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Wednesday Observations US Open Qualies
4 Comments · Posted by Scoop Malinowski in Articles, Scoop
Daniela Hantuchova has a lot of fans who admire her game and her model-like physique, well, guess what, there’s a new young Dani on the scene and her body is even longer and taller. Elizaveta Kulichkova of Russia could give Giselle Bundchen or Heidi Klum a run for their money and cover shoots. Keep your eye out for eighteen year old Elizaveta Kulichkova (in photo). She lost a tough one to veteran Stephanie Foretz, the bestacled French lady 67 06.
If you want to see an unfulfilled talent, watch Alexander Kudryavtsev of Russia, tall, rangy, long arms, solid technique but his head is the problem. He can lose his mind at any moment. And if you like to see racquets thrown and smashed, Kudryavtsev is your man. He smashed some racquets while beating Italian Thomas Fabbiano 76 76.
Lleyton Hewitt hitting with Mikhail Youzhny, the man who ousted him from the tournament last year in a classic five set marathon.
Tomas Berdych arrived at the bus gate and walked in the front gate and through the fountain area at around one, sans hat and sans girlfriend Ester, but many fans didn’t realize it was him. The New Balance kicks also were a throw off.
Jeff Salzenstein’s charge, James McGee of Ireland, dominated Gonzalo Lama of Chile. You won’t meet many sharper tennis minds than Salzy…and Tim Mayotte, the former top ten player who was on site yesterday. Of all the young guns on the rise, Mayotte is most impressed by Nick Kyrgios.
Maryna Zanevska, a blonde beauty from Ukraine, was down 2-5 in the third against Polina Vinogradova but rallied for the win. Her boyfriend Andrey Golubev stayed for the entire match and then shared some Facing Rafa insights for me after. The interesting thing he said was that Rafa can beat you 6060 but you feel you are in the points and you have great rallies but Federer can beat you 6364 and you don’t ever feel like you ever had a chance.
Jose Higueras was observing the Samantha Crawford vs. Heidi El Tabakh match. Crawford was touted by Tom Gullickson a few years back as a potential Lindsay Davenport prototype. But she lost in three sets to the Canadian veteran.
Can you believe Portugal’s Joao Sousa is seeded in the main draw?
One of the great coaches of tennis Larri Passos was spotted around court fifteen. The man who guided the entire career, from junior to Hall of Fame induction, of Gustavo Kuerten, is back coaching Tamira Paszek again.
Jeremy Chardy, the #32 seed in the main draw, came out to watch and support his girlfriend Alize Lim, but it appeared Lim’s movement was compromised by some kind of injury. Lim lost 26 26 to another Japanese Misa Eguchi. Seven Japanese players contested matches on Wednesday alone.
Borna Coric defeated Thiemo De Bakker by the strange scoreline one-love. The Dutch man retired. I watched Coric and TDB walk to their match to court 4 and TDB had no energy or spunk in his step, and he even looked sleepy-eyed. His energy was so low, I half-expected to see him yawn a few times. It looked like he knew he wasn’t fit to play.
Alex Bogomolov straight setted Kimmer Coppejans and walked back to the locker room with his buddy/coach James Cerretani who had a lot to say in his ear. Cerretani, the very bright minded doubles veteran from Brown University and Rhode Island, could make a very good coach someday. Bogie plays Tiafore conqueror Tatsumi Ito today.
Stefan Kozlov handled his business from a set down against Mitchell Frank. Kozlov now meets fellow young star Coric which should be a most interesting clash.
Also, Mats Wilander is going to play a challenge match against local Eastern Open and 35s star Raj Vaswani on Sunday at the Willowbrook Tennis Club in Mount Kisco, NY.
Seven Japanese players played yesterday, six play on Thursday.
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<< Daniel, Coric, Jabeur, Rusty Shine on US Open Qualies Thursday
Bryan · August 21, 2014 at 10:48 pm
Did Borna Coric advance today? Last I heard on Twitter he lost the first set.
Also how is Alizé Lim doing? She’s Serena’s regular hitting partner and lost to her at the FO. It’ll be great if she makes it.
Nicole Gibbs is in the main draw via wildcard so I don’t need to worry about her for once. Fingers crossed.
Scoop Malinowski · August 21, 2014 at 11:53 pm
Bryan; Coric won today in 3 sets. 62 in third. Lim is hurt. She clearly had some kind of leg or ankle injury that was affecting her movement vs. the Japanese girl yesterday. Also, she is not Serena’s regular hitting partner. I spoke with Lim earlier this month about playing Serena at the FO and she said she hasn’t seen her since the match. Am a Nicole Gibbs fan too Bryan, will check her out next week ) BTW I got a Coric Biofile yesterday. And got a Jabeur Biofile today. Also spoke with Siemerink, Higueras about Facing McEnroe. And Gabashvili, Scheuttler, Lacko about Facing Rafa.
Andrew Miller · August 22, 2014 at 12:12 am
If a player loses in qualies sorry to say aint no endorsements coming! No matter how good looking.
As for Salzenstein no surprise on coaching ability. His dad is a great coach and so too his cousin.
Bryan · August 23, 2014 at 1:04 am
Good stuff Scoop thanks. I saw your new story about Coric making the draw. This is going to be an interesting first week.
Bummed about Alize Lim. Guys said she was hitting with Serena a lot but maybe that was just ahead of the FO. Serena has a flat in Paris now so that would make sense.