 Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |  Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |  Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |  Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |  Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |  Photographer: Corinne Dubreuil
Date: 24 Jan 2008 |
|
| 24 Jan 2008 - Melbourne Park - Eleanor Preston |  Related Audio |
| Rafter hails atomic Tomic - Day 5 Australian Open |
 An interview with Dan Evans (MP3 format)
An interview with Bojana Jovanovski (MP3 format)
 
If you cannot play the audio on your computer, then you can update your media player by following one of the links above.
Fifteen-year-old Australian Bernard Tomic must be used to hearing himself being talked up, especially when he is beating all comers at his home junior grand slam. Tomic moved through to the junior Australian Open semifinals on Thursday, courtesy of a 64 63 win over the tournament’s top seed, Mexican’s Cesar Ramirez, and was praised afterwards by none other than two-time US Open champion Patrick Rafter.
Rafter is being inducted into the Australian Tennis Hall of Fame on Sunday and has been taking a keen interest in his fellow Queenslander Tomic. He is impressed with the 15-year-old, who would become the youngest junior grand slam champion ever if he wins the title on Saturday. Tomic, who takes on Yuki Bhambri of India in the semifinals, won last week’s ITF Grade 1 event in Nottinghill and is nominal favourite to win at Melbourne Park.
“He's obviously got a lot of good results. He's setting all sorts of records at the moment, and he has potential here to be I think the youngest to win. And being two matches away from that, obviously every match gets tougher and tougher,” said Rafter. “He's got a lot of potential. He had a few things he had to sort of work on to get stronger and bigger, but he's still pretty young. But now he's coming to the time where he starts to get some really good grounding, and one of those things was his serve. But he had potential there to push up and get a bit stronger with it. I thought he had a really great backhand, just a world class backhand, and his forehand was potentially lethal. There are a few things he could tidy up on. That's a really encouraging sign.”
Tomic certainly looked like a champion in waiting during his 63 64 win over Ramirez and will be a sizeable obstacle for Bhambri, who knocked out British junior world No.9 Daniel Evans with a 76 46 63 win in their quarterfinal. “I came out firing, felt like I was on top of the game," Tomic said. "From the first point played I was always playing my best tennis when I needed it. I knew he was a good player, number one seed for this tournament, I'd seen him play a lot. He's a great player and I had to play my best tennis to beat him. This was definitely one of my best wins. He's up there.”
In the other boys’ semifinal, Tsung-Hua Yang of Chinese Taipei will take on Ryan Harrison of the USA. Yang was a 75 61 winner over Poland’s Jerzy Janowicz, who was runner-up at last year’s junior US Open. Harrison was too strong for Di-Yu Wu, beating the Chinese teenager 36 63 60 in a protracted battle out on Melbourne Park’s Show Court Two.
Ramirez can console himself with the fact that he was not the only top seed to lose on Thursday. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the No.1 seed and two time defending champion, was sensationally sent tumbling by Simone Halep of Romania. Halep beat the 2006 ITF Junior World Champion 62 63 and will face Australian Jessica Moore in the last four, who was a 64 60 winner over Croatia’s Jasmina Tinjic. The Netherlands’ Arantxa Rus will play China’s Yi-Miao Zhou in the other girls’ semifinal after Rus beat Bojana Jovanovski 61 63 and Zhou beat Karen Barbat 60 63.
Related Articles
> Pavlyuchenkova takes home advantage - Day 4 Australian Open
> Easton Promise - Day 3 Australian Open
> More wins for Moore - Day 2 Australian Open
> Keeping up with the Joneses - Day 1 Australian Open
> Pavlyuchenkova favourite to retain Australia title
^ Back to Top
|
