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| 06 Sep 2003 | |
| Juniors double up for survival of the fittest |
By Eleanor Preston in New York
The effect of three days of dismal weather which blighted the US Open earlier in the week was still being felt at Flushing Meadows on Friday. The backlog of matches in the junior tournament forced organisers to schedule both the second and third round matches in one day. Successful players can expect the same on Saturday too, with the quarter-finals and the semi-finals also scheduled back-to-back.
“To go on the court once and play again it’s physically tough,” said boys’ top seed Marcos Baghdatis (CYP), who beat first Mischa Zverev (GER) and then Federico Gil (POR) to earn a place in the last eight. “If you don’t stretch properly or you don’t take care of yourself you can get into problems. In a way it helps your tennis because you feel light on the court, you feel confident. It does feel a bit strange to be through the quarters and it will be even stranger tomorrow because quarters and semis are when the tough matches start.”
Baghdatis now takes on Arizona native Scoville Jenkins after the American knocked out Spain’s Daniel Gimeno-Traver in the third round. Baghdatis admits he expects to be tired by the end of Saturday but says he is experienced enough to work his way through another long day. “I won’t think about it,” said Baghdatis. “I will just fight and whatever comes, comes. I hope God wants me to win.”
Amid the 48 matches played on Friday there were plenty of upsets, the biggest of which was top seeded girl Bethanie Mattek’s (USA) third round loss to Katerina Bondarenko. The Ukrainian, who had already beaten Canada’s Katarina Zoricic in the second round on Friday morning, beat Mattek in three tough sets.
Yugoslavia’s Ana Ivanovic proved to be the most impressive giant killer of the day, first knocking out American hope Ally Baker, seeded No.8, and then scoring another big win in the third round against eleventh-seeded Czech Andrea Hlavackova 64 60.
“They are both good players and it was difficult mentally to get over a big win and play again,” said Ivanovic. “Physically it will be hard to do it all over again but I will do my best. It’s all good experience. This day was a big success.”
Fifth seed Tatiana Golovin (FRA) was also counting her blessings at the end of a long day even if she did admit she expects to wake up with aching bones on Saturday.
“Even at Wimbledon we didn’t have to play two matches so this is new for everyone but, you know, it’s okay. I’m playing well and that’s all that really matters right now,” said Golovin, who now plays second seed Michaela Krajicek in the quarters.
“Actually it can help,” she added, brightly. “This afternoon I played a lot better than this morning and this morning I played a lot better than yesterday and with all the rain I got to rest a bit so overall things are great.”
In other results, Wimbledon boys’ and girls champions Florian Mergea (ROM) and Kirsten Flipkens (BEL) both progressed to the quarters, along with Britain’s No.4 seed Dudi Sela (ISR), Great Britain's Andrew Murray and American Brian Baker who scored wins in the boys’ competition.
Photos by Susan Mullane
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