US Open 2019

[Rajiv]

At the USO qualies , in the opening round Ram up against 146 ranked Italian  Fillipo Baldi , while Sumit face the Japenese veteran  132 ranked Tatsuma Ito.

While in the ladies section Ankita is up against 111 ranked Belgian Ysaline Bonaventure.

[PKBasu]

Here are their full brackets:

7-G. Andreozzi (ITA) vs Tobias Kamke (GER)
Ramkumar Ramanathan (IND, 180) vs. F. Baldi (ITA, 146)
N. Kuhn (ESP) vs. Sergey Stakhovsky (UKR)
17-Yannick Maden (GER, 120) vs. Lukas Lacko (SVK, 215)


13-N. Gombos (SVK) vs. M. Janvier (FRA)
J. Menezes (BRA) vs. F. Horansky (SVK)
P. Polansky (CAN) vs. R. Dutra Silva (BRA)
13-Tatsuma Ito (JPN, 132) vs. Sumit Nagal (IND, 192)


9-Ysaline Bonaventure (BEL, 111) vs. Ankita Raina (IND, 197)
R. Brantmeier (USA) vs. D. Allertova (RUS)
H. Hobgarski (GER) vs. C. Bucsa (ESP)
H. Tan (FRA) vs. 25-Priscilla Hon (AUS)

[sameerph]

Tough draw for all 3 of our players against higher ranked players. RamK's form has been awful of late and Sumit is playing his first hard court tournament in a while. I wish he had played at least 1 challenger on hard courts before playing here. But, I guess the injury did not help.

2 more Indian origin player playing at USO qualies this year. 18 year old American Govind Nanda has got a wild card and is playing German Oscar Otte. Brirish Naithia Bains is also playing qualifying in womens,

[Daniel]

Raina served for the match at 6-1 1-6 5-1, but just got broken.

But she breaks back easily to record her first ever win at the US Open qualifying draw!

[Daniel]

RamK's match should start soon

[arjun2761]

Nice win by Ankita! Hope she can qualify into the main draw!

[meyyis]

RamK has lost the first set 5-7 against Baldi. After breaking the Italian in the second game of the first set to go 2-0 up, Ramk surrendered the break back in the fifth game. After being level at 5-5, Baldi broke Ramk to lead 6-5 and went on to won the first set 7-5.

It is level at 1-1 in the second set now. Ramk to continue serving in the third game.

[PKBasu]

Fabulous win for Ankita Raina, who knocked out the highest seed in her section of the draw, the world #111.

[PKBasu]

Sadly, Ramkumar lost 57 67

[gbelday]

RamK’s game has regressed. He didn’t hit one good ground stroke on his backhand throughout the match. His biggest problem is his shot selection. It was so disappointing to watch him play today. He started well but took his foot off the pedal and got into his chip/slice/drop game mode. His opponent wasn’t great but has a better game than RamK and deserved to win. A couple of times, RamK was talking to his opponents coach on the sideline and once asked him if he actually could see the line from where he was sitting. It was a questionable call but he let it get to his head.
ITD posted some videos of anyone is interested in watching them.

I caught Ankita’s match in the third set. She was anxious and kept looking up to her box after every miss. She lost a very poor service game but did manage to grind it out. She needs some weapons and an aggressive game style. She is a grinder and her game currently won’t take her to the top 100, I feel.

Also caught the first set of Govind Nanda’s match and he has a pretty good game. He’s fast, plays aggressive style of tennis but needs some weapons (a better serve for sure) to do well on the pro tour. He’s also just 5’9”. Spoke to his parents and they are real nice and humble folks.

[punarayan]

Gautam, Thanks for the set of eyes. RamK needs to hit the reset button, take some time off, and shore up his ground strokes. I have never been able to discern some strength to base a victory on. The serve can be strong, but not reliable. The chipping and charging seems to be the residue of a lack of options. He has physical abilities, but they are not put to consistent use. The first serve percentage is less than 60% and the second serve won percentage is less than 50%. This is not a winning formula. I want very much for him to rise higher, but just trying is not the answer. I hate being negative, but I could not help myself today.

[gbelday]

Gautam, Thanks for the set of eyes. RamK needs to hit the reset button, take some time off, and shore up his ground strokes. I have never been able to discern some strength to base a victory on. The serve can be strong, but not reliable. The chipping and charging seems to be the residue of a lack of options. He has physical abilities, but they are not put to consistent use. The first serve percentage is less than 60% and the second serve won percentage is less than 50%. This is not a winning formula. I want very much for him to rise higher, but just trying is not the answer. I hate being negative, but I could not help myself today.

Spot on, Narayan. Were you there today? Hoping to see you next week. There was good group cheering for Ram today. A bunch of players from the eastern region (NY, NJ and CT). One of the players is of Indian background (plays in my sons age group) and the rest of his friends (all non-Indians). They were pretty vocal in their support but obviously it didn’t help Ram.

[knarayen]

I’m hoping the Pakistan DC tie will energise him much like the China DC win energised Prajnesh’s run earlier. Maybe a bit of a stretch - grasping at straws here - anything to get him out of this slump.

Prof

[Rajiv]

Gautam thanks for the lucid onsite reports , Mr Narayan the net rushing is the alteration made by Emilio to Ram the baseliner when he was rising up the rankings , and not sure if that has really helped him. Not only was his opponent an average player (he let Ram come back after being 5 nil up in the TB and Ram couldn’t capitalise and even had set point) but the all important key factor was that the Italian just parachuted on hard courts from over 2-3 months of clay court play ,but quickly made the transition to a faster surface , where as Ram has been playing non stop on fast surfaces for past 3 months and even practiced with Djokovic coming into this match, but his bad form keeps continuing like an uncontrollable oil slick,as even a 3 love lead in the opening set was wasted. Very worrying to read Ram getting into an argument with his opponents coach which is unlike Ram.

Ankita brought a much needed silver lining over a fancied opponent and looking forward to her making the MD, and hope Sumit turns the tide against Ito, who has a penchant of getting every thing back , Sumit should try to finish the match quickly , the longer it gets will only work in the Japanese’s favour.

[PKBasu]

[Q1] 9-Ysaline Bonaventure (BEL, 111) l. Ankita Raina (IND, 197) 16 61 26

So, next up is (on paper) a much easier match:

[Q2] Ankita Raina (IND, 197) vs. Denisa Allertova (CZE, 279)