2019 Eastbourne International - WTA Premier

Who's winning Eastbourne?

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Aussie Darcy

Aussie Darcy

Bionic Poster
Pretty big Premier tournament the week before a slam.

Loaded field with 8 of the top 10 playing (only Osaka and Kvitova missing). Seeds are:
Barty, Pliskova, Bertens, Kerber, Svitolina, Halep, Sloane, Sabalenka, Sevastova, Bencic, Wozniacki, Vondrousova, Konta, Gorges and Kontaveit.

Many quality unseeded players like:
Sakkari, Mallorca champ Kenin, Hsieh, Ostapenko and more.

Wildcards went to: Dart, Halep, Kerber, Swan and Watson.

Some big name qualifiers including: Stosur, Yastremska, Kudermetova and others.

Wozniacki is the defending champion whilst Dabrowski/Xu were defending champs in doubles.

Barty now has the #1 ranking locked up but is still playing for some insane reason. We're seeing Vondrousova play for the first time since making the RG final.
Also will be the first tournament for defending champ Wozniacki since she got married. I believe I read somewhere that she will be Wozniacki-Lee? Somebody has to keep an eye on her match to see what the chair ump says!

So who do you think will win the last tournament before Wimbledon?!
 
Aussie Darcy said:
Both Birmingham finalists Barty and Gorges withdraw.

Thank god Ash withdrew.
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Sevastova and Wang Qiang also withdrew earlier - so a fair few decent players reducing the stacked field a little. I'm a little worried for some players like Sloane who are playing their first match on grass here - losing their 1st match wouldn't be great for preparation. Do players who end up in that predicament tend to get match play against say junior boys, hitting partners etc? Surely there is contingency in place.
Muguruza choosing to play no warm-up event - even Venus played Birmingham! I sincerely hope she has something up her sleeve... It would be class to see her win the event but I am so cautious with my hopes for her nowadays.
 
The Su wei Giorgi match been an interesting affair. Started out pretty lack luster.
Now though at 3 all in the 3rd having some pretty good pts.
 
elkwood said:
The Su wei Giorgi match been an interesting affair. Started out pretty lack luster.
Now though at 3 all in the 3rd having some pretty good pts.
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Every time I see a giorgi match I check to see how many double faults she has. Almost always in double digits. You’d think she would fix that problem
 
For some reason Svitolina CONTINUES to play tournaments with that bum knee. Should be resting until 100% or until next years clay season
 
Ka. Pliskova against Gasparyan looked completely different than a week ago against Kristyna. What a difference a week can make!
 
Stosur who is notoriously terrible on grass up a set on Mallorca champ Kenin who beat top players like Mertens, Sevastova and Bencic.

Weird.
 
Great hold there from Stosur saving two break points after going up the break in the 2nd. Very clutch which isn't something used to describe Sam these days.

A game away from the win.
 
Huge win for Stosur over Kenin. Into the 2R where she'll play Kerber.

Stosur having a better grass season than her clay season, confusing.
 
Stosur v Kerber is always a good match.

They've played 8 times with Kerber leading the H2H 5-3.

Their first match was the 2011 US Open SF with Stosur winning in 3 en route to the title. Their next 3 matches were at the Fed Cup with Stosur winning the first but Kerber winning the next 2. Kerber has also won their last 3 matches including the 3R of the Olympics and Hong Kong SF.

Wonder if Kerber will play Eastbourne, made the SF at Mallorca and has to defend her Wimbledon title in the next few weeks. Could do with the points if she wins Eastbourne but also a huge risk playing the week before a slam. Guess her team has to weigh that up.
 
Somehow missed that Stosur has to play three matches today.

Just finished the Kenin one and now has Kerber on centre court in a few matches time. Also has doubles with Zhang to close out the day on centre court. Ouch.

Lucky she easily beat Kenin in an hour and 12 minutes.
 
Match resumes and Cornet knocks out Svitolina who just did not play well, this injury has really messed with her. She'll definitely fall early at Wimbledon.

Bertens gets past Putintseva in straights

Bencic beats Kudermetova in 2.
 
Only caught a bit of the 2.6 hour R1 match between the 20 yr old Katie Swan and 30 year old Rose Zhang. Apparently, the veteran, Zhang, found it necessary to lash out in social media against the younger player for ONE close line call in their match. She questioned Swan's integrity for a call made by both a linesperson and the chair. Any idea when this call happened in the match?

Was the public lashing really warranted? Seems very unlikely but I didn't see the incident. Is Zhang a sore winner? Did she just happen to come across a video clip of that one call and decide to make a public issue of it? The video she tweeted was rather grainy (with a relatively low frame rate) and the angle was not the best for making that call.

For the given angle, her shot could conceivably be IN, but it could hardly be considered conclusive. Swan may have been too close to the bounce to see it accurately... too difficult to track the ball when it gets very close. Wasn't her call to make anyway. A veteran like Zhang should be aware of all this.
 
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@Aussie Darcy I haven't followed WTA for a year now, but I want to this Wimbledon try and follow the tournament from start to finish. Who would you recommend I keep my eyes on and who are players you think are contenders to hold that trophy? Thanks
 
Great match Kerber vs Stosur. Was a winnable one for Stosur, sorry she had too many UE at key points.
 
Aussie Darcy said:
Huge win for Stosur over Kenin. Into the 2R where she'll play Kerber.

Stosur having a better grass season than her clay season, confusing.
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I do wonder why some players continue with the tour when they have a huge downturn in their career toward what many would presume is the back end of their career. Obviously, Lopez proved last week what can happen in the odd instance - so I would be cautious counting anyone out. Having said that, when they've earned millions upon millions, winning a round here and there won't really change their financial situation and they would probably be better suited to go do something else with their time (I do know many don't know ow what they actually want to do). If they're playing because they love the game, you'd think they'd train harder though
Aussie Darcy said:
Match resumes and Cornet knocks out Svitolina who just did not play well, this injury has really messed with her. She'll definitely fall early at Wimbledon.

Bertens gets past Putintseva in straights

Bencic beats Kudermetova in 2.
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It won't just be the injury - whatever went on between her and Gael won't be something you just get over cause you're a professional, unfortunately she may have a love hangover.
 
SystemicAnomaly said:
Only caught a bit of the 2.6 hour R1 match between the 20 yr old Katie Swan and 30 year old Rose Zhang. Apparently, the veteran, Zhang, found it necessary to lash out in social media against the younger player for ONE close line call in their match. She questioned Sawn's integrity for a call made by both a linesperson and the chair. Any idea when this call happened in the match?

Was the public lashing really warranted? Seems very unlikely but I didn't see the incident. Is Zhang a sore winner? Did she just happen to come across a video clip of that one call and decide to make a public issue of it? The video she tweeted was rather grainy (with a relatively low frame rate) and the angle was not the best for making that call.

For the given angle, her shot could conceivably be IN, but it could hardly be considered conclusive. Swan may have been too close to the bounce to see it accurately... too difficult to track the ball when it gets very close. Wasn't her call to make anyway. A veteran like Zhang should be aware of all this.
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I think the ball was in, but I had to watch the video she tweeted about 5 times because as you said, it's not the best quality. Certainly a bizarre outburst on Twitter considering she won the match. It would be funny if they drew one another in R1 at Wimbledon!
 
Her coaches probably tell her she will never be a consistent winner until she learns to do something besides swing for a flat winner on every ball, and she disagrees and fires them.
 
So, as I'd expected - Sloane loses her first match on grass and will go into Wimbledon 0-1 on grass this year. Why do so many of these players think they're good enough to hardly warm up for slams? Playing your only tournament 1 week before a slam gives you no chance to regroup on losses and go again the next week. So many light schedules on the WTA tour, which would be great if they actually worked but all they do is leave so called 'top players' rusty.
 
time_fly said:
Her coaches probably tell her she will never be a consistent winner until she learns to do something besides swing for a flat winner on every ball, and she disagrees and fires them.
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Have you seen her matches lately? She‘s doing great. Her serve improved, her drop shots are wicked, and she hits with much more topspin than before. If she‘ll continue like this she‘ll be back in top 10 quite soon.
 
D-Lite said:
So, as I'd expected - Sloane loses her first match on grass and will go into Wimbledon 0-1 on grass this year. Why do so many of these players think they're good enough to hardly warm up for slams? Playing your only tournament 1 week before a slam gives you no chance to regroup on losses and go again the next week. So many light schedules on the WTA tour, which would be great if they actually worked but all they do is leave so called 'top players' rusty.
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Yep... the switch from the clay to the grass is no subtle transition.

Sloane has become pretty much un-watchable for me because I'm convinced that she has the physical abilities to take over #1 for a good stretch. But then she gets out there on the grass and plays exactly the same as she does on every other surface; lazy footwork, clinging to the baseline, and whacking the ball at top speed. I spent enough time on not-so-well maintained grass courts as a kid to know that she won't get anywhere doing that.

The surface gives her inherently smaller targets to hit at and too often she's out of position with those heavy feet. How do you spell unforced errors? She wants to loiter on the baseline and wait for the surface to funnel the ball back to her, but grass does not accommodate that style. She has access to top level coaching. She has resources. She's not using them.

Plenty of other WTA players are trying to apply a hard court game to the grass and it's also painful viewing for me, but at least Ash Barty has bucked the trends. Her all-court game may give the WTA the wake-up call it's been begging for, but we'll see. Sloane needs to evolve in a hurry or she's going to be an historic disappointment in my book.
 
Yow. It looks like Hseih, the giant killer, went down rather quickly in R2. Halep exacted her revenge for Wimbledon in a mere 55 mins (6-2, 6-0). Simona credited her prior doubles match where she and her partner, Raluca Olaru, dismissed the number one seeds.
 
Hitman said:
@Aussie Darcy I haven't followed WTA for a year now, but I want to this Wimbledon try and follow the tournament from start to finish. Who would you recommend I keep my eyes on and who are players you think are contenders to hold that trophy? Thanks
Click to expand...
Thanks for asking!

Ok well Ash Barty is definitely the most popular choice to watch. French Open champ, on a 12 match winning streak, top seed and loves grass. She's still young and relatively new to the scene so she has never gone past the 3R at Wimbledon but similar story at RG and she won it there. Her matches will be high quality and she's definitely the favourite for the title.

Another one to watch is Petra Kvitova. 2x champ and had been having a fantastic year before injuries struck. She hasn't confirmed if she's playing which is worriesome and she probably won't win the title unfortunately with the injuries she's got but you can't not watch Petra on grass, it's enjoyable.

This ones a given but Serena Williams. Won the title 7 times, made the final last year, don't really need to say much more.

Angelique Kerber is the defending champ so you have to watch her. Her 2019 has been fairly decent but not like her 2018. She can beat anyone at her best but if she's not at her best she can fall early. She should make at least the QF so i'd definitely watch her.

A couple names that went far last year and have gone well on grass this year include Ostapenko, Goerges, Bertens, Vekic and Bencic so keep a big eye on them.

Jo Konta will be one to watch this year and i'm sure @PDJ will back me up on his homegirl. She's from the UK so she's a hometown fav, made the SF in 2017 and just made the RG SF and Rome Final. Having a great year and will be a top 20 seed.

Wimbledon is the slam that a number of top players struggle at. Players like Halep, Sloane, Keys, Svitolina, Pliskova and Wozniacki have mediocre results there so it'd be a surprise to see any of them make the final or win the title even though most of them are top 10 players. For Wimbledon you sometimes have to look a little lower to the 10-20 ranked players because while they're good on grass, the season is so short you don't get many points from it so as I said Goerges, Bencic and Ostapenko.

I'll definitely be watching Sharapova at the tournament. She isn't a title contender or even a massive chance at going deep but given the name value and the injury timeout for the last 6 months, got to keep an eye on her. Same goes for the youngsters like Anisimova, Kenin and Vondrousova who just had breakthrough runs at RG. They aren't title contenders or have a high chance at making the QF but i'll be watching them for sure.

Wimbledon is hard to predict just cause of the unpredictable nature of grass for the WTA. I'll also make note that if Serena is to win one more slam since her baby, Wimbledon is the slam where she's most likely to do it as a lot of the tougher players are likely to fall early so that's always something to consider.
 
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Hitman said:
@Aussie Darcy I haven't followed WTA for a year now, but I want to this Wimbledon try and follow the tournament from start to finish. Who would you recommend I keep my eyes on and who are players you think are contenders to hold that trophy? Thanks
Click to expand...
Keep your eye on the young (17) phenome, Amanda Anisimova... as long as she can stay away from the toxic Nick Kyrgios (who's 24 going on 17, himself).

Everyone's talking about Ash B, of course. Surprisingly, Serena W is still in the conversation. And then there's Petra K, Naomi O, Angelique K, Karolina P and possibly, Jo Konta or Simona.
 
SystemicAnomaly said:
Keep your eye on the young (17) phenome, Amanda Anisimova... as long as she can stay away from the toxic Nick Kyrgios (who's 24 going on 17, himself).

Everyone's talking about Ash B, of course. Surprisingly, Serena W is still in the conversation. And then there's Petra K, Naomi O, Angelique K, Karolina P and possibly, Jo Konta or Simona.
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Ah yes Osaka, it seems weird to omit the current holder of 2 slams but I just didn't have much to say. Given her ranking she's one to watch but she's still so new to grass so it's hard to predict.
 
D-Lite said:
I think the ball was in, but I had to watch the video she tweeted about 5 times because as you said, it's not the best quality. Certainly a bizarre outburst on Twitter considering she won the match. It would be funny if they drew one another in R1 at Wimbledon!
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From that angle, it certainly appeared that it could have been on the line. Linesperson called it out. When Rose Z questioned the call, the chair also said it was out. When asked if she was sure, the chair ump said, "100% sure". Rose then looked to Katie to get her to contradict the call. She was frustrated that Katie did not.

There were are a number of close balls in the match. Even tho I only caught bits & pieces of the match, I saw a couple of other close ones that Rose Z questioned. I believe that she was wrong in those instances. But not so sure about the one that she posted on Twitter.

Rose Z might have felt that chair and lines persons had a somewhat Brit bias. But why take it out on her opponent, an American Brit? The point in question was not exactly a very critical point. It looked like it happened early in the third set when the score was 2-2.

Katie had just started the fifth game. Rose had returned the serve very deep. Katie, who was inside the baseline after her serve, quickly backed up to play the ball. Swan had actually successfully returned that deep ball but it had already been called long.

It seems doubtful that Katie had a good look at the exact bounce location. The bounce was too close to her and she was moving as it happened. Not ideal for seeing the exact bounce location. I've been in this situation countless times. And have seen it happen to others countless other times. When the ball is that close to the baseline, you have 2 choices. You can try to keep your head still and focus on the line. But this will make it more difficult for you to play the ball cleanly. The other option is to focus on the incoming ball and then focus on your contact point in order to make a good return. In this scenario, you only have an approximate idea where the ball has bounced.

I'm sure that the veteran has experience this quite a few times herself. Is she really that clueless that, just because a player is close to a bounce, it doesn't mean that they can accurately see the bounce location? Linespersons are trained to keep their eyes & head still and focus directly on the line rather than watch the ball. Moving the eyes and head while the ball is bouncing severely impairs the ability to call lines accurately.
 
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PeteD said:
Wait. Is that even legal?
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Perhaps in some cultures. But you gotta wonder what Mom and Dad have to say about this.

I recall that a couple of years ago Francis Tiafoe's dad was not too pleased that his son was hanging out with toxic Nick. Felt that he was a bad influence and Francis would lose his drive.
 
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D-Lite said:
I do wonder why some players continue with the tour when they have a huge downturn in their career toward what many would presume is the back end of their career. Obviously, Lopez proved last week what can happen in the odd instance - so I would be cautious counting anyone out. Having said that, when they've earned millions upon millions, winning a round here and there won't really change their financial situation and they would probably be better suited to go do something else with their time (I do know many don't know ow what they actually want to do). If they're playing because they love the game, you'd think they'd train harder though

It won't just be the injury - whatever went on between her and Gael won't be something you just get over cause you're a professional, unfortunately she may have a love hangover.
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Her and Gael got back together so it's not that

https://twitter.com/x/status/1143638798821142539
 
So Jabeur comes from nowhere and scuppers Konta's Wimbledon preparation. Hopefully this just allows Konta to work on her weaknesses and any issues from the past 2 losses before Wimbledon. She will probably still be confident from the clay season, and knowing she's made SFs at Wimbledon, I doubt she will be in panic mode just yet. As to Jabeur, I think she had a few good wins last year? Don't recall her making much noise this year though, so far at least.
 
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