Getting To The Sharp End

British Open

The information on the British Open is sadly not first hand as I have been attacked by a very nasty bug which just won’t go away!

The quarter finals yesterday were full of questions though and the matches ‘electric’.

First up was Nick Wood against Jamie Stout.  Although Jamie won in three sets, it took him quite some time;  Was his win a surprise?  From what had happened in Jamie’s earlier matches the answer to this has to be “No”; Jamies is very fit and athletic, Nick had a long 5 set match the day day before and his powers of recovery are not what they used to be.  In the first set Nick was blown away but the next two sets went to 6/5.  At 11:00 on Saturday 21st Jamie has a rackets match against Will Hopton, let’s hope he is able to use his time on court as a ‘warm up’ for his match against Rob Fahey at 14:00.  How will this match go?  There are two scenarios Rob will win convincingly or it could just be the second ‘thriller in Manila’

The next match up was between Rob Fahey and Ben Matthews.  Rob won 6/0 6/2 6/4.  The champion was probably ‘disappointed’ as I am sure he would have liked it to have been shorter than this!  Ben’s improvement in the last year has been huge and he is certainly one of the “new generation” of elite players.

The penultimate quarter final was David Woodman against Camden Riviere.  Except for the very close set in the second Camden would appear to have had it his way.  The score was 6/1 5/6 6/1 6/3.

The final match was Steve Virgona against Bryn Sayers.  The question hanging over this match was not who was going to win but how close would Bryn go to the World No. 3?  It was a ‘funny’ score line really 1/6 6/0 6/5 6/1. The result though was the closet Bryn has had against one of the top 3 and if he had won that 3rd set.....?

So Saturday is set to be the most fantastic day of tennis.  Predictions?  Always difficult - and what a change that is from previous semi-finals of the British Open!  I think though it will be a Rob Fahey v Steve Virgona final as long as Steve’s semi does not go to 5 sets

The draw can be seen by clicking here