This is about the time in a Grand Slam when there are so few matches played that the juniors become interesting to those looking for a fresh story. Wednesday at Roland Garros brought some surprises, including the loss of France's Jonathan Eysseric, the third seed, to Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria, seeded 14th. That was a match I would have gravitated to had I been in Paris, knowing the talent and the recent success of both in Futures events on clay, but it turned out to be a 6-3, 6-4 win for Dimitrov and another disappointing exit from a junior slam for Eysseric. Dimitrov plays No. 12 seed Jerzy Janowicz of Poland, whom he beat in the semifinals of the Orange Bowl last December in three sets.
Another favorite, although not seeded, who lost in the round of 16 is Flilip Krajinovic of Serbia, who dropped a three-setter to Evgeny Donskoy of Russia. Top seed Bernard Tomic will face his toughest challenge Thursday in unseeded qualifier Guido Pella of Argentina, who, despite his lowly ITF junior ranking, has already claimed the Italian Junior championship. Caesar Ramirez, the second seed, plays unseeded Soong-Jae Cho of Korea, who surprised Ryan Harrison on Tuesday. Speaking of Harrison, Ted Robinson has written about him and about top seed Melanie Oudin in his blog post today.
Charlie Bricker of the Sun-Sentinel isn't far behind, although he has the round wrong in this paragraph, as Oudin has reached the quarterfinals, losing a total of six games in three matches. She has also reached the quarterfinals of the doubles with Mallory Burdette. Oudin faces No. 10 seed Elena Bogdan of Romania and then the winner of the match between qualifier Lenka Jurikova of Slovakia and wild card Nathalie Mohn of France. Jurikova is 18-3 on the ITF Women's Circuit this year, so her run may not be all that surprising. while Mohn has a WTA ranking of 544. Girls second seed Arantxa Rus of the Netherlands has also reached the quarterfinals, without loss of a set.
Eleanor Preston talks with Dimitrov, who is always a lively source of quotes, and also with Oudin, in this story on the ITF Junior website.
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