Singapore Futures #1

I have been in Singapore for a little over a week now. The 1^st Futures tournament just wrapped up for me on Wednesday. The conditions are very hot and humid here with temperatures in the high 80s and the humidity usually around 80%. The courts are outdoor hard and I would say the speed is medium-fast. The tennis center is nice as it has a good location in the middle of the city and they have 8 courts which makes it easy to find a court to practice. I am staying with another American guy here in Singapore in an AirBNB that is a few miles from the tennis center.

I played my first round Qualifying match this past Saturday against a local Singapore player. He was a consistent baseline player who could make a lot of balls but didn’t hit with much pace or direction. He also had a good return of serve. I broke him in the 3^rd game and then got a hold to go up 3-1 with an early break. I was returning well and making a lot of shots while mixing in aggressive plays coming to the net. I broke him again and held my serve to close out the first set 6-2. In the second set, I got broken in my first 3 service games, which was due to a combination of some loose service games and some good returning from him. So I found myself in a 2-4 hole in the 2^nd. I didn’t panic as I had been breaking him a good amount and I focused in and got the break to get it back on serve. I saved 2 break points on my serve to make it 4-4 before getting another break. I served out the match at love to take the match 6-2, 6-4. This wasn’t my best tennis, but it was great to get a win and get used to the courts and conditions.

In the final round of Qualifying I played against Jose Bendeck, who played #1 at Idaho a few years ago. He also happened to be my doubles partner this week. He has an all-court game with good groundstrokes while he likes to finish points at the net. I broke him to go up an early break 3-1 by hitting a few good returns and playing a game but he broke me right back. I need to do better at consolidating the break and holding the game after breaking. We had a few long Deuce games to make it 3-3. I saved 1 break point in the next game to stop his momentum and take a 4-3 lead. In the next game, I hit a 2^nd serve return winner to get the break and serve for the first set at 5-3. He competed well and saved the first 3 set points that I had with good shots. But I closed it out with a good serve to take the first set 6-3. In the second set, I continued to serve well and get free points on my serve. I broke him twice to jump out to a 4-0 lead. However, he held and broke me to cut my lead to 4-2. I played a good game to break him again and serve for the match. I held at love to close out a solid, 6-3, 6-2 to qualify for another Futures main draw!

The next day I played my 1^st round of doubles against a team from Australia of Evans/Nkomba. They are both younger and good singles players with solid groundstrokes. However, my partner and I started off strong by holding on a no-Ad point and then breaking them on a no-Ad point to take a 2-0 lead. We played some solid doubles by returning well and moving a lot at the net. We broke them again to take a 5-2 lead and we served out the first set 6-2. In the second set, we continued to play well and we got an early break. We broke them again to win a solid match 6-2, 6-1.

I played my first round of Singles Main Draw against the #4 seed, Moritani, who is from Japan. He has an aggressive attacking gamestyle with good groundstrokes, but also is crafty as he has a one-handed backhand and uses the slice effectively. I started off the match serving and I saved 3 break points in the 1^st game. There were no breaks until he played a good game to break me to go up 4-3 in the 1^st set. I had a chance as I was up 0-30 but he came back after hitting some quality shots. He broke me again to take the first set 6-3. However, I responded in the second set by breaking him in the 1^st game to get a strong start. There was a long game on my serve but I held for 2-0 and then I was starting to return better and broke him again. I was playing more aggressive and making more shots in the set and I jumped out to a 5-0 lead before he broke me. I played another good return game to take the 2^nd set 6-1. In the 3^rd set, I had a game point on my serve in the 1^st game and had an easy ball to putaway but missed it and he came back and broke me that game. In the next game I had a good look at a passing shot on break point but just missed it. So unfortuantely I found myself in a  0-2 hole even though I felt like I had the momentum. This loosened him up to play more freely as he broke me again to take a 4-1 lead in the 3^rd set. He continued to play at a high level in the 3^rd set and I lost a tough match 3-6, 6-1, 1-6. I thought I competed at a good level but needed to convert more of my opporutnites and also hold my serve better in the 1^st and 3^rd sets. My opponent eneded up making the final in singles this week.

In the quarterfinals of doubles we played against Vucic/Wong. Vucic is a very good doubles player with great hands at the net and hits hard and flat from the baseline. Wong is solid but most of the time sets up his partner. In the 1^st set, both teams were holding fairly easily until 3-3 in the 1^st set. They broke us on a no-Ad point with a return winner of a good 1^st serve from my partner. That was the only break of the 1^st set as they were serving well and served it out 6-4. There was a 30 minute lightning delay after the 1^st set. Once play resumed, they continued to return very well and broke me in the 1^st game. They jumped out to a 3-1 lead before we played a good game to break them. But we couldn’t sustain the momentum as they broke us again for a 4-2 lead. I thought they played at a high level and put a lot of first serves and returns in. We ended up losing the match 6-4, 6-2.

For this week I earned $240 for qualifying for the main draw and making the quarterfinals of doubles. I’m back at it for the 2^nd tournament in Singapore as I play in the qualifying starting on Saturday.



"It's all about the journey, not the outcome." -Carl Lewis