Despite Summer Losses, Angelique Kerber Still Upbeat About US Open
Angelique Kerber hasn’t had the luckiest summer. She’s been knocked out of four tournaments in the early rounds, including New Haven.
She’s still upbeat about her chances at the US Open, where she made the semis of a Grand Slam for the first time in her career. I don’t think her summer suggests another such run, but she does seems to play better tennis when more is on the line.
Caroline Wozniacki tipped her decision to head to New Haven.
“I talked to Caroline. She won here a lot of times. She told me it’s great because everything is the same, it’s not so far, you can have a good preparation here and it’s a great place.”
I like the US series. Everything started in my career in New York two years ago, and its great to be back here. I like America and I have great memories of that time. When I reached the semis, I was like #92 in the rankings. After that, I started to believe in me. I started to practice harder, because I thought I could beat the top players and now I’m one of them. I think my fitness is improved from two years ago. I’m feeling more relaxed. I have more energy now.
On Bartoli’s Retirement:
“I was surprised because I think nobody would know that she would retire so soon after she won Wimbledon. She’s a great player and also a great personality. It’s sad to say goodbye to her.”
On meeting Steffi Graf for the first time:
“I was so nervous. I was waiting for her for 10 minutes and I was feeling like I was waiting for two hours. And then I met her and it was great. We were talking like we knew each other for the last 20 years. She’s a really great person.”
The press had plenty of questions for Wimbledon Finalist Sabine Lisicki at New Haven Open this week. Luckily, they weren’t all about Wimbledon Champion Marion Bartoli’s retirement.
Is your life any different now that you made the Wimbledon final?
It is different. It’s been quite a change when you go home and all of a sudden everybody on the streets knows who you are. It is nice, because it shows that the hard work pays off.
Alright, real quick. Marion’s retirement?
I’ve known Marion for a very long time. I think she thought a lot about it. I think she will be happy. She fulfilled her dream. She wanted to win Wimbledon for her entire life and I am happy for her.
Wrist Injury during or after Wimbledon?
It was during Wimbledon, but I think I handled it well. At a Grand Slam, you give it everything you have no matter what’s happening. And that’s what I did. I needed to take care of it. I needed a bit more time than I wanted (to heal the wrist) but that’s the way it is. I played my first final in a Grand Slam, so that’s good.
On whether she’s tried New Haven’s famous “Apizza”: No, and I probably won’t because I’m gluten-free.
What did it feel like walking out on Centre Court at Wimbledon?
Awesome feeling. I loved every second that I could step out at Wimbledon for every match and especially for the final. I think at Wimbledon the final is even more special than the other grand slams, starting with the walk on court. Everything just changes. All of a sudden you walk on court with flowers, someone else carries your bag, all those little things make a difference. Just that tournament with lots of tradition which I love about. It’s just amazing and I think I’ll learn a lot from that experience knowing how it is.
Did it ease the pain of the loss after hearing Marion had retired recently?
Didn’t change anything. I lost to Marion in the final giving every thing I had. She’s had that experience before and she knew what to expect going into the Wimbledon final. I think that’s a positive for her. She played unbelievable and I wasn’t on top of my game.
But the way to the finals, I couldn’t have a much tougher draw than I had, beating Serena, beating Radwanska and the other three girls as well who played great beforehand on grass. It really was a tough road to the final, but it made me a better player as well for the future. It gives you a huge amount of confidence and it shows that the hard work is paying off. I had to go through tough patches in the past with injuries. Just to get all of that back and to get the support of the crowd, it was the best feeling in the world.
Look out, US Open. The charming Lisicki has a taste for big show courts. I hear playing on Arthur Ashe is pretty sweet, too.
2013 New Haven Open Feature Interview: Auf Geht’s @JuliaGoerges! #NHO13 Stephan Fogleman, TennisEastCoast.com
Julia Goerges is a fun, friendly and well-balanced person off the court. No, she won’t make you laugh so hard your sides hurt. That’s Andrea Petkovic’s job. But Goerges possesses a deep appreciation of her job and her colleagues. She opened up with me at New Haven on Monday after a first round win.
Julia’s had a rocky ride since winning a title and a Porsche in Stuttgart in 2011. Two years later, she’s finally back where she wants. She discussed the on-court and off-court resiliency required to overcome tough opponents and nagging injuries. She also mentioned her love for Bayern Munich of the Bundesliga and reminds us that German footballers follow women’s tennis, too.
How are you feeling right before the 2013 US Open?
Physically, I’m in great shape. I have my team around me all the time. Body-wise, I’m in pretty good shape. Just need to bring it on the court. So far, I’ve had ups and downs in every year in my career so far but I still went up at the year’s end ranking every year. But I had a pretty sloppy last three months. This year, it’s going to be tough. I had some pretty sloppy matches. It’s never easy getting a win under your belt after some tough matches.
On her never give up attitude:
I think you get used to it. You need to have it in your body and your mind. If you do this job, you need to do it 100%. Selling your body and character, as expensive as it can be. If you give your 100%, there’s always a chance you win a match, and that’s how it should be.
How important are the fans to you?
It’s great to have great fans behind you, who are supporting you also in rough times. You can support someone who is always winning, but you always need to stand behind the player you’re a fan of when they’re going sloppy as well. I appreciate it a lot and I can be proud of them. It’s nice to share some thoughts about tour life. It’s nice to give back to them for their support.
On German Tennis Pride:
We have a lot of players in the top 50. German Tennis is doing pretty well at the moment. We get a lot of questions about Steffi (Graf) and the history and will we never achieve what she achieved, but we try to come as close as we can. I actually played an exhibition two years ago in Halle with her. It’s kind of a big moment when you meet her and you get to know her. It’s just amazing when you meet her. She can give you a lot of thoughts and experience on what she achieved in her career. It’s great to share those moments with her.
On Bundesliga:
I’m a Bayern Munich fan. A big one. It’s always been like that. It’s been 10 years now since I’m a fan of them. I’m going a little bit crazy with them. It’s nice that they took all three trophies home last year. We can get a little excited about it.
Eintracht Frankfurt Fan Andrea Petkovic told me there’s a big match coming up between your two teams?
They just played last week and Bayern won 1-0 in Frankfurt!
It’s just great when a lot of players have different clubs to support. It’s just fun when you can make jokes here and there. Overall, I think a lot of soccer guys are interested in tennis. It’s fun when you’re interested in Bundesliga and they’re interested in your sport.
Julia Goerges plays Sloane Stephens tonight in prime time on New Haven’s Stadium Court. She’s sure to give 100%. New Haven has been ripe for upsets this week. Anything can happen here.
Defending Champ Petra Kvitova More Confident Ahead of US Open
Defending New Haven Open Petra Kvitova is headed to a fourth straight WTA quarterfinals appearance if she beats American Alison Riske this afternoon on Stadium Court. The press caught up with her on Monday about her chances at a repeat.
On New Haven: I feel like its more relaxed here. It’s a pretty familiar tournament for me.
On her game: “I still have spaces to improve.”
The 2011 Wimbledon champion is feeling good about her chances at the US Open, having made the quarters of the last three tournaments she entered and having won it all here in New Haven last year. Even so, the humidity challenges her.
“I’m pretty satisfied. After grass, for me, its always tough. I never like playing in America because of my asthma, but the last year I played quite well. It was a good year, so I know I can play well here. It gave me confidence to be like OK, I’m going to America and I can play good.”
“The asthma was a big problem, but with the medication, it’s better. I have an inhaler that I can use during the matches. It’s more about the humid. Humid is the worst for me.”
She not resting on her New Haven laurels, knowing that competition lurks around every corner.
“It’s nice to be defending champion, but every week is different. It’s a chance for everyone, so I’m not thinking like this.”
Sara Errani Speaks About A Stellar Season and “Sufrimiento”
In 2012, Sara Errani made a racquet change and had a great year.
Many predicted she would struggle to keep her top 10 status with a need to defend so many rankings points. The doubters were wrong. Errani has met her 2013 goals already.
She shared some thoughts with the press at the New Haven Open on Monday.
On the Racquet: ” The racquet was the beginning of the change. From then, I started to play better on the court. I started to win more matches. I started to feel more confident.”
She was asked about Bartoli’s retirement and the pain Bartoli cited in her decision. She brought up the Italian term “sufrimiento” to describe the physical toll that the game takes on players.
But she’s thrilled for Marion. “There is another new life after tennis. She’s young and can do many things. So, why not?”
Go Like Hell.
Good friend Roberta Vinci seems to pop up in Sara’s singles draw all the time. Is that frustrating for the Italian doubles duo?
“Sometimes, yes. Maybe you would like to be on the other side. It’s tennis. It happens. There are more matches to play.”
Sara won’t have to face Roberta Vinci in New Haven, as her Italian counterpart fell to Carla Suarez Navarro in the first round. Errani has an excellent chance to advance to the quarters at the tournament, as she plays Ekaterina Makarova this afternoon.
Simona Halep is a name that everyone is quickly learning if they didn’t know her before. But the only insight that she’ll give us is that she “likes to fight”. She brought that fact up twice in the brief interview with Tennis East Coast on Monday in New Haven.
Her terrific year has propelled her to a career high ranking of World #22. Since June alone, she’s won a stunning 3 WTA titles (Nurnberg, ‘s-Hertogenbosch, Budapest). Halep speaks of her great run this summer and that of Romanian compatriot Sorana Cirstea.
Simona Halep, New Haven
On Romanian WTA performance this summer: “We played really good this year. Sorana played really good in Toronto. She had a really good result. I think we are fighting girls.”
She concluded by telling me that she’s “very relaxed on court now and I just like to play with pleasure.” And if I needed a reminder, I got it.
“I’m a normal girl and I like to fight”.
Halep will pick her next fight with Carla Suarez Navarro for a trip to the Quarterfinals at New Haven Open this afternoon.
Puig, Riske, Power Through to Main Draw at New Haven Open
Monica Puig had a vocal crowd of Puerto Rican supporters in the stands today as she dispatched French phenom Caroline Garcia 6-2, 6-4 to advance to the main draw at the New Haven Open. The self-styled “Boricuan-style” player, Puig is in the unusual position of having had to qualify for a premier level tournament in which she knocked off its top seed, Sara Errani, at Wimbledon.
Alison Riske also impressed, simply routine-ing the off-form Yanina Wickmayer 6-4, 6-2. Wickmayer continues to disappoint, while Riske continues to march forward toward the US Open. Riske, after dominating the grass earlier in the summer, seems to have found her form on the hard courts at a very fortuitous time. She needed three sets to win in each of the first two qualifying rounds, but there was little drama in today’s final.
Stefanie Voegele, Karin Knapp, Ayumi Morita and Anna Schmiedlova also advanced to first round play.
The New Haven qualies must be the strangest thing I witness as a fan. Unlike other tournaments, where the players all neatly fit into the 100-300 range, there are routinely a bevy of top 50 players and top 500 players squaring off for a spot in the draw. It all has to do with the US Open, of course. You either play here or you play US Open qualifiers. So it is that high-ranked players like Yanina Wickmayer, who have already been granted a spot in the 128 woman field at Flushing Meadows but must scrap through three tough matches to make the field of 32 at New Haven. The end result for fans is unusually big-name qualifying matches.
The end of 2012 marks the end of my first full year as a blogger. This scribbling also marks the blog’s 500th post. Milestones abound. Here’s my memories of 2012 laid out as a nifty quasi-top ten just in time to say my final goodbyes moments before the Mayan calendar runs out.
Our Coverage Area
As the name Tennis East Coast would portend, I traveled to Charleston, Newport, DC, New Haven, New York, Charlottesville and Atlanta to cover events in 2012. I mostly stayed in cheap hotels to keep costs down. Those experiences could spawn a top ten list of their own, and it’s possible that some of the cities in which I stayed reflected on my tournament experiences. Like the guy at the front desk in an unnamed city who told me “the hotel internet don’t work real good when it rains”.
To the list:
1) My Biggest surprise (TIE) : Loving the Washington Kastles and the success of a combined WTA/ATP event in Washington.
Big Success: CitiOpen ATP/WTA and their Little Radios
When I found out that Legg Mason was replaced as the corporate sponsor and that the new event had consumed Maryland’s only tournament, the WTA CitiOpen, I was devastated. That meant one less week of tennis for local fans and the loss of the last Maryland link to the DC ATP event in the sponsorship of Baltimore-based Legg Mason. It all changed for me by actually attending the tournament. The focus was still squarely on the men, but that meant unprecedented access to the women. The new show court at Rock Creek Park and a Saturday night women’s final made for a memorable experience that will only get better with age.
Kastles Crusades Equal Fun and Serious Competition for Fans
When I finally decided to go to a Kastles match, I was a long-term skeptic on world Team Tennis. I’m a pro tournament guy of any denomination. I want points for the winner, a trophy and an over-sized check. And I want it all done within a week. I figured it was the closest thing to an exo without being Pam Shriver’s Baltimore Tennis Challenge (which I used to attend) where pros played Oriole legends. And where Maria Sharapova showed up in jeans and phoned it in. How mistaken I was.
Instead, it’s fired-up pro tennis, with the big names among the lesser-knowns. Those lesser-knowns are the ones who really put on the show. It’s uber competitive for those who rank inside and outside the top 100. The fans are raucous, the little stadium guarantees that everyone can hear everyone else, it’s on the water, and it’s the ultimate in family friendly tennis. Not to mention, the Kastles are the elite team in World Team Tennis. In the words of a famous former California Governor, “I’ll be back!”
Best Food of the Year (non-catered): New Haven
2) My Favorite meals at tournaments: Charleston/New Haven. Tournaments feed their media in two different ways, so I have two winners. Some provide a bag lunch. Some cater into the media tent. While the food ran delectable at most, one catering job stood out above the rest. Charleston’s chef stuck to ribs, barbeque and corn muffins with artisanal cheeses. Other offerings included home made soups with fresh baguettes. You never needed to leave the grounds to get the best Charleston had to offer.
The New Haven Open did it differently. They privatized it by giving you a $12.00 lunch voucher each day to use at the ‘food court’ erected on outer courts. My wife is from Rhode Island and I am a snobby Maryland seafoodie. Imagine my surprise when I tasted some of the freshest tender clam strips in my life, and I was eating them at a pro sports event. Later, I tried and loved the grilled cheese with a homemade Gazpacho. You don’t need credentials to enjoy the offerings at New Haven. Just bring an appetite.
The Best Tournament
3) My Favorite tournament: Family Circle Cup. This is the toughest category, because all tournaments are a blast. With the camaraderie in the press room, the all-access media hour with the top 8 seeds, the daily trivia contests, the great big little stadium, the aforementioned grub, the media tennis tournament and former Media Director Mike Saia (who we will all miss), Charleston offered the biggest bang for the drive down 95.
The Only Queens that Matters is the One where they play the US Open
4) My Least favorite media center/grounds: New Haven Open at Yale. The gargantuan mothership stadium houses the huge mostly empty media center in its bowels three flights of stairs down from the tennis upstairs. It was the quietest media room I’ve ever entered and the worst. There was little chatter or camaraderie among the media, except for the constant smarmy bantering of three caddy media boys about how Melanie Oudin had gained weight. Seriously, this is ALL they talked about for three days and it made me sick to my stomach.
The Players cohabitate with the Bloggers in Newport
5) My Favorite grounds: Newport. The old Casino and Tennis Hall of Fame event is the photo-perfect setting for shooting tennis, family and wooden scoreboards that blow over. If you get a free moment, you happen to find yourself in one of the greatest summer destinations in the world, just minutes from history, beaches and shops. It’s also as open as a Challenger in terms of fan access. The players are all on display in the open-air player’s lounge, so if a fan wants an autograph, she won’t have to wait long to stake out her favorite.
6) My Favorite interview: Andrea Hlavackova. When I spoke with Andrea Hlavackova in Charleston in early April, neither of us knew that she was about to become (almost) a household name. Her silver medal exploits were still a few months off and she was a lucky loser at the Family Circle Cup. She warmed up to me when I wanted to talk about her hometown and her brewing legacy, which was not well-known at the time. Her family story has been repeated many times now in the big league press and I like to think I got that ball rolling. It’s now the #1 most read interview on this blog. I’ve asked a lot of players about their love for their hometown and none reacted with such effusive praise than Hlavackova. Go Plzen!
Best Blog-league Buddy
7) My favorite tennis blog colleague: Mike Barber of WTAToday.com. Not only has Philly Mike provided excellent exhaustive coverage of the tour, he’s also been a great resource as an early adopter of everything web-related. He’s taught me about self-hosting, reddit and google plus. I’m behind the times. He is not. He’s also become a good friend and I’m watching his latest project with wide eyes: as President of the USA Eintracht Frankfurt Football Fan Club.
The real action here was the jostling of photographers
8) My favorite moment(s) of 2012: They happened within the same hour. First, standing on Ashe interviewing Carly Rae Jepsen at Kids Day, who clearly knew very little about tennis despite being mobbed by the tennis press and (2) watching US Open Media Director Jean Marie Daly push back against pushy photographers who had decided their own pecking order. Some of the NYC photographers had decided that only the ones who had signed up on their own list would get the prime positions for shooting. They complained loudly to Ms. Daly, who shot back, “Your list means nothing to me!” and let the little people keep their spots. She could run a day care or a country and the USTA is lucky to have her. Well played.
9) My favorite media director: (Male) Mike Saia, (Female) Anne Marie McLaughlin. Family Circle’s Cup Mike Saia served as a fantastic media host at Charleston for the reasons mentioned in #3 above. Besides, he was knowledgeable and highly approachable. Same goes for Newport’s Anne Marie McLaughlin, who catered to the bloggers and treated us like equals. She not only invited bloggers to the exclusive, members-only draw ceremony, but graciously allowed us to help pick the draw, too. She’s hard-working, fun and really seems to enjoy the different perspectives that bloggers bring to the table. Bravo!
10) My biggest breaking story of 2012: Tweeting that top seed Aga had withdrawn from the Family Circle Cup. Someone announced it in the media center and I sent it to the tweeps. It was almost an hour before the story appeared on mainstream news sites and it always reminds me that micro-blogging is so much more fun than macro-blogging.
That’s a wrap for 2012. The experience was unforgettable and I hope you’ll have me back in 2013. Except to that one place that I don’t think I’ll return. The Days Inn in West Haven.
Pjotrs Necajevs and Sophia Abelson, 2012 USO MAS Mixed Doubles Champions
Leading off on Grandstand Court at the US Open National Playoffs final rounds at the New Haven Open at noon today is the mixed doubles sensation of Sophia Abelson and Pjotrs (pronounced Peter) Necajevs. This match could affect my life more directly than any other tennis match played 260 miles away. Here’s why.
I entered the US Open National Playoffs Mid-Atlantic Regional Sectionals in May with my dear doubles partner, Sophia Silbergeld. We received a first round bye while our eventual opponents, Sophia Abelson and Pjotrs Necajevs, had to win for the right to play us in the quarterfinals. When I googled them, I immediately knew we were in trouble. She a 14-year-old Girls Doubles National Open Champion and he a former college and Latvian National Team doubles player and Head Coach of the University of Detroit Women’s Team. Yeah, we got smoked. We supposedly won a game in all of this, according to the official scoreline, but I don’t remember it being that close. Of all the memories of that day, I was most proud of my seamless, instantaneous transition from bad tennis player to decent on-court interviewer with my shaking racquet hand clutching the camcorder literally seconds after match point.
Anyway, back to me. We ended up losing to the Mid-Atlantic champions who won it all in College Park. I’ve spent the better part of eleven weeks telling everyone that we lost to the champs. It always elicits an ‘If you’re gonna lose, you might as well lose to the champions’, signifying subtle gratitude when I tell the story anywhere people will listen.
Now the stakes are higher. If they win it all in New Haven, I will have huge bragging rights for life. I will go to NYC to see them in the first round (and all subsequent rounds) and cheer them on loudly. I will even scream “Sophia. Pjotrs. Remember me? Your buddy from College Park”. And they’ll be all, “Oh, yeah.”
So, please Sophia and Pjotrs, please win it all in New Haven. I love an excuse to get to the US Open every chance I get. And I do like to brag a little about even playing in the US Open National Playoffs this year, since I had a foot injury last winter and almost didn’t register. I’m so glad I did, because I would have never had a chance to play or meet the very talented and highly affable Player/Coach combo of Sophia Abelson and Pjotrs Necajevs. Detroit!
Day 1 of main draw play is a wrap. Sloane Stephens and Nicole Gibbs impressed the most. Stephens beat Tamira Paszek, 6-3, 6-1 in just over an hour, while qualifying wild card entrant Nicole Gibbs gave tournament organizers something to be proud of as she rolled over Muguruza into retirement, 6-1, 1-0. Gibbsy didn’t drop a set all weekend en route to the main draw entrance. The late sentence reads that Bartoli also looked powerful and precise en route to dispatching Olympic Silver medalist Laura Robson 6-3, 6-3.
Melanie Oudin’s play looked suspect yesterday in her comeback win, but today the slow start came back to haunt her. American Alexa Glatch moved on to the main draw. This is not the tennis she’d like to be playing this close to the US Open. Luckily(?), she’ll get a do-over tomorrow as a Lucky Loser. Who knows? She could go ballistic on the main draw. Tune in tomorrow and find out which Oudin takes the court aginst Sofia Arvidsson.
Tomorrow is also a trophy day at Yale. US Open National Playoff winners will be crowned and they win the right to enter the qualifiers at Flushing Meadows on Tuesday. Later in the week, mixed doubles teams will square off here for the right to enter the main draw in New York. I played in the Mid-Atlantic Mixed Doubles and lost to the eventual sectional champions, Sophia Abelson and Pjotrs Necajevs. They’ll be playing later in the week. Go Team Detroit!
NEW HAVEN OPEN AT YALE PRESENTED BY FIRST NIAGARA – NEW HAVEN, USA
$ 637,000.00
AUGUST 17 – AUGUST 25, 2012
RESULTS – AUGUST 19, 2012
Women’s Singles – First Round
[5] M Bartoli (FRA) d [WC] L Robson (GBR) 63 63
[8] L Safarova (CZE) d V Lepchenko (USA) 63 41 Retired
S Stephens (USA) d T Paszek (AUT) 63 61
C Suarez Navarro (ESP) d A Szavay (HUN) 76(3) 64
Women’s Qualifying Singles –
Qualifying -T Babos (HUN) d [WC] S Vickery (USA) 26 64 64
Qualifying – O Govortsova (BLR) d V Dushevina (RUS) 57 62 75
Qualifying – [WC] N Gibbs (USA) d G Muguruza (ESP) 62 10 Retired
Qualifying – A Glatch (USA) d M Oudin (USA) 60 62
ORDER OF PLAY – MONDAY, AUGUST 20, 2012
STADIUM start 12:00 noon
[WC] B Mattek-Sands (USA) vs [4] S Errani (ITA) – WTA
S Peer (ISR) vs [7] M Kirilenko (RUS) – WTA
[Q] T Babos (HUN) vs A Petkovic (GER) – WTA
Not Before 7:00 PM
[3] C Wozniacki (DEN) vs E Makarova (RUS) – WTA
[1] L Huber (USA) / L Raymond (USA) vs V Dushevina (RUS) / O Govortsova (BLR) – WTA
GRANDSTAND start 12:00 noon
[LL] M Oudin (USA) vs S Arvidsson (SWE) – WTA
D Hantuchova (SVK) vs M Barthel (GER) – WTA
A Medina Garrigues (ESP) vs [6] D Cibulkova (SVK) – WTA
COURT 1 start 12:00 noon
[Q] N Gibbs (USA) vs [Q] A Glatch (USA) – WTA
K Date-Krumm (JPN) / A Szavay (HUN) vs L Lee-Waters (USA) / M Moulton-Levy (USA) – WTA
[LL] V Dushevina (RUS) vs [Q] O Govortsova (BLR) – WTA
N Grandin (RSA) / V Uhlirova (CZE) vs C Chuang (TPE) / S Peer (ISR) – WTA – After Suitable Rest
COURT 2 start 12:00 noon
[1] M Hibi (JPN) or M Weatherholt (USA) vs [4] S Roma (SWE) or [2] A Mueller (USA) – USONP Women
C Reix (FRA) vs N Meister (USA) – USONP Men
COURT 4 start 12:00 noon
A Groenefeld (GER) / K Peschke (CZE) vs A Amanmuradova (UZB) / K Bondarenko (UKR) – WTA
Tennis Atlantic 