Two Sets Vs A WTA Pro

With one public park open in Bradenton and Sarasota and two main hitting partners both afraid to play because of fear of virus and fear of being arrested, I am starving to play some real tennis instead of hitting on a wall or driving over an hour to Tampa where a friend plays at open Compton Park.

To the rescue came a WTA ranked pro who is training regularly at the unlocked Bradenton courts. She agreed to play me two sets for $20 each if she wins.

I jumped at the deal despite the fact I have not played a real match against a tough player in a month. My last match was a 62 61 win vs. a 5.0 at Gillespie Park in Sarasota which has since been locked. I felt at my best that day, saving so many break points and game points and making the scoreline look like a blowout though it really was a tough battle. Since then it’s just been pick up hits and wall hits .

Anastasia is 17 and ranked 845 in the world from having earned WTA points in Cancun last year. We played a ten point tiebreak last week as the price for me giving up my court, she prevailed 10-4.

But this time I had my favorite racquet the Head Speed Pro, not the less maneuverable Yonex ezone.

In the warm up I hit two backhands into the middle of the net, which never happens when I’m match tough. But now everything is off. And Nastia’s shots are pro shots so it made it even harder to get a rhythm and rebuild confidence.

She took a 3-0 lead quickly and easily. I tried feeling her out and just keep the ball deep and hope for errors but that tactic failed miserably. Her groundstrokes are too solid, too consistent. She hits almost daily with her father Andrei Cherkasov, a former ATP champion.

My backhand could not cause her any trouble at all, no matter how deep I put it or wide, she teed off on my backhand feeds and either hit a winner up the line or just beat me up until the error.

6-0 in about 19 minutes. She broke me again to start the second set but I started to hit my forehands harder and they started to do damage. I broke her for 1-1. I had a break point in the next game but failed and was broken again. My serve was ineffective though I did hit a few good ones which she returned long or side. Maybe three tops. But I noticed clearly her returns were eating up my serve.

My only success came from blasting forehands about as hard I could hit, inside out forehands or cross court from an acute angle. I still remember controlling the middle of the court and setting up, loading, and unleashing three inside out forehands in a row with the last one being clean winner. I won two points like that in the second set. That felt really good. And if anyone on the adjacent courts saw them, they knew I wasn’t just some clown enduring a one-sided shellacking.

I tried to will myself on with some cmon roars and I was feeling ready to take over the match but those dreams were futile fantasies.

Another rare highlight in this beatdown was ripping forehand cross court returns like Djokovic vs Federer that she got to but netted up the line, missing by an inch or two. I won about two points this way.

I also hit two inside our forehand return winners late in the second set, shots I rarely try against lesser opponents because I’m not desperate but one good thing about this experience is I now know I have that shot and will use it more.

When you’re getting killed you savor the highlight moments with extra appreciation. Those big shots erase the memory of blowing some game points in the second set to actually make it a competitive set. 6-3 or 6-2 I’m not even sure what it was. Big shots help you forget all the stupid misses you made on pretty much neutral balls.

Oh, the positive memories are coming back now. I won two points from drop shots from my backhand. One in each set. Not easy to do that off of pro shots. Those were the only two backhands I hit to win any points the entire match. My backhand was like a feed ball for her. She never missed any. She never missed a passing shot either. I don’t remember hitting one good volley in the two sets. And I’m known down here for my volleys.

Anastasia, who plays with a green and black Dunlop, has all the shots, she doesn’t miss volleys, I didn’t make her hit any overheads. Her serve is okay, it can be better. I once played the since retired Michelle Larcher De Brito when she was 240 in the world, a couple of years after she beat Maria Sharapova at Wimbledon – she beat me 6-1 though I had a break point for 5-2 in the set – and the difference between Michelle and Anastasia is minimal or nothing.

After we finished, her mom noted my forehand return winner from ad court to save match point and offered that she thinks I can do better next time.

Kata admitted her daughter was surprised by some of my forehands but I also confessed it was partly due to her mentally falling asleep too because she was winning so easily. And Kata brought up the memory that when she was trying to go pro she would play one of her sponsors who was a rec player and she would play from love-40 down each game, which is a good way to force a player to be mentally concentrated on every point, every ball, instead of thinking a shot or two ahead. If she won the match from love-40 down, the sponsor would pay for the next travel expenses, if Kata lost, she had to pay him a sum.

I felt there was enough respect to do this again, but the rematch may have to wait because I got Anastasia into the Harry Cicma International Tennis Series women’s series which will begin on May 4 at Saddlebrook and will continue for sixteen weeks. The format there will be like Cicma’s Bradenton men’s series, three or four matches a day, sets to four, three or four times a week, $500 per week. Any women or girl with a WTA ranking can play.

Bradenton · Dunlop Tennis · Head Speed Pro · Russia · WTA

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