Wombledon 2014 Qualifying Thread

[The Special Juan]

I can't believe no one's put a thread up.

The biggest story from a British perspective so far is Oli Golding beating 8th seed Peter Gojowczyk in the first round to set up a match with Switzerland's favourite tennis player Marco Chiudinelli.  Other British players who got through their openers were Brydan Klein (NZ) and Aljaz Bedene (Svn).

Aside from the British interest, other stories are:

• Top seed Thomaz Bellucci was knocked out in his first match
  
• Number 2 seed Go Soeda was also defeated in his first match
  
• Last year's hero Steve Darcis (who has a WC into qualifying) won his opener
  

I didn't realise it was free entry to qualifying matches until today. Who knew??

[CaledonianCraig]

With this thread up it acts as a reminder for me to go and download this year's Wimbledon app.

[The Special Juan]

Oh well, if it achieves one thing....!

Wimbledon wildcards were also announced last week. There's a sizeable British contingent in the first round so I hope Andy draws one of them. It's been a while since the last all-British match.

[CaledonianCraig]

I see Ollie Golding got through a tough match but a plethora of British men lost like Ed Corrie, Alexander Ward and too many others to mention early doors.

[The Special Juan]

Alas, poor Oli could not beat Switzerland's finest. He's really dropped off the radar these days (Golding) - I know he's had injuries but I expected more from him.

[MrInvisible]

List of qualifiers so far...

Men: Jimmy Wang, Gilles Muller, Marsel Ilhan, James Duckworth, Jan Hernych, Konstantin Kravchuk, Ante Pavic, Yuichi Sugita, Alex Kuznetsov, Pierre-Hugues Herbert, Ryan Harrison, Denis Kudla.

Women: Alla Kudryavtseva, Tereza Smitkova, Aleksandra Wozniak, Michelle Larcher de Brito, Timea Bacsinszky, Lesia Tsurenko, Ana Konjuh, Andreea Mitu, Tamira Paszek.

[The Special Juan]

Yes!! Jimmy Wang is in.

Luke Saville was a junior champ a few years back. He looked good then when beating Broady, who has since disappeared into obscurity.

[laverfan]

Was the choice of the misspelt title intentional, TSJ? (or should I correct it ).

[The Special Juan]

It was intentional LF I heard someone say the Wimbles of Wombledon Common the other day and found it much funnier than it was.

[laverfan]

I can also think of Wobble and Done! WobblyDone!

[ListenUp]

I didn't realise it was free entry to qualifying matches until today.  Who knew??

I know I'm saying this too late for this year, but I really really really (yes, really) recommend going to the Wombledon qualies for anyone who can get there. There just aren't enough spectators, and the players really appreciate having people to support them. They also tend to wander around the site during the day - no crowds or security people like at Wimbledon proper - so it's usually quite easy to talk to them.

For those who don't know, the qualifying event is held at Roehampton (not the National tennis centre, but the Bank of England sports ground).

There's no fixed seating, you can stand if you can't find one of the plastic chairs dotted around, or sit on the bank by one of the "show courts" - they tend to draw a reasonable crowd, but all the other courts just have little alleys between them and the matches are sometimes only watched by one man and his dog.

Get down there next year if you can.  

[The Special Juan]

That's really good to hear, thanks. I was thinking about going down next year to one of the grass court events so I may well pop along.

[invisiblecoolers]

What does Wombledon mean?   

[The Special Juan]

Nothing, it's just based on the Wombles (they're a British thing from a few decades ago).

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