AEGON Classic: Central issues

“I didn’t sign up for this…”

I’m starting to feel quite sorry for the ground staff here at the Priory Club, those student types who shift the covers around at grass court tournaments. Normally it would sound like a pretty sweet gig: being paid to deal with eventualities that in a good year might never happen, and then tuck in the grass courts at night, ready for the next day’s play. They do other things too, I imagine, but most of the time the job apparently centres on looking as important and disinterested as possible at the same time: hence, presumably, why student types take the bait.

Not this year, though. When the line “Ground staff: to your courts please” rings ominously across the Tannoy – you could almost set your watch by it – the groans and knowing looks break out in the crowd, who for the umpteenth time up sticks and head for cover. That’s when these guys start working. Not only that, but there seems to be a sweepstake running between them all to see whose unconvincing water removal method gathers the biggest crowd.

On show today were the Four Towel Brigade, who lay down four towels (clue’s in the name) and march ever-so-slowly over them, until the formerly white cloths are an irrevocable shade of brown. Next door, the Dust’n’Sweep mob, an al fresco twist on that Shake’n’Vac stuff they used to advertise but I assume never caught on, otherwise Dysons would doubtless come with a cleverer pre-packaged version. Is sawdust absorbent? The answer, it would appear, is…got any better ideas? Where’s Juan Sheet when you need him – he’s got the important/disinterested look down pat.

Then there’s the ultimate in desperation: the Forkers. So-called because when the head groundsman finds out what the amateur landscape gardeners were doing to his pristine WTA-standard courts tomorrow morning…

Ultimately, the problem with all of this pesky precipitation is it means no tennis. No tennis means no tennis to write about, and no tennis to write about means writing about ground staff. Apologies for the rather irrelevant entry, which says more about the cabin fever induced by sitting in a windowless room waiting for weather reports than it does much else.

Born slippy

Saying that, there was some tennis today – a feast compared to Tuesday slim pickings, in fact. Eight whole matches reached their conclusions – and there were a couple of shocks and the odd marathon among them.

Two marathons, actually. Defending champ Magdalena Rybarikova, who was a set down to Regina Kulikova when the Russian retired, was put through the mill by Ekaterina Makarova before finally sealing a 7-5 4-6 7-6(5) victory, but even that paled into comparison with the ding-dong battle between doubles partners Jill Craybas and Sophie Ferguson.

The two-day affair looked to be nearing a conclusion when Craybas served for the match at 5-4 in the third. The American promptly slipped 0-40 down, and lost the game to 15. Advantage Ferguson? Certainly looked that way, especially when she brought up match point a 5-6, only to see that slide by.

Just to add to the drama, the match may have set some unwanted record for the number of replayed points, owing to a combination of call corrections and balls dropping over the low fences that run between the courts, particularly at the sharp end of the third. It all proved too much for Ferguson, who flipped out at a line judge who denied her a match point…then corrected himself. Point replayed. Craybas held, and took the tiebreak for the win and a ‘professional’ handshake in congratulation from Aussie Ferguson at the net. Probably just as well the doubles was cancelled for the day, giving the pair some space. Evenly matched, you’d have to say. Friends? Maybe not all the time…

The stage was supposedly set for Yaroslava Shvedova to follow up on her quarter-final showing at Roland Garros by romping through the early rounds here and announcing herself as the next big thing in world tennis. Unfortunately, the Russian-born Kazakhstani fell 6-4 6-4 to Bulgarian-born Kazakhstani Sesil Karatantcheva, who had come through qualifying and Katie O’Brien before beating the No.6 seed. That particular coronation will have to wait.

Three more seeds were scattered on day three. Vania King took a drubbing from Alla Kudryavtseva, who romped home 6-1 6-2. Anna Chakvetadze’s 6-4 6-4 win over Andrea Petkovic was notable for more than just the ousting of the No.8 seed, as touched on below, and then there was Elena…

Britwatch: one in, one out

Baltacha, that is. British No.1, AEGON Trophy champ in Nottingham at the weekend, and first round casualty in Edgbaston – though casualty might be the pressing word there. The No.12 seed had said yesterday that the crummy weather had given her an extra day to get over heatstroke – yes, the irony – ahead of her first round encounter with Kaia Kanepi. Unfortunately, two clean days’ break was not enough, as the Suffolk-based Brit languished while the Estonian qualifier thumped her 6-1.

Teary-eyed, Bally called it a day there and then, and on Wednesday evening revealed via twitter that food poisoning could be at the route of it all. At least, for the dripping masses, that sounds more plausible than heatstroke.

There was better news for Anne Keothavong fans, as the former world No.48 put in a gutsy shift out on Court 1, the wettest of the quartet of playable courts, to take down Pauline Parmentier 4-6 7-5 7-5. It was every bit as tight as the scoreline suggests, Keothavong not breaking until the twelfth game of the second set, having only been broken herself at that stage in the opening game of the match.

Back on level terms, she conspired to start the final set by slipping a break back once more, but skipped, slashed and screamed herself back into contention on a court that she admitted afterwards was hardly going to offer peace of mind to a player who has had two knee surgeries. It wasn’t always pretty, but Keothavong showed heart and the crowd lapped it up. Her reward: a showdown with top seed Na Li in the second round.

Centre of retention

EPC’s Centre Court must be situated over an Indian burial ground, or a burst water main. How else could they explain why a court situated around 10 metres higher than the remaining four courts – and 15 or so metres above the practice courts – has proven to be the most sodden of them all?

In all, those poor souls who bought tickets for the showcase showdowns (cabin fever makes you use an inordinate amount of alliteration) were treated to 4¾ games of Maria Sharapova’s first outing against Bethanie Mattek-Sands, five hours after the match should have started, and four or so hours after the action had kicked off elsewhere.

In truth, the American was probably glad to get off court, having lost all four games and tweaked a thigh muscle in the process, and MaSha didn’t look set to lose any sleep over the affair. Unlike the tournament organisers, you might imagine, after less than half an hour of play on the court in two days.

Random fact: In India, ‘Rezai’ translates as ‘heavy duvet’. What you do with this information is up to you, but remember: with great power comes great responsibility.

Good day for: Anna Chakvetadze. The former world No.5’s 6-4 6-4 win over Andrea Petkovic marked only the third time in the past twelve months that she has posted back-to-back main draw victories. It was a gutsy effort against a dangerous opponent, especially given how close the German came to ousting defending Roland Garros champion Svetlana Kuznetsova in Paris a couple of weeks ago. Next up for the Russian is either Aleksandra Wozniak or qualifier Alison Riske.

Bad day for: those with Centre Court tickets for Wednesday. The weather was bad enough for the organisers to offer some compensation – in the form of a 25% discount off another ticket over the remaining days of the event. Hardly digging deep into their pockets – especially for those who paid to see 22 minutes of ‘action’, eight of which involved Bethanie Mattek-Sands getting a rub-down and patch-up while MaSha gave the turf a fraught expression. So much for yesterday’s blog…