closed circuit televisions in the press room, I could track both, although obviously not with the same attentiveness as being on court. Brodsky took the first set against Russian Ksenia Pervak, the No. 10 seed, 6-4, but dropped the second 7-5, leading to the roulette of the 10-point tiebreaker (first player to 10 by two). Brodsky got a 7-5 lead and got a line call in her favor at the baseline to make it 8-5. Pervak questioned the decision, pointing to a spot behind the thick chalk line, but the chair didn't budge, and when Brodsky pasted a backhand winner on the next point, she had four match points. The 2007 Easter Bowl champion needed only two, and next faces unseeded Katerina Vankova of the Czech Republic, who upset No. 5 seed Nikola Hofmanova of Austria 6-1, 6-7 (4), 1-0 (6).
Brengle, the No. 7 seed, easily took the first set from left-hander Cindy Chala of France, 6-1, but fell behind a break early in the second set. When I got back to the court, she was serving for the match at 5-4, but was broken at love, and lost the ensuing second set tiebreaker seven points to three. Brengle had the luxury of another tiebreaker however, and played very few loose points, while Chala's errors multiplied, giving Brengle, a 2007 Australian Open junior finalist, a 10-5 win. Her opponent in the third round hasn't been determined.
Reka Zsilinszka, the No. 14 seed, made her way into the round of 16 with a victory on Wednesday evening. If top seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia gets past Arantxa Rus of the Netherlands in the second round, Zsilinszka will meet her on Friday.
The girls lost another high seed on Thursday, when British wild card Anna Fitzpatrick defeated No. 4 seed Ksenia Milevskaya of Belarus 6-4, 6-4, in a completion of a match called for darkness on Wednesday night.
At 3:50 p.m., when play was suspended for the day, never to resume, No. 3 seed Donald Young was only four games in to his third round match with Indonesia's Christopher Rungkat. Young had survived a championship tiebreaker against qualifier Andrei Karatchenia of Belarus in his first match of the day 6-7 (4), 6-1, 1-0 (4). Unlike his first round victory over wild card Neil Pauffley of Great Britain, Young didn't serve particularly effectively, and made very little use of his superior touch. Instead, he seemed content, at least in the first set, to play clay court tennis with Karatchenia, getting in long rallies that more often ended with an error than a winner.
No. 8 seed Kellen Damico and No. 9 seed Brydan Klein engaged in a more conventional grass court battle in the third round, after Damico had squeezed by India's Rupesh Roy in his first match of the day 6-3, 3-6, 1-0 (6). Klein, the 2007 Australian Open junior champion, had himself taken a championship tiebreaker in his previous contest, and he made it two in a row with a 1-6, 6-3, 1-0 (7) victory over Damico.
Damico, playing with a new Prince racquet, was broken only once, at 2-3 in the second set, and despite having two break points in the next game, he couldn't convert either, and Klein served out the set.
The first point of the championship tiebreaker saw Klein completing a Boris Beckeresque dive volley winner; the second point had him deftly half-volleying a perfect return by Damico for a winner. But despite those impressive displays, Damico hung tough, and there was never more than a two point lead for either player. But at 7-7, Klein hit a service winner, then smashed an overhead, to earn a match point. Damico chose to pressure Klein by coming to the net, but Klein hit a clean pass to join top seed Vlad Ignatic as the only two boys through to the round of 16. Ignatic defeated Mateusz Kecki of the U.S. 6-2, 6-2, then snuck past Thomas Fabbiano of Italy 5-7, 6-3, 1-0 (8).
Due to a four-hour five-set men's doubles match played on their court, the second round match between No. 2 seed Matteo Trevisan of Italy and Mark Verryth of Australia is still in the first set, but all other second round matches were completed in the boys draw. The only boys seed to fall in that round was JP Smith of Australia, the No. 12 seed, who lost to British wild card Marcus Willis 6-4, 7-6 (8). Four girls second round matches remain unfinished.
The weather forecast for Friday is positive for the first time in days, and the doubles are scheduled to begin.
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