Zootennis


Schedule a training visit to the prestigious Junior Tennis Champions Center in College Park, MD by clicking on the banner above

Friday, July 1, 2016

June Aces; Wimbledon Junior Championships Begin Saturday, with Four US Juniors Through Qualifying; Shapovalov, Potapova Win Roehampton Grade 1 Singles Titles; Blanch and Kirkov Earn Doubles Championship

My look back at June's top performances by junior and college players is available today at the Tennis Recruiting Network, with a total of 17 champions, several of them multiple times, posting impressive results.

Rain has made a mess of the first week of Wimbledon, resulting in the announcement of play on the middle Sunday for the first time since 2004.  Details of who will play on Sunday will not be released until Saturday, so we'll have to wait to see how that impacts junior scheduling.

Saturday's schedule does contain some junior matches, although none are earlier than third on, with other matches obviously having priority. Americans Kayla Day, Sam Riffice and Sonya Kenin are scheduled for courts, with JJ Wolf and Alexandra Sanford in the "to be determined" category.


Four US juniors received entry into the main draw via qualifying.  Chiara Lommer, the only US girl in qualifying, will be making her junior slam debut after defeating No. 10 seed Lea Boskovic of Croatia 7-6(3), 6-3.  Three of the seven US boys in the final round of qualifying advanced to the main draw.  William Blumberg defeated August Holmgren of Denmark 7-5, 6-1, Nathan Ponwith beat Anton Matusevich of Great Britain 6-1, 6-2 and Alafia Ayeni downed No. 13 seed Lukas Klein of Slovakia 4-6, 6-2, 6-3.  With the four qualifiers, the US has 20 juniors, 8 boys and 12 girls, in the main draw.

The draws, with qualifiers placed, can be found at Wimbledon.com

The seeds for the 2016 Wimbledon Junior Championships are below.

Boys:
1. Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE
2. Ulises Blanch USA
3. Felix Auger-Aliassime CAN
4. Mate Valkusz HUN
5. Denis Shapovalov CAN
6. Yosuke Watanuki JPN
7. Alex De Minaur AUS
8. Geoffrey Blancaneaux FRA
9. Genaro Olivieri ARG
10. Yunseong Chung KOR
11. Jurabek Karimov UZB
12. Miomir Kecmanovic SRB
13. Benjamin Sigouin CAN
14. Juri Rodionov AUT
15. Yibing WU CHN
16. John McNally USA

Girls:
1. Olesya Pervushina RUS
2. Rebeka Masarova SUI
3. Amanda Anisimova USA
4. Anastasia Potapova RUS
5. Kayla Day USA
6. Bianca Andreescu CAN
7. Dayana Yastremska UKR
8. Sonya Kenin USA
9. Usue Arconada USA
10. Olga Danilovic SRB
11. Yuki Naito JPN
12. Katie Swan GBR
13. Kaja Juvan SLO
14. Katarina Zavatska UKR
15. Elena Rybakina RUS
16. Mai Hontama JPN

The good news of the day is that the ITF Grade 1 at Roehampton was finished, something of a minor miracle considering all the rain this week. Canada's Denis Shapovalov won his first Grade 1 title, with the No. 4 seed defeating No. 5 seed Yosuke Watanuki of Japan 6-1, 6-4.  Russian doubles partners Anastasia Potapova and Olesya Pervushina squared off in the girls singles final, with Potapova, seeded fourth, taking out the top seeded Pervushina 6-4, 6-3. The title is the first at the Grade 1 level for the 15-year-old. 

Americans Ulises Blanch and Vasil Kirkov won the boys doubles title, beating Jurabek Karimov and Khymoyun Sultonov of Uzbekistan 4-6, 6-1, 10-8 in a final between two unseeded teams.  Top seeds Potapova and Pervushina were defeated in the girls doubles final, falling to No. 7 seeds Jodie Anna Burrage of Great Britain and Panna Udvardy of Hungary 2-6, 6-4, 15-13.

0 comments: