I was surprised by the number of people in attendance at the tennis centre for qualies, nice to know I wasn't the only one who'd rather spend a hot summer's day at the tennis than at the beach.
Before I head towards the match courts, a quick peek at the practice courts first.
Of course, quick is a relative term. I ended up spending 2 hours there, most of it at the court where Andrea Petkovic was practicing with Feliciano Lopez. It was... Eye candy for all. I'm not ashamed to admit I was the only person there taking pics on my phone and immediately uploading to twitter. isn't that every fan's duty? I wouldn't want my card revoked hehe.
It got incredibly hot towards noon so I sought some shade... And found Ana Ivanovic practicing with Jelena Dokic. Ana was not happy with her toss, Jelena was all focus. Sat on the shade next to Ana's mum, she was all smiles when people came and went, taking pics of Ana.
After some lunch by the far match courts, I went to Mahut's match. It was horrid. Nicolas lost in straight sets. Next up, Kiri! I had my fingers crossed for her, she barely scraped by with the win in her first qualifying match. A couple of bad line calls had Kiri protesting "are you joking??!" and smacking a ball out of the court in disgust. No warning though. I guess the ump didn't want any more drama. After the meltdown, it was all downhill, towardsa a bagel in the second. Ouch. Bye kiri. I'll see you in Melbourne!
Sam Stosur was practicing on centre court with Peng Shuai when I went there to seek some shade. Cameras everywhere Sam goes. Comes with being Australia's darling. We wuv you, Sammy!
Went for another peek at the practice courts cos I haven't seen (or heard! LOL) Vika all day. No blonde Belarussian princess in sight. Sadz. I had a sneaking suspicion that she was on to my sta-- um, observation at a polite distance plans, practicing really early in the morning. I was right, I heard people discussing she practiced early. Boo.
And that's when I saw her, Jelena Jankovic, walking towards the farther courts with her coach (I have a twitpic of this). so ofc I followed her. Practice partner turned out to be Petko! Vera Zvonareva was just leaving, in her new Fila gear.
Still no Vika. I decided to watch the last qualifying match of the day, Alize Cornet vs Mirjana Lucic. Alize was up by a set, but the second set was awful, everything that could go wrong went wrong. There was near tears complaining to the umpire abt calls, cursing in French (much to the amusement of my companions who actually understood what she was saying) and wind drama. Lucic was fistpumping like it was a semifinal. Good stuff.
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| Alize Cornet |
Just as I was wondering how she won the first set, things started to look up for Alize, she was not overhitting, dealing better with the wind, and going forward and winning net points. Alize won pretty convincingly in the third.Grigor Dmitrov was just starting his second qualie match when Alize got done. His serves weren't going in, he was putting balls long and wide...and this was just the first three games. Well, the only games of the match. Retirement was quite abrupt. He just walked up to the ump, said a word or two and waited to shake Feeney's hand. Um, somehow I have a feeling his first qualie opponent isn't feeling too cordial right at that moment. It was bizarre, so sudden when I saw it happen, cos clearly no injury happened, there was no MTO. It was the exhaustion fr playing Hopman Cup then flying straight away and playing the following morning. Too much. I admire the effort to play, I hope he's rested and ready for Melbourne.
And that was my cue to head home, in addition to the increasingly dark tan I've got to show for a single day at the grounds. I'll be back on Tuesday for main draw action. After that... Flying to Melbourne on Saturday!!! :D
(pics @chel_ever1)
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