Showing posts with label Junior Profiles Non-U.S.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Junior Profiles Non-U.S.. Show all posts

Bhambri Given Sony Ericsson Main Draw Wild Card; New Tennis Blog Debuts

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    India's Yuki Bhambri, the world's top-ranked junior and the reigning Australian Open Junior champion has received a main draw wild card into the Sony Ericsson Open, which begins on March 25. That news, first reported by The Hindu, was confirmed by IMG Vice President Olivier Van Lindonk. The 16-year-old had earned a qualifying wild card by virtue of his victory at the Orange Bowl, on the site of the Sony Ericsson, but IMG, who owns the tournament, has decided to upgrade him. He'll join Marcos Baghdatis and Lleyton Hewitt, who have already been announced as wild card recipients.

    Bhambri recently came in for some criticism for choosing to play in this week's Pro Circuit event in Texas rather than serve as a practice partner in India's Davis Cup tie with Chinese Taipei this weekend, according to this story from DNA. (University of Virginia's Sanam Singh, who is mentioned here as a part of the Davis Cup team, is not participating). Bhambri, using a junior exemption gained by finishing in the Top 10 of the ITF Juniors last year, lost in the first round of the Futures event to Lester Cook 6-4, 6-2. He also lost, in three sets, to Singh in the first round of qualifying for the ATP's Chennai Open back in January. IMG needs to use some caution in handing out a wild card to such a big tournament--it worked fine with Michelle Larcher de Brito, who last year used hers to win two Sony Ericsson matches before losing to Shahar Peer, but Bhambri is well behind her in terms of physical maturity. No one wants to see the Donald Young scenario repeated with another precocious and talented teen who is being viewed as the best hope to improve his country's tennis fortunes.

    I recently spoke with Chris Woodruff, the associate head coach at the University of Tennessee (this is a teaser for my Tennis Recruiting Network article next week) and he made it very clear to me the danger of playing at the wrong level--and this was as an NCAA champion who felt in over his head. The occasional wild card is generally not harmful, but as Woodruff said, word gets around that you haven't earned your way in and there's not much sympathy from professionals for that circumstance.

    Although there are plenty of tennis blogs out there (see my links for some of my favorites), a new one by my Tennis Recruiting Network colleague Marc Lucero is definitely worth a read. He has posted only once, but his account of the Stanford and USC men's match last week will be much appreciated by those of us who can't get enough college tennis match reports.
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Bhambri Given Sony Ericsson Main Draw Wild Card; New Tennis Blog Debuts


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Tomic Wins Challenger; Kriese Working with Lertcheewakarn; Keys Makes Professional Debut

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    For reasons that elude me, 16-year-old Bernard Tomic's win at the $50,000 Melbourne challenger over the weekend has produced no comment from the Australian press. This is a significant accomplishment for a player of his age, and the lack of coverage is surprising, given the media blitz that accompanied him in the same city last month, when he won one match in the Australian Open main draw. The final featured yet another meeting between wild card Tomic and fellow Australian Marinko Matosevic, the sixth seed. In the brief time that Tomic has been playing Pro Circuit events, he and Matosevic have met four times, with the 23-year-old winning the first two, including the infamous match when Tomic left the court at the behest of his father, leading to a default. Tomic has won the last two times they have played, with the defaulted one the only match not reaching three sets. For a brief synopsis of Tomic's performance last week, see the Tennis Australia account.


    A few days ago, I came across a story in Thailand's The Nation about Noppawan Leertchewakarn, the 2008 ITF World Junior champion (and US Open Jr. doubles champion) from that country. While she transitions from the juniors to the pro tour, she is planning on playing the remaining junior slams; she was a semifinalist at the Australian Open juniors in January. She is working with former Clemson men's head coach Chuck Kriese, who took a position with the Thai Federation last year.

    The story goes on to say:
    Being the world No 1 junior is no guarantee of success in the big leagues. Only three of the top girls since 1994 - Martina Hingis, Amelie Mauresmo and Svetlana Kuznetsova - have gone on to be No 1 among the professional women, and they'd all won at least one junior Grand Slam.

    First of all, being No. 1 in the world is a pretty high standard for defining "success in the big leagues." But the odd thing about this is the selection of 1994 as the cutoff date, the year Martina Hingis was the World Junior Champion. Going back to 1978, there are a lot fewer No. 1s--why not start there to make the point?

    Madison Keys, who turned 14 last month, made her debut in a professional tournament today in the $25,000 Challenger in Fort Walton Beach, and although she didn't win it, she did take eighth seed Ekaterina Bychkova, ranked 141 by the WTA, to three sets. For the complete results of that event, and the $15,000 Men's Futures in McAllen, see the Pro Circuit page at usta.com.

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Bhambri, Pervak Take Australian Junior Titles; McHale Wins Girls Doubles Championship; All U.S. Players Out at Tarbes

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    Congratulations to Yuki Bhambri and Ksenia Pervak for their convincing wins in the finals of the Australian Open junior championships on Saturday. The top-seeded Bhambri cruised past unseeded Alexandros-Ferdinandos Georgoudas of Germany, who was contesting his first junior Grand Slam at the age of 17, 6-3, 6-1, the same score as the Russian 17-year-old's victory over fellow left-hander Laura Robson of Great Britain. Reuters posted this article about Pervak's victory. The New Delhi News got the reaction from Bhambri's family in this story.

    Given Robson's status in Great Britain (the match was broadcast live on BBC radio at 2 a.m.), there were several British newspapers weighing in on her defeat, including this article from The Telegraph. Much is made of Pervak's decided advantage in age and professional experience, and rightly so, but I saw no mention of the fact that it was Pervak's first Grand Slam final, an area where Robson had the edge with her win at Wimbledon last year. This story from The Guardian, written prior to the final, gives a chronology of Robson's development and also compares her to the most accomplished current women players at the age of 15.

    In the girls doubles, Christina McHale and Ajla Tomljanovic won the title in the day's most exciting match, with the No. 6 seeds defeating unseeded Alexandra Krunic of Serbia and Sandra Zaniewska of Poland 6-1, 2-6, 10-4. The boys title went to the Phillippines' Francis Casey Alcantara and Chinese Taipei's Cheng-Peng Hsieh, the No. 7 seeds, who defeated unseeded Mikhal Biryukov of Russia and Yasutaka Uchiyama of Japan 6-4, 6-2. This is Hsieh's third Grand Slam doubles title (Australia and Wimbledon 2008), although the first without 2008 World Junior Champion Tsung-Hua Yang. (And thanks to our resident Australian, Andrew D, I've found out that's a stuffed wombat they are all holding.)

    And as we close the book on the 2009 Australian Open Junior Championships, I'd like to commend the organizers for:
  • Improving their website coverage of the juniors, with stories on all four of the finals: boys singles, boys doubles, girls singles, girls doubles.

  • Providing live radio coverage of the junior finals via Australian Open radio.

  • Playing the junior singles finals in Rod Laver Arena, which includes use of Hawkeye.

  • NOT PLAYING THE JUNIOR SINGLES FINALS AT THE SAME TIME. Sorry for the caps, but this is a format every Grand Slam should follow. The US Open should play the boys and girls junior finals beginning at noon on Sunday with the boys, followed by the girls, and put the matches on the Grandstand. There is no good reason that spectators should have to choose between the two finals.

    At Les Petits As, the finals are set with 13-year-old top seed Nikola Milojevic of Serbia facing 12-year-old Borna Coric of Croatia, seeded 10, for the boys title and two Russian girls, No. 3 seed Yulia Putintseva, 14, and No. 4 seed Irina Khromacheva, 13, deciding the girls champion. Sachia Vickery, Vicky Duval and Joe DiGiulio all lost their quarterfinal matches. Duval and Vickery, the top seeds in doubles, lost in the final to the second seeded Czech Republic team of Sonja Liaskoska and Petra Rohanova 3-6, 6-4, 10-8.

    For complete results, visit the tournament website.
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Bhambri, Pervak Take Australian Junior Titles; McHale Wins Girls Doubles Championship; All U.S. Players Out at Tarbes


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Robson Beats McHale in Australia; Kudla Signs with BEST; Your Match Reports Welcome

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    In a just-completed first round girls singles match in Melbourne, No. 5 seed Laura Robson of Great Britain has defeated Christina McHale of the U.S. 7-5, 6-3. It's dangerous to speculate without seeing the match, but it's apparent that neither player served well, with nearly as many breaks of serve (10) and holds (11). McHale was serving for the first set at 5-3, but she was broken without reaching set point and went on to lose eight of the next nine games. Serving at 4-2 in the second set, Robson was broken, but McHale couldn't pull even, losing her 3-4 service game and allowing Robson to serve out the match.

    With McHale's loss, No. 8 seed Lauren Embree and qualifier Alexandra Cercone, both of Florida, are the only Americans remaining in the junior singles draws.

    I heard while in Florida that Denis Kudla had signed with BEST, the sports and entertainment management company, and that has been confirmed with his addition to their junior client list. Lynn Berenbaum of Off The Baseline recently posted about the possibility that BEST, whose most famous U.S. client is Andy Roddick, will be acquired by the French company Lagardere.

    Laura Robson is not the only seeded girl that British fans will be following this week in Melbourne, as Eddie Herr finalist Heather Watson is seeded at No. 9, and won her first round match Sunday, a result duly noted by Neil Harman of The Times. Harman speaks with Watson's parents and finds she has received financial sponsorship from online bookmaking group Sportingbet which allows her mother to travel with her. Although Harman may not be aware of the intricacies of NCAA regulations, with that sponsorship, the Bollettieri-trained Watson is no longer eligible for a tennis scholarship that was mostly likely the reason she attracted the interest of what he refers to as "premier American educational establishments."

    And for those of you don't read comments regularly, please take a moment to check out Scott's report on the 10th-ranked Florida men's 7-0 win today over No. 7 Baylor. And Andrew D also took the time to comment about some of the junior matches in Australia on Sunday. I really appreciate their efforts, and invite any of you observing live tennis to do the same. If you would prefer to email me rather than using the comment function, please contact me via my profile page.

    I would have liked to be watching live tennis myself today, instead of monitoring the Australian Open live scoring, and the match I wish I could have seen was at the Plantation Florida Men's Pro Circuit Futures event. In the third round of qualifying there, Chase Buchanan beat Ryan Lipman 4-6 6-3 7-6(5). For results of all the Pro Circuit events, see usta.com.
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McHale and Oudin Fall in Australian Open First Round; Tomic Makes History with Win

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    Today is a travel day--back to the single digits of Michigan's winter--so this early post will be a brief review of the opening round performances of some of the juniors at the Australian Open.

    In matches overnight, 16-year-old Christina McHale, the USTA wild card tournament winner, lost a heartbreaker to Jessica Moore, an 18-year-old Australian wild card, 1-6, 6-3, 9-7. McHale was featured on the ESPN2 coverage, and was shown early in the third set suffering from a severe leg cramp, but it apparently didn't keep her from taking a 5-3 lead in the the third set. Eventually Moore began to wear her down however, from this account in the Herald Sun. Prior to McHale's grand slam debut, the New York Times and Northjersey.com published profiles. The Times' story, found here, contains an error. McHale did not lose in the first round of the juniors at the U.S. Open this year. She lost in the third round to Madison Brengle, as the Northjersey.com story accurately states.

    Seventeen-year-old Melanie Oudin, who was the youngest player to qualify for the women's main draw, lost to 84th ranked Akgul Amanmuradova of Uzbekistan 6-1, 6-4.

    Sixteen-year-old Australian wild card Bernard Tomic became the youngest man to win a main draw match in Australian Open history when he beat 73rd ranked Potito Starace of Italy 7-6(5), 1-6, 7-6(5), 7-6(6). Former Wimbledon champion Pat Cash had an assessment of Tomic's strengths and weaknesses in this article by Linda Pearce in the Sydney Morning Herald.
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McHale and Oudin Fall in Australian Open First Round; Tomic Makes History with Win


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Austin Visits Bollettieri's for Tennis Channel; Stories on Reynolds, DeSimone, Krajinovic and Vickery

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    In just a few days we'll be at Bollettieri's for the Eddie Herr and I've been hard at work on my preview, which will be available on The Tennis Recruiting Network later this week. Tracy Austin has already been to Bradenton to talk with Nick for the first installment of her show for the Tennis Channel called "Tennis Channel Academy 08." The premier was last night, but the Bollettieri segment will air again Tuesday night. The release on usta.com, which I thank a reader for bringing to my attention, mentions segments with the Everts, Pat Etcheberry, Robert Lansdorp, Carlos Rodriquez and Justine Henin. See the Tennis Channel schedule page for dates and times.

    Bobby Reynolds won the Knoxville challenger Saturday, bringing his ATP ranking to a career best of 70, but this Knoxville News article doesn't just report on the match. There is also much on Reynolds' upcoming wedding with details of how he and his fiance met while student-athletes at Vanderbilt.

    The San Diego Union-Tribune follows their area's high school tennis closely, and Gabrielle DeSimone's second straight CIF sectional win merits this article. DeSimone beat Lacey Smyth 2-6, 6-1, 7-6(7) in the final, so there was obviously plenty of drama to report.

    Sixteen-year-old Filip Krajinovic of Serbia, retired from his Knoxville semifinal match against Reynolds with blisters, but this story, from the English language version of the Serbian tabloid Blic, says he hopes to compete in the Cancun Challenger this week, having received a wild card into the main draw. Krajinovic is still listed as an entrant in the Eddie Herr, but depending on his foot and how long he's in Cancun, I wouldn't say he's certain to play in Bradenton.

    There are a lot of big names thrown around in the Krajinovic story--Agassi and Federer chief among them, and that's also true of this story about Sachia Vickery, who, like Krajinovic is now a Bollettieri student. From a Guyana publication called Kaieteur News, the story invokes the Williams sisters, and Serena in particular, who has long been a source of inspiration to Vickery.

    On Tuesday, look for this month's Coaches Q & A, in which Harold Solomon discusses the issue of taking a break from tennis.
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Tomic Update; Weinhold Blog; Intermountain Great Pumpkin Report

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    Australia's Bernard Tomic had initially planned on playing the Florida Junior circuit this year in keeping with his goal, stated after he won the 16s Orange Bowl last year, to win all four divisions. But the wild card tournament for a main draw berth in the Australian Open, which he has been invited to play, conflicts with the long trip to South Florida, so he will stay in his home country. The Sydney Morning Herald has this story on Tomic's goals and plans, while the Melbourne Herald-Sun posted this story on the 16-year-old, who is quoted as saying: "Making the transition to the seniors is what I've prepared for over the next few months. I can always come back to juniors if I'm not doing so well."

    2007 USTA Girls 18 winner Ashley Weinhold is in Spain for several tournaments, and her blog, which can be found on the Austin Tennis Academy website, describes the unpleasant weather she's encountered this week in Mallorca, and provides analysis of her tennis matches. She and her partner won the doubles titles today.

    I receive monthly email newsletters from most of the USTA sections, and often it is difficult to distinguish one from another. But this month's newsletter from Intermountain contains a very detailed account with pictures of one of their major sectional tournaments, the Great Pumpkin, which serves as the endorsement selection for the upcoming USTA Winter Nationals in Arizona. It would be terrific if more sections could supply similar roundups of their significant tournaments.
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Paz Signs with Renaissance; Cako Update; Simidian Wins New Jersey High School Title

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    U.S. Open Junior Championship finalist Gabriela Paz of Venezuela has signed with Renaissance Tennis, the South Florida sports management firm. This isn't breaking news--the RTM website's announcement is dated September 26--but often there isn't any way to know if a young player has signed with an agency unless you ask them, so a formal release is helpful. Renaissance is one of the newer agencies, with Norman Canter, Richard DeVries and Tarik Benhabiles as Managing Director, Chairman of the Board and Director of Tennis respectively. Clients include Flavia Pennetta, Peng Shuai, Alisa Kleybanova, Benjamin Becker and Benedikt Dorsch. Valeria Solovieva of Russia is the only junior listed. I believe her father is the Director of Physical Fitness. Another new agency that's been formed recently is Mamba International, which represents Somdev Devvarman, Treat Huey and Takanyi Garanganga. Not surprisingly, it's based in Charlottesville, Virginia.

    Jacqueline Cako continues to receive extensive coverage on her tennis career, and this story, from the Daily Herald in Everett, Wash., has comments from her mother and her coach, Russ Bucklin. Bucklin is quoted as saying:

    "Predicting potential is difficult," Bucklin acknowledged. "So with that disclaimer, I'd say that every three months I have to up my guess. In the beginning I would have said, 'If she can make the top 125 (in the world) and play for five years on the pro tour and break even (financially), that's really good.' But then she starting blowing up the junior (international) rankings and we thought, 'Well, maybe she can make it inside the top 100." But right now she's already playing pretty close to even with the top 100 players.

    "So what I think now is that she's going to make the top 50," he said. "And I think she's going to hang there for a while."

    And finally, a New Jersey weekly, The Leader, recognized Amy Simidian, who will be playing tennis at Penn State next fall, for winning the NJSIAA singles tennis championship as a student at Becton High School.
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"Horror Show" in British Junior Tennis; Broadys Say No to LTA Funding

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    Just how much more important the sport of tennis is in Great Britain than here in the U.S. is illustrated by these three recently published newspaper stories about junior tennis and its governing body.

    The first, with a rather sensational tabloid-style headline from the respectable Independent of "Junior tennis serves up a horror show" is a discussion, prompted by the comments of former British greats Annabel Croft and Jo Durie, of the pressure and misbehavior that accompanies junior tennis matches in that country. I can't dispute anything that any of the quoted people have to say--I've witnessed blatant cheating and unbecoming behavior by parents and children (although little I would classify as violent); I agree that there needs to be more supervision (which means more money spent), especially at the younger ages, and I also agree that this is hardly an issue confined to junior tennis. But tennis's one-on-one nature does contribute to the ugliness, just as it plays a major role in the sport's appeal. Croft describes her daughter's decision to quit junior tennis, saying:

    "I think my daughter just wasn't cut out for it; she's incredibly laid back. Either you're cut out for it or you're not – if you're rather sensitive it's not really for you."

    Again, I agree, but it only serves to enhance my admiration for those young players who do continue, who take the best from it, reject the worst, and emerge wiser without surrendering their integrity.


    The other story, brought to light by Neil Harman of the Times, in his must-read weekly column, details the history and consequences of the rift between the Broadys and the LTA. Liam, the 14-year-old Les Petit As finalist, and his older sister Naomi, a quarterfinalist at Wimbledon Juniors this year, are not accepting funding from the LTA. The Daily Mail also had coverage of this spat.

    As for the U.S., I'm still awaiting any newspaper or magazine mention of the major changes at the USTA, which now include the naming of Ola Malmqvist as head of women's tennis, and Jay Berger as head of men's tennis.

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Aubone, Hardenbergh win Pro Circuit Titles; Robson Makes WTA Debut Tuesday

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    After 23 days in Tulsa this year, I'm certainly feeling comfortable there, but it's good to back in Kalamazoo, even with rain dampening the spirits and bringing down the dramatically colored leaves. I've got a lot of news to catch up on, so stay tuned this week as I work through it all.

    Jean-Yves Aubone of Florida State won his second Pro Circuit title Sunday in Louisiana, a $15,000 level event, and I think it clearly demonstrates the level of men's Division I tennis. Aubone, a junior who was ranked 13th in the preseason, lost in the third round of the All-American in Tulsa, to Robert Farah of USC. The following week he wins a pro event over what I would consider a typical field in the U.S. when there is a challenger also on the schedule. If you are playing D-I tennis in a major conference, you are facing competition as least as strong as most $10,000 Futures. Whatever the arguments against college, the level of competition isn't one of them. The Florida State athletic website has this story on Aubone's victory.

    Another college website was called into action as qualifier Lindsey Hardenbergh, who is just beginning her college career at Virginia, won the $10,000 event in St. Louis Sunday. The field wasn't particularly strong due to the $50,000 in Lawrenceville and the Pan-American ITF in Tulsa, but even so, Hardenbergh has to be considered a surprise winner. A five-star, not a blue chip, on The Tennis Recruiting Network, Hardenberg failed to win a match in Mobile at the Spring Nationals and at the Hard Courts in Berkeley this summer, but she certainly stepped up her game last week. See this story on the Virginia Cavalier website for more.

    See the Pro Circuit page at usta.com for complete draws.

    Last week Jacqueline Cako won the Southlake, Texas Pro Circuit $10,000 event, beating Ashley Weinhold in the final. Although she downed one Vanderbilt grad in Texas, Amanda Taylor, Cako couldn't get by another in St. Louis, where Taka Bertrand beat her in the first round. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram covered the tournament, and posted this story on Cako's win, and her plans for the future. It's interesting that she's considering Vanderbilt among her choices for college, if she goes.

    Laura Robson plans don't include college, at least not college tennis, as she signed with Octagon several years ago, but the 14-year-old Wimbledon girls champion, now ranked in the 500s on the WTA computers after the obligatory three events, will no doubt get some vocational training in Luxembourg on Tuesday, when she plays in her first tour event. Amelie Mauresmo, a former Wimbledon girls champion, has some advice for Robson in this story by the Telegraph, as does Annabel Croft, the last British girls Wimbledon champion, in this story that appeared in the Times.
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Embree in SI; Dabrowski at Crossroads, Niu and Family on Move to Evert Academy

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    Lauren Embree is a Face in the Crowd in this week's issue of Sports Illustrated. One of the magazine's most popular features over the years, it now highlights one player by directing readers to a video on the web, and Embree was chosen. Takkle, which is apparently Sports Illustrated's answer to Rise, the ESPN high school sports magazine, hosts the video, which is the one I took at the USTA Girls 18 Clay Courts in Memphis this year. To watch it, just be patient, it will autoload and after a few moments will show Embree.

    Canada's Gabriela Dabrowski is the subject of a feature by Stephanie Myles of the Montreal Gazette, who spoke to the 2008 US International Grass Court champion in New York this year. One of the most poignant quotes, in an article with many, is:

    "I remember provincials and nationals, I would play so well because I didn't care how I did," she recalled. "I was just having a good time playing and fighting. Now I feel like everything is closing in on me; I have to win so my name gets noticed, stuff like that."

    And as Myles points out:
    That's the reality of the junior tennis racket: At some point, it's no longer fun and games. It becomes a business.

    To quote John Mellencamp--Hold on to 16 as long as you can, changes come around real soon make us women and men.

    Soon to be 15-year-old Belinda Niu of Portland, Ore., is now training at Evert Tennis Academy in Boca Raton, and the Portland Tribune, which published this story about her a couple of weeks ago, had another article yesterday, with comments from her parents and coach, all of whom are aware of the pros and cons of such a move. Evan King and his parents went through the same process last summer, and he appears to have thrived at the USTA High Performance Center in Boca Raton, after leaving his home in Chicago and his high school there. It's a tough, tough choice that no one takes lightly.

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U.S. Jr. Fed Cup and Davis Cup Teams Reach Semifinals; Robson Wins Again

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    Both U.S. 16-and-under teams reached the semifinals of the Junior Fed Cup and Junior Davis Cup competition in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. Neither team has dropped a point, winning all three ties by 3-0 scores, including Friday's ties against seeded teams.

    Christina McHale gave the top-seeded U.S. girls a 1-0 lead with a 6-1, 6-4 decision over Doroteja Eric of Serbia and Kristie Ahn moved them past the No. 7 seeds with a 6-4, 6-1 win over Aleksandra Krunic. McHale and Sloane Stephens made quick work of Eric and Jovana Jaksic 6-0, 6-1 in the dead rubber doubles match.

    Evan King gave the U.S. boys, seeded third, their first point with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 win over Tobias Blomgren of Sweden, who were seeded sixth. Denis Kudla played what coach David Roditi described as a "near-perfect" match, quickly dispatching Sweden's No. 1 player Daniel Berta 6-1 6-3. King and Raymond Sarmiento completed the sweep with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 win over Berta and Blomgren in doubles.

    The girls semifinal opponent is Hungary, the No. 5 seeds. Former Cal star Susie Babos's younger sister Timea is a member of that team. The U.S. boys meet No. 2 seeded India, which boasts the competition's highest-ranked player in the ITF junior standings, Yuki Bhambri, at No. 18. In the other Junior Davis Cup semifinal, No. 1 Russia meets No. 5 Argentina. The other Junior Fed Cup opponents are No. 4 Great Britain and No. 8 Belarus.

    For more details and full results, see the ITF Junior website.

    Laura Robson continues to impress, defeating tour veteran Tzipi Obziler 6-3, 6-3 to advance to the semifinals of the $75,000 event in Shrewsbury. Up next for the 14-year-old Wimbledon girls champion is No. 2 seed Maret Ani of Estonia. Nigel Sears of the LTA comments extensively on her progress and her game in this story from the Daily Mail.
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Zsilinszka's Vietnam Photo Album; Rain In Mexico; Robson Defeats Radwanska in 75K Event

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    My weekly story for The Tennis Recruiting Network really isn't a story at all, but nine photos with captions that are the work of Reka Zsilinszka, now a sophomore at Duke. She wrote a diary during her trip to Vietnam this summer for the Coach for College initiative, and excerpts from that diary will appear in the next issue of SMASH, due out in November. It's been a real treat to talk with Reka about her experience there and it sounds as if the adventure was all she had hoped for. ESPN.com did a story about Parker Goyer and Coach For College in July; it is truly amazing what she has been able to accomplish. Making a vision a reality is never easy, but Goyer is an inspiration to anyone who has a dream to make the world a better place.

    The persistent rain in Mexico has hindered the Junior Davis and Fed Cups being played there. Today, neither the U.S. boys or girls took the court (against Sweden and Serbia respectively) for the matches that will determine the semifinalists. Both the U.S. teams are 2-0 and must win to advance to the semifinals.


    The campaign to keep 14-year-old Wimbledon junior champion Laura Robson out of the spotlight while she and her game mature lasted all of two months. She played her first ITF Women's Circuit event last week, a $10,000 event in France, qualified and won her first match before retiring in her second one. This week she is back home in England, received a wild card into the $75,000 tournament in Shrewsbury and beat Great Britain's No. 8, 29-year-old Sarah Borwell in the first round, who was very impressed. Today, the current girls Wimbledon champion battled the previous one, Urszula Radwanska of Poland, with Robson taking a 6-3, 6-3 decision over the WTA's 128th-ranked player. The Telegraph published this account, which focuses on the unlikely scenario of Radwanska feeling old at 17. Neil Harman of the Times contrasts Robson with Jennifer Capriati, who made a very much bigger splash at an even younger age, in this article, which will appear in Friday's print edition.
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ITF B1 in Tulsa Entries Close Thursday; Cako Wins Wild Card; Update on Canadian Juniors

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    Although there are lower level ITF events going on in Illinois this week and Atlanta next week, the next big event points-wise in the U.S. is the Pan-American B1 in Tulsa. Coming right on the heels of the ITA D'Novo All-American college tournament, it's convenient for me to get two tournaments for the price of one plane ticket, and the Case Tennis Center is a great facility. Entries close Thursday at 5 p.m. Eastern, and last year players without ITF rankings did get in. There was a small qualifying field for boys and no qualifying for girls.

    Jacqueline Cako lost in the Kentucky Grade 1 final last week, in three sets to Victoria Kamenskaya of Russia, but her great form over the week extended to a wild card tournament for the $50,000 Pro Circuit event in Ashland, Ky. Cako won three matches to earn a main draw wild card for next week's event, according to this article in the Ashland Daily Independent. Ken Thomas of radiotennis.com will be livestreaming from that event again this year. Thomas is currently covering a Pro Circuit Futures tournament in Costa Mesa, Calif.

    Stephanie Myles, who writes about tennis for the Montreal Gazette was in New York covering the Open, without, alas, many of Canada's best juniors to write about. Vasek Pospisil and Milos Raonic didn't enter, and Rebecca Marino, who is the third player in her article entitled "Canadian Teens Take Aim at the Pros," lost in the first round, to eventual finalist Gabriela Paz. Gabriela Dabrowski, the only other Canadian in the draw, qualified but fell in the first round. Marino still has the option of attending college, presumably Georgia Tech, where she committed last fall prior to deciding to take a year off, but Raonic has signed with BEST (formerly SFX), so he will not be playing tennis for the University of Virginia. According to Myles, Pospisil was not considering college seriously. Is Tennis Canada actively discouraging their promising players from taking the college development route? If so, they are doing a disservice to the players and to the long-term success of their own federation.
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Tennis Gypsies; Oudin and Tomic Featured in Sports Illustrated

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    The $50,000 Pro Circuit Women's Challenger in Allentown, Pa. is getting excellent coverage from the Morning Call, with today's feature about the nomadic and financially difficult existence of that level. One of the players featured in the story, USC's Amanda Fink, is having an excellent run in Allentown. On Thursday, she defeated No. 2 seed Varvara Lepchenko in three sets, as detailed here, and today downed Brenda Schultz-McCarthy to advance to the semifinals, where she'll face Lauren Albanese. Sixteen-year-old Grass Court champion Gabriela Dabrowski of Canada is through to the doubles semifinals with her partner Neha Uberoi.

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

    This week's Sports Illustrated is rare enough in featuring tennis on the cover (what, no Brett Favre?) with a photo of Nadal vs. Federer at Wimbledon. It also has a "Where are they now/Where will they be?" section that has brief profiles of Melanie Oudin and Bernard Tomic. Click here for the online version, which is without the photographs that accompany the stories in the magazine.

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What's Happening at Tennis Tournaments Without Whale Logos

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    It's been nice to watch tennis on TV again (no, still no Tennis Channel in Kalamazoo), even if Fox Sports Detroit did cut away from today's Tsonga/Nadal match with Tsonga leading 5-2 in the third, in order to do the Red Wings pregame. It was back to the computer to watch the Pacific Life Live Scoreboard as Nadal won the match's final five games.

    But in addition to Indian Wells, there is tennis being played in other parts of the Americas and we have the Sun-Sentinel, the Redding, Calif. Record Searchlight and the ITF Junior site to keep us informed.

    At the $25,000 Women's Pro Circuit event in Redding, Madison Brengle qualified and yesterday advanced to the second round. The Record Searchlight talked with Brengle about her three-set win over Maria-Fernanda Alves of Brazil. Since their photos don't include one of Brengle, I'll post my most recent one. For complete draws and results, see the Pro Circuit homepage.

    Charlie Bricker has been posting early and often from the $100,000 BMW Challenger in Sunrise, Fla. and today weighed in with his estimation of the prospects of Ricardas Berankis, who lost in the final round of qualifying. (For complete results, see the tournament's website).

    Bricker also revealed an imminent announcement from the French, which will next year go to the Super Tiebreak in lieu of playing out a third set. And finally, he makes public the unfortunate news, which I had heard a month or so ago, that the Luxilon Cup is no more, or at least will not be held this year at the Sony Ericsson.

    The Grade A Copa Gerdau in Brazil is the big event this week in ITF junior tennis, and the American juniors there fared so poorly that even the ITF junior website used it as a basis for their wrap-up story. Last year's foray into South American clay also produced very few wins, and given the relative U.S. success on the European clay last summer and fall in the team events, I'm at a loss to explain it.

    And finally, I would be remiss in not mentioning the results of the Blue Gray Tennis Classic, which was held last week in Montgomery, Alabama. Sixteen teams vie for the title at the prestigious event, with the surging Tulsa Golden Hurricanes emerging with the championship this year. Now at No. 8 in the current ITA rankings, the Tulsa men are making a push to be more than just hosts for the 2008 NCAAs. No. 9 USC visits the Michael Case Tennis Center on Saturday.
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Exclusive Berankis Interview; TCU Men's Tennis Put on Probation; Jan Silva on Nightline Tonight

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    Last month while I was at the North Miami Beach Futures, I had an opportunity to interview Ricardas Berankis of Lithuania, the ITF World Junior Champion in 2007. Although Berankis signed with IMG and is not going to be playing college tennis, many of his insights into the game and its levels seemed appropriate for The Tennis Recruiting Network's audience. For the interview, click here.

    TCU has been placed on two years of probation by the NCAA for infractions discovered while Joey Rive was head coach of the men's team. The details of the violations and the penalties were announced today on the NCAA website.

    Another feature on six-year-old Jan Silva was released today on abc.com with the notation that it will air tonight on Nightline. There isn't anything new here that wasn't in Tom Perotta's Tennis Magazine piece, but those of you who would like more visuals than the YouTube clips out there might be interested in tuning in. I had hoped to see him myself when he was in Tampa, working with Steve Smith last month, but I missed him by a day or two. I guess it doesn't matter to TV that Tracy Austin's name is misspelled in this story, but they probably will get a few letters if they don't correct the Boris Becker error. Michael Chang is the youngest male to win a Grand Slam, not Becker.
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Sweden's Tennis Development Struggles; The top Canadian Prospect; Winning ATP Tournaments as a Teen

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    With all the talk of the decline in tennis fortunes in the U.S. and Australia (has Great Britain had a pinnacle from which to descend?), the hard times of former powerhouse Sweden haven't received much press. Over at espn.com, Ravi Ubha explores what has gone wrong in the land of Borg, Wilander and Edberg. I've noticed, since I've been covering junior tennis daily the past three or four years, that there are very few Swedes competing internationally at the highest levels. The above photo is of Sandra Roma, who is the only junior, male or female, in the ITF junior Top 100 (she's 62). Jonas Bjorkman and Magnus Norman have some ideas why this has happened.
    Bjorkman wasn't about to use Sweden's sparse population (about 9 million) as too big of an excuse, saying "a few good players on and off" should be in the pipeline. He did, however, target the federation.

    "We were always telling them a lot of ideas of what we think we should do to get tennis in Sweden back on track," he said. "Unfortunately the ideas never went further than when we spoke."

    "We need to get out in schools, we need to inform about tennis, we need to write about tennis, we need to start a tennis community," Norman added. "Tennis has been not as proactive as track & field, ice hockey and soccer in Sweden, so it has lost a lot of interest."

    Speaking of ice hockey, Canada now has a new National Training Centre for tennis, with Les Petits As winner Edward Nguyen one of its prize pupils. The Ottawa Citizen, Nguyen's hometown newspaper, spoke with him about his life there, and about his excellent results in Europe.

    Tom Perotta of tennis.com explored the history of the youngest winners of ATP events for espn.com, prompted, of course, by Kei Nishikori's victory Sunday in Delray Beach. It's an interesting list, headed by two-time Kalamazoo winner Aaron Krickstein and reaching, 12 players later, to Nishikori. And if any clever headline writers are reading this, his first name is pronounced KAY, so don't waste your time working on puns as if it were KEY.
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January Aces; Davis Cup; ITA Women's Team Indoor Underway

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    My regular first-Thursday edition of the previous month's aces is now available for viewing at The Tennis Recruiting Network. It begins with the Winter National champions, and it ends with Somdev Devvarman of Virginia, who won a Futures event last month in Tampa. I just learned today that Devvarman will be playing Davis Cup for India this weekend in their zonal tie with Uzbekistan. Devvarman will play singles in place of Prakash Amritraj, who is not fully healthy. There's more on why Captain Leander Paes selected Devvarman in this story from the Financial Express.

    Injury also figures in the need for shuffling the lineup in Canada's Davis Cup zonal tie with Mexico, with Peter Polansky, the 2006 U.S. Open Junior finalist from Canada, inserted into the singles lineup in place of the injured Frank Dancevic. That announcement is here. Highly ranked juniors and sometime doubles partners Cesar Ramirez and Vasek Pospisil are serving as hitting partners for their respective countries, and the experience is chronicled from Pospisil's perspective here.

    And finally, usta.com had this interview with Jesse Levine, who is in Vienna as a practice partner for the remarkably healthy and cohesive U.S. Davis Cup champions, who take on Austria on indoor clay in a World Group tie.

    I am planning on being in Madison, Wisc. for the next three days of competition at the ITA Women's Team Indoor, but I've already missed a big upset, with No. 2 seed UCLA falling to North Carolina 4-3. (A TarHeel blog had some comments about the win.) So far there hasn't been a single sweep (three matches are still in progress due to travel delays experienced by some of the teams) among the five played, so it looks to be an exciting weekend. For results and live scoring, see the ITA website.
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Bhambri Copes with India's Hopes

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    Yuki Bhambri of India reached the semifinals of the Australian Open Junior Championships last month and the 15-year-old has received quite a bit of press since returning home. Here is one such story from the India Times. Aside from the obvious contrast in attention to the other losing semifinalist, Ryan Harrsion of the U.S. (I found virtually nothing written about Harrison, which indicates yet again how unimportant tennis is here), what struck me about all this attention is how India, like Great Britain, is desperate for a male tennis hero to challenge for Grand Slam titles.

    The recent national uproar over India's major tennis star Sania Mirza's actions (Bonnie Ford has a thorough synopsis of her tribulations at espn.com), serves as an indicator of the difficulties that accompany sports fame in India, to the point that Mirza has announced she will not play there. Bhambri would not face some of these issues simply because he is not female, but it has to make any athlete wonder if they should be careful what they wish for.

    In addition to an interview with Bhambri, the Indian Tennis Blog has a list of all ATP, WTA and ITF players from that country, and Mirza is the only singles players inside the top 150 in the pro ranks. Like Harrison, Bernard Tomic and Filip Krajinovic, Bhambri is represented by IMG, so expectations are much higher for him than they were for say, Somdev Devvarman, although Devvarman had won a Futures event before he came to the U.S. to attend the University of Virginia. For the blog's interview of Devvarman, click here.

    Bhambri and Devvarman have obviously selected different routes for their tennis careers, routes based on their individual circumstances, options and personalities. I hope that dealing with the visibility that comes with winning is equally stress-free for both of them.
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