Weather Forces @TallyChallenger To Move Indoors, Kosakowski Left To Wait On Wild Card
Steen Kirby, Tennis East Coast
Because of torrential downpours and a forecast that predicts rain continuing through at least today, the Tally Challenger is moving indoors to the Florida State tennis complex, and at least for a day, switching to indoor hard courts from Har-Tru. This may well be the first time a challenger (or ATP) event has switched surfaces during the event itself.
Seven round one singles matches will be played indoors at the complex, and then we will see what they do for the rest of the week and the later rounds of the tournament. There are two main draw doubles matches still scheduled to be played at Forest Meadows in the evening on Har-Tru.
On Tuesday, the tournament was almost entirely rained out, but Jason Kubler eliminated Daniel Kosakowski 5-7 6-4 6-0 to reach round 2, as he pulled it together, broke at 4 all in set 2 to push it to a third, and thought through cramps to bagel Kosakowski in the third set. In the only other match that took place, Fratangelo/Krueger beat Aubone/Vahid Mirzadeh 6-4 6-3 in round 1 doubles.
Kosakowski’s round 1 loss means that Alex Kuznetsov must reach the semifinals to capture the French Open wild card, while any other American player left in the draw besides Donald Young, must at least reach the final and have Kuznetsov lose early. Kosakowski, the current wild card leader is left to wait for his fate to be decided.
It should be interesting to say the least; in terms of how the players adjust to a surface, they have not been practicing or playing on for a couple of weeks (most of them).
Tennis Atlantic 