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Post Info TOPIC: Heather Watson


Futures level

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RE: Heather Watson


Decided to put this in Heather's forum but there were another couple of forums equally appropriate. Basically under the heading "Too easy to blame the LTA when you collapse on court " Oliver Brown  Chief  Sports writer of the Telegraph is  having a real go at the British players and Heather in particular. Meanwhile Scott Lloyd coming from the Lloyd family has the right credentials for his the job and after just 2 years deserves time to discover the right formula. All Mr Brown suggests is for tennis writers   to  be highly critical in great depth of all our current players perfomances. I assume Mr. Brown must be a friend of the Lloyds. He completely misses the point of Heather's that her and Jo have no immediate successors which is down to the LTA. He criticises Jo's  restrained reaction to losing but Francis Tiafoe's slumping in his chair and smashing his racket  is what she should be doing. The worst comments to read  are  Watson has been lavished with love by the LTA and delivered with precious little in return. The only reason anybody is talking about her this week is because of her carping not her tennis. It's like Brown and Lloyd are best mates.  When Jo and Heather retire at the present rate these writers aren't going to have anybody British to write about.  From what one has read about Llloyd's reaction to Heather, his tenure as LTA CEO is not going  to produce anywhere near champions. 



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Urgh, what an article.

I like Jo's restrained reactions (Kyle is kinda the same). Heather has done well in her career. She's got titles in both singles and doubles at ITF and WTA level, she's been in the top 50 before and top 100 fairly consistently (in the top 100 area).

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flamingowings wrote:

Urgh, what an article.

I like Jo's restrained reactions (Kyle is kinda the same). Heather has done well in her career. She's got titles in both singles and doubles at ITF and WTA level, she's been in the top 50 before and top 100 fairly consistently (in the top 100 area).


 I have reread this article and it reads like a personal attack on Heather. I feel as article it is awful and should never have been published. Scott Lloyd must be a friend of the writer Oliver Brown who is not the Telegraph tennis  correspondent. The day before Mike Dickson in the Mail reported Scott Lloyd saying he didn't recognise  much of Heather's interview. Well it was in plain English and honest wasn't it. 



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ROSAMUND wrote:
flamingowings wrote:

Urgh, what an article.

I like Jo's restrained reactions (Kyle is kinda the same). Heather has done well in her career. She's got titles in both singles and doubles at ITF and WTA level, she's been in the top 50 before and top 100 fairly consistently (in the top 100 area).


 I have reread this article and it reads like a personal attack on Heather. I feel as article it is awful and should never have been published. Scott Lloyd must be a friend of the writer Oliver Brown who is not the Telegraph tennis  correspondent. The day before Mike Dickson in the Mail reported Scott Lloyd saying he didn't recognise  much of Heather's interview. Well it was in plain English and honest wasn't it. 


 I'm probably going against the grain but I though Heathers attack on the LTA was as much an indictment of her. The timing IMO was more about taking the focus away from her poor performances in the slams rather than anything else, meanwhile we have 3 juniors in the last 16 and 2 if those already have shown they can mix it with the Seniors.



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JonH comes home wrote:

I commented in another thread that Dan is 11th (really 10th with Fed out for the season) in the Mens Race, with Joe and Jonny both top 8 pairings in doubles. All stand a chance of reaching the Tour Finals, if they happen.

Well, Heather isnt too far off herself, she is 17th (something I had forgotten) and could reach the WTA Tour Finals or, more plausibly, the Elite Trophy Finals, both of which are planned to take place in the revised calendar.

live-tennis.eu/en/wta-race

It could very well require just two or three really strong weeks, and given the big events coming up there are lots of points on offer in a short period of time. Heather's biggest issue maybe making the draw of some of the Premier events (as she is 50th in the rankings) but she should have a shot of playing most events that she attempts to play. The US swing and later Asian/Chinese swing will be where she will focus her efforts no doubt, time to come out of the blocks quickly I would say


Jon

You commented this in June and obviously there's no WTA Tour Finals or Elite Trophy finals now. There is however a WTA  ranking list just for 2020 and Jo is still the top ranked British  female  player. Jo has 658 points after the French and Heather 515. That gives Jo a ranking of 32 and Heather 51.  Heather's year fizzled out after her Acapulco win. Jo had 8 wins and Heather  had 9 wins in main draw tournaments in 2020. Jo's points for a semi final in Cincinnati count for alot. In 2020 Jo reached the semi final of 2 tournaments on outdoor hardcourts i.e Monterrey and Cincinnati. But since her win in Miami in April 2017 and the end of 2019, the only other outdoor hard court tournament where she won more than 2 matches was the 2019 US Open. So she actually managed it twice in 2020. 



-- Edited by ROSAMUND on Sunday 11th of October 2020 03:39:03 PM



-- Edited by ROSAMUND on Friday 16th of October 2020 07:39:57 PM

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emmsie69 wrote:
ROSAMUND wrote:
flamingowings wrote:

Urgh, what an article.

I like Jo's restrained reactions (Kyle is kinda the same). Heather has done well in her career. She's got titles in both singles and doubles at ITF and WTA level, she's been in the top 50 before and top 100 fairly consistently (in the top 100 area).


 I have reread this article and it reads like a personal attack on Heather. I feel as article it is awful and should never have been published. Scott Lloyd must be a friend of the writer Oliver Brown who is not the Telegraph tennis  correspondent. The day before Mike Dickson in the Mail reported Scott Lloyd saying he didn't recognise  much of Heather's interview. Well it was in plain English and honest wasn't it. 


 I'm probably going against the grain but I though Heathers attack on the LTA was as much an indictment of her. The timing IMO was more about taking the focus away from her poor performances in the slams rather than anything else, meanwhile we have 3 juniors in the last 16 and 2 if those already have shown they can mix it with the Seniors.


I havent read the article but and it maybe too early, there is only really one person who is qualified to run Elite British performance tennis & that is Andy. Unlike Scott he has complete insight into what is required to develop and support elite athletes. The Lloyds have been very successful in tennis but I would argue are well qualified to run the recreational aspect as opposed to elite performance.  He  an appreciation of the level of commitment Kyle had for his craft even as a junior and knew exactly what he needed to do to make the step up to elite senior and helped facilitate it, similarly he has always been very supportive of Heather. 



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Heather's match win over Elise Mertens in Hobart was the longest match of the WTA Tour in 2020

www.wtatennis.com/photos/1602731/marathon-marvels-2020-krejcikova-s-cracker-in-linz-makes-the-list



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Heather's match win over Elise Mertens in Hobart was the longest match of the WTA Tour in 2020

www.wtatennis.com/photos/1602731/marathon-marvels-2020-krejcikova-s-cracker-in-linz-makes-the-list

Jo Konta was 23rd longest at the US Open

Harriet Dart was 25th longest, versus Doi at the Aussie Open



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New Battle of Britain event to be held between 20th and 23rd December at Roehampton. Heather is the leading female entry. 



-- Edited by ROSAMUND on Wednesday 16th of December 2020 03:29:50 PM

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Heather's name is headlined  in a couple of articles about Hawk-Eye  in todays papers 14th February. Heather is in favour of Wimbledon switching  to the  digital line-calling system Hawk-Eye Live instead of line judges. It was however  pointed out by Simon Briggs that the  automated system  might interrupt the evolution of officials. James Keothavong's experience as a line judge at Wimbledon in 1999  when he was 16,made him consider umpiring as a career.



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I first started listening to music on cassette, then CDs came out. It didnt stop me buying them or then downloading music. Ive often thought it odd that tennis has so many officials when technology is there.

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Coming out? I don't remember 'coming out'.....

But I agree - no reason to keep in obsolete stuff just because it has some educational benefit - better to work on how to provide that educational benefit via a different route

I love the automatic linecalls

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Coup Droit wrote:

I love the automatic linecalls


 Agreed, but they need to fix the system for those that are a foot out, and missed by the umpire. (Ref: Ms Jones last week)



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Coup Droit wrote:

Coming out? I don't remember 'coming out'.....

But I agree - no reason to keep in obsolete stuff just because it has some educational benefit - better to work on how to provide that educational benefit via a different route

I love the automatic linecalls


 Its took me a while but I finally left got what you meant there CD. smile



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Has Heather had the type of career you expected when she surged into the top 100 in 2011 ?

Career high 38

Highest year end ranking 49

So far 8 years finished inside top 100 (2021 will be her 9th)

Since breaking into the top 100, her worst year end finish is 119th

4 titles (Acapulco, Monterrey, Hobart, Osaka) 1 final (Tianjin)

Grand Slams R32 (Aus, Wim x 3)

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Her consistency seems incredible to me. But other players of similar ability, perhaps even less, have managed to achieve superior career highs and year end rankings, even if just for one or two seasons, and made a Grand Slam QF at some stage.

Not sure I gave that much thought to Heather back in 2011 as I was far more excited by Laura's tennis. I can recall the time when she decided her brick wall approach had got her as far as it could.

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