Week 21 - Roland Garros women's main draw

albino · Intermediate Club Player

RE: Week 21 - Roland Garros women's main draw

albino · Intermediate Club Player

And she takes her first. 1st set to the fighter.

rebel_rebel · Lower Club Player

Excellent, Hev takes the first set!

seagull · Hall of fame

Incredible stuff

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

I am loving this match so far. Standard of tennis is dire but compelling viewing. F-G had so many chances to win that set. There was a spell in the first half of the set where both players were taking on the 2nd serve but never managing to land the ball in court. Sometimes Heather thinks she's won the point so she stops moving then watches as a lob lands in or F-G's defensive forehand push creeps over the net.

-- Edited by kundalini on Monday 23rd of May 2011 06:06:45 PM

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Well that was a complete steal but we'll take it.

After that easy miss on the first set point Foretz was looking for Heather to gift her the set with an error and that was never going to happen.

Will be interesting to see if Heather can take confidence from this and start playing more positively. She is doing well in the points where it is a series of baseline hits to eachother waiting for a mistake, but struggling to finish off points with clean winners

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Heather has pretty much the perfect game to take advantage of an oppontent whose game is falling apart. If she holds her nerve this could be over quite quickly

rebel_rebel · Lower Club Player

Awesome result!

murray_2k9 · Challenger qualifying

Fantastic! Wish I had gone higher than 88 in the prediction thread now. I see Heather nearing the top 50 before this season is out.

tony_orient · ATP qualifying

Great result for Heather, having ended a 28 year wait for a qualifier, she now ends the 17 year wait for a R1 winner as well.

How often have we seen a British player fail to close out a set they should have won and then fall apart - nice that it happened with the Brit on the other side of the court for once.

Probably the key for Heather was her composure. It would have been easy for her to get down on herself when she wasn't playing that great and she was behind in the first set but she maintained a steady state of mind, kept in the game and gave herself the chance to turn it around.

Smidster · Challenger level

Surprised this thread isn't busier!

Great Result - Her battling qualities and will to win shined through again.

16th seed Kanepi up next - A streaky player so lets hope she has a bad day on Wednesday.

British_is_Best · County player

First time I have had the chance to watch Heather play and I have to say I was very impressed with her desire to win. I think the match against Kanepi is probably a step too far at this stage but it certainly isn't the worst R64 match you could have!

Maza1987 · Challenger level

THE DROUGHT FINISHER!

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Well done Heather. This win should help her with the nerves at Wimbledon and US Open.

I would imagine Heather will need a rather different balance between trying to win the point and keeping the ball in play, if she is to be competitive in her next match. In the matches I saw at the start of the year, Heather was playing far more aggressive tennis and looking quite impressive.

-- Edited by kundalini on Monday 23rd of May 2011 07:19:57 PM

Julia Carrot · All-time great

Wow, had to have supper and compose myself after all that excitement smile smile

Absolutely brilliant result. So happy for Heather. So happy for British Tennis and British tennis fans.

Obviously she was quite lucky with that match, but we know that she will learn from it and work on her weaknesses (not serving out, perhaps losing concentration etc).

Turning round the 1st set was a real truimph.