 Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |  Photographer: Susan Mullane
Date: 30 May 2005 |
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| 30 May 2005 - Roland Garros, Paris - Eleanor Preston | |
| Australian champions stay on course for grand slam double |
Reigning Australian Open junior champions Viktoria Azarenka and Donald Young stayed on course to win back-to-back junior grand slam titles on Monday by earning wins at Roland Garros.
Azarenka is seeded second in Paris, behind American Jessica Kirkland, and beat Slovakian Magdalena Rybarikova 6-2, 7-6 and now faces a potentially dangerous second round match against experienced Russian Alisa Kleybanova.
15-year-old Young, from the USA, wasted little time in easing past Abdullah Magdas from Kuwait 6-3, 6-3 and afterwards said he was learning to love European clay despite the fact that he has only played a handful of tournaments on it. “It is weird to move on and when I first got here I didn’t like it at all but I’m starting to like it now,” said Young. “Today was a pretty good match for me, particularly the first set. I had a little bit of a mental lapse in the second but overall it was pretty good.”
Like Azarenka, Young is learning to cope with the expectations that come from winning a junior grand slam, pressures which are multiplied in Young’s case since he has already been widely hailed as the future of American tennis.
“It is difficult because everyone wants to beat the top people,” explained Young, who faces Ukraine’s Alexandr Dolgopolov in the second round. “But winning a junior grand slam is great because it’s the biggest thing you can do in juniors and it made me feel like I was a top player. It gave me so much confidence.”
While Young was getting through to the second round, top seed Andrew Murray was earning his place in the third. Murray, who was stricken with a bout of food poisoning in his opening match, beat French wildcard Jonathan Dasnieres de Veigy 6-3, 7-6, despite being a break down in the second set. He now plays Gianluca Naso of Italy, a surprise 6-2, 6-1 winner over 13th seeded Australian Carsten Ball.
Ball wasn’t the only seeded casualty in the boys’ draw on Tuesday. Last year’s Orange Bowl champion Timothy Neilly (USA), was knocked out in the first round by another local wildcard, Yannick Thivant. Neilly’s compatriot Matt Bruch, who came through qualifying, upset ninth seed Raony Carvalho.
In other girls’ results, eighth-seeded Hungarian Agnes Szavay made light work of Anna Tatishvili, beating the Georgian 6-3, 6-2 to set up a third round clash with American Alexa Glatch, seeded ten. Szavay says she is getting better with every match and said she was optimistic about her chances of picking up her first junior grand slam title in Paris.
“I want to win, that’s my only goal,” said the forthright 16-year-old. “I think everybody does. When you are younger and you aren’t seeded maybe you are thinking about getting through a couple of rounds but I have been playing junior grand slams for a few years and now I really want to win one.”
Fourteenth seed Raluca-ioana Olaru said she hasn’t set herself any goals at Roland Garros, though after beating Karin Knapp of Italy 6-3, 6-4 she had every reason to be confident about her chances of going much further through the draw.
“My goal is to do the best I can and enjoy myself and to get used to playing here on these courts and in grand slams,” said the Romanian, who plays Irena Pavlovic of France next.
Olaru trains at the Romanian national training centre in Bucharest and is part of the girls’ ITF Development Travelling Team, which she says has brought her game along in leaps and bounds. “It’s very good to be part it because has brought me lots of good experiences,” she said. “You have a bit more responsibility but that teaches you to be more professional. Having your team-mates around you is great because you compete with each other and push each other forward.”
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