Back in the Saddle - USA Futures #7

Third round of the Futures at Irvine and Greg was facing up against a hot young USA prospect, 16 year-old Taylor Fritz, who has had a break-out season in the ITF Juniors this year, reaching the semis at Junior Wimbledon and QF round at the US Open, to be ranked 21 in the Juniors at the age of 16. Fritz comes with a tennis with his Dad an former pro-circuit professional and his Mom a former top ten WTA player. Still in the early days of his pro-career, Fritz has not had that kind of Junior success at Pro-circuit level yet but is one of the higher ranked of his age, currently ranked at 1227. Fritz beat two competent players, including the No. 3 seed,  in getting to the QF round so it will be an interesting match for Greg.

Taylor Fritz at Wimbledon

Playing on the centre court this time, with a newer rougher surface which is slower than the outer court surfaces Greg took awhile to adjust to the speed of the court and found himself a break down early in the first set. He adjusted accordingly and managed to quickly get the break back to get to 2-3 on serve. Games then went on serve to the tie-break. Greg got the all important break mid-way through the tie-break and then went on to break Fritz again, to win the tie-break 7-3 and pouch the first set 7-6.
The second set saw Greg, with the advantage of serving first, go an early break up A sloppy service game saw Fritz break back to let him back into the set. Greg tightened up his game and they again went to the tie-break at 6-6. Greg was growing in confidence and in the tie-break was all over Fritz, dominating the points and running away with the tie-break to win it 7-1, and a hard fought match 7-6(3), 7-6(1).
Greg said he was pleased with his performance against a young USA player who had all the crowd support. He felt lot more relaxed out on the court, which he contributes to being out on court, in both singles and doubles a lot more, and of course being successful. With winning comes confidence.
In the doubles yesterday Greg and partner Greg Ouellette won a close match against the No. 2 seeds, Deighton Baughman and Joseph Digiulio. They held their nerve in the second set tie-break in which they got an early two break point advantage but saw that whittled away for the score to be back on serve, before winning the last two points for a  6-4 7-6(5) win. They play the doubles final today up against Greg's good mate and part-time Los Angeles host Carsten Ball and his tennis pupil Junior Ore.