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British Tennis Forum -> Junior tennis -> Boys & Girls: Wimbledon under 14 Invitational Singles, grass (week 28
Post Info TOPIC: Boys & Girls: Wimbledon under 14 Invitational Singles, grass (week 28
Coup Droit


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Boys & Girls: Wimbledon under 14 Invitational Singles, grass (week 28
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From a recent article in The Sunday Times about the cost and process for raisining young tennis 'champions-to-be':


One of those is Liv Zingg from Barnes in southwest London although shes speaking to me from Nairobi, where shes just triumphed in an International Tennis Federation tournament.

The 14-year-old, who started playing with friends, aged 5, in a Notting Hill park, has recently taken a big step on the path to going pro: leaving home.

She and her mother, Nicole, a former figure skater and until recently Livs fitness coach, first moved to Mallorca, where Liv had a scholarship at the Rafa Nadal Academy. Now theyre at the Francesca Schiavone training facility in northern Italy, which her family is paying for with the help of Tennis First (academies can cost £40,000-£60,000 a year).

Livs days are carefully structured. I do three hours of tennis and three hours of fitness. On Wednesdays, a physio comes. And we always break from 12-2pm the Italians like their lunch.

She is happy, but there are sacrifices that come with not living a regular teenage life leaving friends behind, being home schooled, only seeing her dad and sister during holidays or if she has a tournament in the UK. I started doing trips at 12 and I had trouble with staying away from home. I was crying. I was kind of bullied at one stage too. But Ive got used to it, she says.

In September shes going to join the acclaimed National Tennis Academy in Loughborough, with a fully funded package including schooling, meals, accommodation, travel and coaching. It will mean living by herself for the first time and sharing dorms with her peers (ie the competition).

Ill be able to go home every weekend and its only two hours away, so I think Ill be OK, she says.

Her commitment is, at least, paying off. Liv is ranked third in Europe for her age, plays for Britain and has been invited to take part in the prestigious under-14s tournament at Wimbledon during the championships. Oh, and she signed with talent agency IMG at the age of 12; thats 6 years earlier than Jack Draper.

On Instagram shes known as Super Liv and has 4,000 followers. One recent post read, You accept it. Cry it out if you need to, then force a smile. You move on. Be relentless. Adapt and grow. Work harder. Work smarter.
Although, Liv says, Ive never posted anything myself; thats all my mum.

Her dream? To become world No 1 and hold the record for winning the most grand slams. That would be cool.

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Oscariyan


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Haqim has such a good snap and power on his groundstrokes and serves.

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Oscariyan


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Really enjoyable match between Haqim and a Brazilian with the Brit winning. Haqim also moves so well from what I saw today and has so much explosivity.

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Oscariyan


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Can Grace still advance from the group stage if she wins her match now?

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DavidC


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Oscariyan wrote:

Can Grace still advance from the group stage if she wins her match now?

 It looks to me that a Grace win would result in a 3 way tie in her group and she would lose out on sets difference, but Liv has qualified for the semis with 3 wins.  The other girls top seeds have won their groups with 3 wins.



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DavidC


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Liv is drawn against Sakino Miyazawa in the semi-finals (second match on court 4)

PS Thanks CD for the article about her current life

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miriam abc


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Congratulations to Liv for winning her group. Will she get points for this, or is the clue in the title, invitation?



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DavidC


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miriam abc wrote:

Congratulations to Liv for winning her group. Will she get points for this, or is the clue in the title, invitation?

 Yes the clue is in the title smile  The competition is about giving the experience of playing against other top players in their age group at Wimbledon (something that excites most or all taking part - as you can judge from the Aussie competitors' reaction ).  Tennis at this age level is administered regionally rather than internationally, so it wouldn't be appropriate to earn points for a regional ranking.  



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Coup Droit


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It's a slightly strange set-up

A lot of the best players aren't here (the winner of Les Petits As, for instance)

Mainly because of political reasons and the fact that they want to make it global

If you did it purely on level, you'd have a big chunk of Eastern Europe players (the Petits As winner is Russian, for instance)

And that wouldn't be so all-encompassing - it wouldn't have a great 'look' to it

So, it seems to me, there's always a couple of real top players, and then a bunch of 'others'

Not that it matters - it's the AELTC's thing, it is an exhibition event, in essence, they can do it how they like, and others can come or not, as they see fit (well, not the ones who aren't invited, of course - they can't come , not unless they've won a quali event and some of those are closed events, I believe)



-- Edited by Coup Droit on Saturday 12th of July 2025 12:05:25 PM

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DavidC


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Liv was broken both sets when serving to stay in it against a girl with greater variety

Girls SF

Sakino Miyazawa (JPN) d. Liv Zingg 6-4 6-4

3rd/4th play-off

Yeri Hong (KOR) v Liv Zingg

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DavidC


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In the end they didn't play for third - only yesterday's winners in whatever section played today. The two overall winners were Moritz Freitag and Sakino Miyazawa. Myles Kiely won his consolation section.

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Coup Droit


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If it couldn't be Liv or the others, I'm very pleased that Sakino won in the girls

She does have such a good game to watch



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dodrade


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DavidC wrote:

In the end they didn't play for third - only yesterday's winners in whatever section played today. The two overall winners were Moritz Freitag and Sakino Miyazawa. Myles Kiely won his consolation section.

 Don't remember ever seeing an umpire take off a player's necklace during play before. It didn't help Bielinska much though as she lost her composure when broken while serving for the match with lots of tears and shouting whereas Miyazawa kept her cool.



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Coup Droit


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dodrade wrote:
DavidC wrote:

In the end they didn't play for third - only yesterday's winners in whatever section played today. The two overall winners were Moritz Freitag and Sakino Miyazawa. Myles Kiely won his consolation section.

 Don't remember ever seeing an umpire take off a player's necklace during play before. It didn't help Bielinska much though as she lost her composure when broken while serving for the match with lots of tears and shouting whereas Miyazawa kept her cool.

 The players are young, it's all part of the learning path, but Bielinska does seem to be either highly emotional (one way of looking at it) or an ultra theatrical young miss (the other way) - every time I've seen her, there's a whole heap of am-dram stuff - not only tears and shouting but sulks, and strops, etc etc

I do wonder if all the publcity she's had, re Rick Macci etc, has had rather an effect, and not for the good. 

Maybe life and tennis will settle down a little as she grows up - she's obviously got the makings of a decent player  



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