Para tennis 2024 thread

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Para tennis 2024 thread

Jan · Hall of fame

Lily Mills

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Jan wrote:
I had no idea about this. There's an article about her on the BBC tennis website too.

here it is

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/disability-sport/67911043

This is what they ran with on the news last night, going to follow her progress with interest.

Her game looks good, nice strokes, no idea how she rates in her category against her opponents, but it appears to be an 8 player draw, presumably with a similar mens event as well.

Not sure if we have any men players - the LTA doesnt seem to have a section for Learning Disability events, so presumably not under their watch?

-- Edited by JonH comes home on Tuesday 9th of January 2024 09:24:55 AM

AnnaM · Junior player

There are performance disability programs run by the LTA, link below
www.lta.org.uk/compete/inclusion-disability/gb-teams/

GB currently has the 2nd, 3rd and 5th-ranked male players, who play at a good standard. My daughter Anna McBride also plays at a decent level and has been the world number one in singles and mixed doubles since Paris 2018, when she was 14. She has defended her World/Global titles ever since, in Brisbane and again in Vichy last June. Due to the lack of other strong female players, she has been unable to do the same in women's doubles.

The results from the Global Games in Vichy can be found on the last 11 pages, starting at 365 here
c3k8ff.n3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Results-GG2023.pdf

Anna is also the defending champion from last year's AO PWWII championships
www.lta.org.uk/fan-zone/australian-open/news/anna-mcbride-among-british-stars-to-make-their-mark-at-the-australian-opens-first-ever-all-abilities-tournaments/

The AO tournament website for this year can be found here
tournaments.tennis.com.au/sport/events.aspx

The Special Olympics are more about inclusion and the players are divisioned into a number of similar-level groups, with medals for each division.

There will be an LTA article about the event sometime this week and they always do another one with the results afterwards.

Jan · Hall of fame

Thanks Anna - and welcome!!!

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

AnnaM wrote:
There are performance disability programs run by the LTA, link below
www.lta.org.uk/compete/inclusion-disability/gb-teams/

GB currently has the 2nd, 3rd and 5th-ranked male players, who play at a good standard. My daughter Anna McBride also plays at a decent level and has been the world number one in singles and mixed doubles since Paris 2018, when she was 14. She has defended her World/Global titles ever since, in Brisbane and again in Vichy last June. Due to the lack of other strong female players, she has been unable to do the same in women's doubles.

The results from the Global Games in Vichy can be found on the last 11 pages, starting at 365 here
c3k8ff.n3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Results-GG2023.pdf

Anna is also the defending champion from last year's AO PWWII championships
www.lta.org.uk/fan-zone/australian-open/news/anna-mcbride-among-british-stars-to-make-their-mark-at-the-australian-opens-first-ever-all-abilities-tournaments/

The AO tournament website for this year can be found here
tournaments.tennis.com.au/sport/events.aspx

The Special Olympics are more about inclusion and the players are divisioned into a number of similar-level groups, with medals for each division.

There will be an LTA article about the event sometime this week and they always do another one with the results afterwards.

Thanks Anna, thats a good read. I havent seem the AO draws this year, is your daughter also playing and what range of categories does the AO include?

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

JonH comes home wrote:
AnnaM wrote:
There are performance disability programs run by the LTA, link below
www.lta.org.uk/compete/inclusion-disability/gb-teams/

GB currently has the 2nd, 3rd and 5th-ranked male players, who play at a good standard. My daughter Anna McBride also plays at a decent level and has been the world number one in singles and mixed doubles since Paris 2018, when she was 14. She has defended her World/Global titles ever since, in Brisbane and again in Vichy last June. Due to the lack of other strong female players, she has been unable to do the same in women's doubles.

The results from the Global Games in Vichy can be found on the last 11 pages, starting at 365 here
c3k8ff.n3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Results-GG2023.pdf

Anna is also the defending champion from last year's AO PWWII championships
www.lta.org.uk/fan-zone/australian-open/news/anna-mcbride-among-british-stars-to-make-their-mark-at-the-australian-opens-first-ever-all-abilities-tournaments/

The AO tournament website for this year can be found here
tournaments.tennis.com.au/sport/events.aspx

The Special Olympics are more about inclusion and the players are divisioned into a number of similar-level groups, with medals for each division.

There will be an LTA article about the event sometime this week and they always do another one with the results afterwards.
Thanks Anna, thats a good read. I havent seem the AO draws this year, is your daughter also playing and what range of categories does the AO include?

Sorry, I see Anna is top seed and also paired with Lily in doubles! Good luck to both of them and hope they do well!

AnnaM · Junior player

Thanks.

Apart from the PWII, there is the deaf DHoH section.
tournaments.tennis.com.au/sport/events.aspx

Last year we had Phoebe Suthers in the women's and Esah Hayat in the men's. This year it is just Esah. He is also a very strong player.

Anna has developed a wrist issue and is due to play 8 matches over three days. The singles are the most important as she is the first seed, there is prizemoney and world ranking points to get. We will have to see if she is fit enough to do the doubles. She was due to play for her Uni tomorrow but has had to pull out. So she has 10 days to get better.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Good luck to her getting fit!

I see the top seeded man in the DHOH section is Duk Hee Lee - is that the same guy who was on the ATP tour en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Duck-hee ?

If so, good standard for sure!

AnnaM · Junior player

It looks like it is. A 13.38 UTR player. The rest of the field contains a lot of 11 plus UTR and a few 10 UTR players.

The top male PWII player is at 9.54 UTR.

Anna was an 8.30 to 8.55 UTR for about four years until covid lockdowns and long covid affected her health and training. Her level is now starting to come back up now she is getting University practice.

So the standard, especially in the deaf is very high. The deaf event should be live-streamed for sure.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

JonH comes home wrote:
JonH comes home wrote:
AnnaM wrote:
There are performance disability programs run by the LTA, link below
www.lta.org.uk/compete/inclusion-disability/gb-teams/

GB currently has the 2nd, 3rd and 5th-ranked male players, who play at a good standard. My daughter Anna McBride also plays at a decent level and has been the world number one in singles and mixed doubles since Paris 2018, when she was 14. She has defended her World/Global titles ever since, in Brisbane and again in Vichy last June. Due to the lack of other strong female players, she has been unable to do the same in women's doubles.

The results from the Global Games in Vichy can be found on the last 11 pages, starting at 365 here
c3k8ff.n3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Results-GG2023.pdf

Anna is also the defending champion from last year's AO PWWII championships
www.lta.org.uk/fan-zone/australian-open/news/anna-mcbride-among-british-stars-to-make-their-mark-at-the-australian-opens-first-ever-all-abilities-tournaments/

The AO tournament website for this year can be found here
tournaments.tennis.com.au/sport/events.aspx

The Special Olympics are more about inclusion and the players are divisioned into a number of similar-level groups, with medals for each division.

There will be an LTA article about the event sometime this week and they always do another one with the results afterwards.
Thanks Anna, thats a good read. I havent seem the AO draws this year, is your daughter also playing and what range of categories does the AO include?
Sorry, I see Anna is top seed and also paired with Lily in doubles! Good luck to both of them and hope they do well!

The pairings seem to have changed since the original list and Anna and Lily are no longer paired together but now with other partners.

in the mens DHOH category, Lee is also no longer entered.

AnnaM · Junior player

The pairings seem to have changed since the original list and Anna and Lily are no longer paired together but now with other partners.

in the mens DHOH category, Lee is also no longer entered.

Yes, I noticed Lee is no longer there. I have no information about that. I will ask when I get there next week.

The singles are the flagship event. The doubles are a bit of an add-on and are out of our control. So the pairs are chosen by ranking. So the 1st seed plays with the 8th player. The 2nd plays with the 7th player. The 3rd seed plays with the 6th player and so on. The idea is to try to make the event fair, but it is probably more helpful to the middle players, as there is a massive difference in level between the top two and the bottom two in the female section. So not the best system for the top players, as it prevents the best players from pairing up.

So two things have happened.

First, the governing body messed up the world rankings and correcting this changed many doubles pairings.

Second, Lily was incorrectly placed as the 8th player when the lists were produced. The German girl does not have a world ranking and it looks like they have corrected this mistake and reversed them in the listing. So Anna is now correctly playing with the German girl Sophia. Hopefully, Anna's wrist is ok for this. Lily is now playing with the Belgium world number 2 Hanne.

Hopefully, that explains it.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

AnnaM wrote:
The pairings seem to have changed since the original list and Anna and Lily are no longer paired together but now with other partners.

in the mens DHOH category, Lee is also no longer entered.
Yes, I noticed Lee is no longer there. I have no information about that. I will ask when I get there next week.
The singles are the flagship event. The doubles are a bit of an add-on and are out of our control. So the pairs are chosen by ranking. So the 1st seed plays with the 8th player. The 2nd plays with the 7th player. The 3rd seed plays with the 6th player and so on. The idea is to try to make the event fair, but it is probably more helpful to the middle players, as there is a massive difference in level between the top two and the bottom two in the female section. So not the best system for the top players, as it prevents the best players from pairing up.
So two things have happened.
First, the governing body messed up the world rankings and correcting this changed many doubles pairings.
Second, Lily was incorrectly placed as the 8th player when the lists were produced. The German girl does not have a world ranking and it looks like they have corrected this mistake and reversed them in the listing. So Anna is now correctly playing with the German girl Sophia. Hopefully, Anna's wrist is ok for this. Lily is now playing with the Belgium world number 2 Hanne.

Hopefully, that explains it.

all clear! Hope yours and Anna's trip goes well and the event itself!

It is always great to hear from someone involved and on the ground, so please post us updates around how Anna and Lily do and in general about the event and AO

Good luck!!

Tanaqui · Club Coach

Anna, thanks for educating us all about this side of tennis and for sharing your "insider insights". I've been reading along with interest.

Best wishes to Anna and Lily for a successful event.

AnnaM · Junior player

all clear! Hope yours and Anna's trip goes well and the event itself!
It is always great to hear from someone involved and on the ground, so please post us updates around how Anna and Lily do and in general about the event and AO

Good luck!!

Thanks and will do!