Golf, Doha, Danielle Collins discussed on The Tennis Podcast
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Like to attempt to be a cool crew as well. Then become a friend and check out the discount code. You've got one more week to take advantage of that offer. And David has booked his golf clubs onto the plane. That's our big Indian world's new week. I've never done it before. I've never gone anywhere with golf clubs before, so I did have to look up how you do it. And I think I've made it work. So yeah, let's see if they actually turn up at the appointed time. I've been looking at, I actually met I asked Catherine to see if she could help me find some golf courses. And she did a four second check and discovered we were surrounded by 6 golf courses. So I think we're all right. Yeah, there's more golf course than there is anything else in Indian Wells. I mean, you can't move for golf course courses. So I think that you'll be fine. Now in terms of tennis happening, literally right now, actually, I've just put the stream of Elena batkin against Bianca andreescu onto my TV, which quite ludicrously is a first round match in Dubai. Absolutely ridiculous, but brilliant Rebecca is taking the opening set 6 three. Let's talk about what happened last week though, starting in Doha, the WTA 500 event there, one by eager on tech for the second consecutive year for the loss of just wait for it, folks. This is, this is an accurate stats. I know you're going to hear me say it and you're going to think, that can't be right. She lost 5 games all tournament, and she played really good opposition. A buy in the first round. Okay, that's not great opposition. Let's do away with buys. Second round, 6 love 6 one, over Danielle Collins. Who beat her in the Australian open semifinals last year, quarterfinal, okay, a walk over against Belinda bencic, I had reported on the podcast last week that blender bencic wasn't playing Doha, having won the week before, probably shouldn't have played Doha. Anyway. Semifinal 6 love 6 one against Veronica coupe. I'll say that again 6 love 6 one against the very good tennis flavor on a cocoon with over. And the final 6 three 6 love against Jessica pegula, who did go on to win the doubles title alongside coco golf, which means that the singles and doubles champions in 2023 are exactly the same as in 2022 and I think this is quite a significant win for eager fun tech because Doha was where the streak started last year. This is where she is starting to defend her position as the dominant player in the world. This kind of marks the year anniversary of her becoming that. We didn't characterize it as that exactly at the time because, you know, we didn't have the benefit of hindsight, but we know now that this week last year was the start of something huge for Yugoslavia and for tennis and I'm not saying that she's going to go on the same streak again and defend all those titles. Look, she might. But I think starting off that defense in this way, given what she told us about her state of mind in Australia. I think is really big for her. I do too. And actually it does remind me that she was pretty serene and phlegmatic about things in that press comments after the defeat she had it in Australia. She didn't seem to think it was going to be a massive problem going forwards. But at the same time, it was a problem in the moment. It was a problem at this tournament, but she was able to sort of sort it out in the next one that she played is what she expected to be able to do. I mean, and boy did she. I mean, this was extraordinary. This level of form and it was just a reminder that when she plays well, when she's at the top of her game, she is the best. And I mean, I guess arena sabal and may have an argument to say, well, hold on, what about what about me? I played my best and when the Australian open, but nobody beats people for the loss of one game, repeatedly, when their top players, that isn't a fluke, what she has just pulled off. She, yes, she had a buy. Yes, she had a walkover due to an injury, but she's beaten three world class players and just kind of humiliated them, and it was simultaneously a bit awkward, but also if you're a fan of just majestic, brilliance. It was a joyful experience as well. I bet Daniel Collins was relieved to see the school line ashante against Veronica could have met over and similarly against Jessica bula in the final because at the time, when, you know, that was shown to first match the tournament, wasn't it having had the buy in the first round, you thought it looked I mean, obviously brilliant for schwarze. But yeah, embarrassing for Danielle Collins, but it turns out she was just, you know, that was just par for Sean tech last week. Whereas blender bang tricks knew she just took one look at her kind of thought. I am out of here. I'm not having any of this. And to be fair, I was actually looking forward to that match because I'd watched, I'd watch bang shit come back from a set and a break down against Azarenka, and it was one of those really Gritty wins that we talked about her having a lot, the previous week, and I thought, right, I want to see this bang chick against that film tech that we saw in her first match. And I think that would have been interesting, but yeah, we obviously didn't get to see it. Absolutely agree with everything you said about tech and the importance of this win coming back from Australia. I had a look at some historical context for her run this week and it only losing 5 games. And I thought, is that a record? And I was sort of set out to try and find out whether it was. And without access to a proper database that the WTA have or the ITF have, it's really hard to find to find that out. You literally have to go through drawers. And I was thinking, right, I'm going to I'm going to start with players like Monica seles, and Steffi Graf and Chris Everett, because they're used to literally just trans people all the time. Anyway, while I was doing all that, WTA notes popped up in my email and they had it there and there for me. They had done the work to confirm that this was the fewest games ever lost en route to a WTA title.