Donald Young falls again 76 61 to Pospisil. The downward spiral continues. At 3-2 up in the breaker, DY fell apart.
Victor Estrella Burgos scored a much needed win in qualies vs JP Smith 76 in third. Smith was down 5-6 match point and missed his first serve and then chided himself, “you havent made a fu***** serve all day.” Of course he then double faulted to put the 37 year old ranked 190 something into the main draw. Estrella had a crew of Dominicans cheering him after every point in Spanish which made a difference.
Bernard Tomic wore all white Lacoste and a blue cap (first time seeing Bernie in a cap), and dispatched a Romanian 6463 to make main draw. Without a coach, loner Tomic had no Aussie support and after the win Tomic did not join the Aussie group – Hewitt, Thompson, Crabb, Drysa – watching deMinaur and Duckworth battle Mahut and Mannarino, the last match on center. Tomic looks so good on these grass courts, seemingly effortless talent. He looks super fit too. Tomic floats around the courts like swan, so elegant and precise. He can win the title. Remember, his highest ranking of 17 is better than almost everyone in the draw except Baghdatis.
Mahut hit before his dubs match with Mannarino on practice courts and Mahut was trying to hit a ball into the second floor window behind Adrian into the old media center. He came close, within a yard but stopped after about a dozen tries. It was funny to see veteran Mahut behaving like Nick Kyrgios.
Sergey Stakhovsky tried also from the row of courts behind Mahut, while Stak hit with Matthew Ebden. Stak also told me about his Facing Safin experience. These two friendly and had a good spirited hit, making friendly comments to each other after certain points.
Christian Harrison threw out the first pitch at the Newport Gulls game about a mile form the Hall. Ryan Harrison was there too.
Tim Smyczek held on for a 64 in the third set win vs Fratangelo.
I saw Steve Johnson practice backhands on the hard courts with his coach, doing both two and one handers up the line and cross.
Good not great crowds on hand today. Perfect weather around 84.
Duke Carnoustie · July 17, 2018 at 2:01 am
Scoop great reporting.
I will add that DY did not get into the event n merit but was handed a wild card. I wonder how many matches he has won on a wild card. His career is over.
Tomic is showing great mental strength to succeed with his countrymen giving him the cold shoulder. He could face DeMinaur in Round two.
Odd note: Hewitt faced Fognini twice in his career and was crushed twice on hard courts – 0 and 2 in Beijing in 2013 and 1 and 4 the next year in Cincy. That is correct – the legendary Hewitt totaled seven games in the four sets and had his serve broken 13 out of 16 times by fabulous Fab!
Dan Markowitz · July 17, 2018 at 5:41 am
Alright, Duke, you seem to be taking too much glee in DY’s demise. You know the match was on the big screen tv’s in the lobby here of the USTA National Tennis Center (which by the way, has courts next to this little pond/lake with signs on the periphery that say, “Alligators/snakes should be watched out for) and a small black boy who’s actually warming Cal up this morning, nice player, was watching the DY-Pospisil match intently, and I thought, this kid really must look up to DY because he’s really the only black American-born/bred player playing these days.
And there are so few black really good juniors out there who are boys, girls yes, boys no. And why? Very few role models is certainly one reason.
Chazz · July 17, 2018 at 9:07 am
Dan, Tiafoe was born in Maryland. Easy pick for a role model for any kid, white, black, asian, etc. in the US.
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Duke Carnoustie · July 17, 2018 at 1:25 pm
No glee but I will echo Chazz. The kid should pick Tiafoe as a role model; DY doesn’t have the sort of character I’d want any young player to copy.
Another one? How about Ulises Blanch, who just won the Perugia Challenger at 20 years old. He’s one to watch in the future.
Dan Markowitz · July 17, 2018 at 1:30 pm
True, Chazz and Duke, Tiafoe is American born and a very good role model, but I somehow look at DY as being more of a black kid from the inner-city, growing up in Chicago and then moving to Atlanta, while I know his upbringing was probablm more middle-class than poor like Tiafoe’s background seems to suggest with an immigrant father working as a janitor, I’ve talked to both DY and Tiafoe, and I came away thinking Tiafoe seems more international to me.
Regardless, I never thought DY would do some of the things he’s done in the game, getting to Top 40, beating Wawrinka in a slam, etc. so I see him as a real positive role model for black boys playing the game of which there’s very few.