I remember the 2014 French Open like it was yesterday. I remember following the live score of the Final between Maria Sharapova and Simona Halep, in awe with both of their abilities to hang in a match and fight. However, another huge reason why the 2014 French Open sticks out to me is because of Taylor Townsend's run to the Third Round.
Receiving a wildcard because of two straight tournament victories in $50k tournaments, Townsend made the most of her opportunity. In the First Round, Townsend easily beat Vania King in straight sets. However, her Second Round match against Alize Cornet is why this tournament was truly memorable for Townsend. Against a higher ranked and home-country favorite, Taylor was up a set and a double break in the second set before Cornet won five straight games to even the match up.
With seemingly everything going against her, it would have been easy for Taylor to let the match slip away. However, in that third set, Taylor immediately got up a double break and held on to win 6-4, 4-6, 6-4. And while she did lose in the next round to Carla Suarez Navarro, who is very accomplished on clay courts, 6-2, 6-2, the future was looking very bright for Townsend. Perhaps she would be the one to take over after the Williams sisters retired as the face of American women's tennis. This wsa certainly a breakthrough for Taylor Townsend. However, in the coming years, there would be many ups and downs for the young American.
Townsend had pretty good results for the rest of 2014. She qualified and made the Round of 16 at a tournament in Washington D.C., she qualified and won a match in the main draw in Cincinnati, and she reached the Semifinals of another $50k tournament. However, 2015 is where things started to spiral downwards for Taylor. Townsend struggled to win matches, losing in the First Round at tournaments such as the Australian Open, Monterrey, Strasbourg, and the French Open. In fact, Townsend was having major difficulties even winning a match at the $25k tournament level. She lost her First Round matches in $25k tournaments in Sumter and Baton Rouge.
2016 was a major turnaround year for Townsend. I will spare you from hearing the story of her match against Gail Falkenberg again, but I do think that this match spurred Townsend to really turnaround her game and strive for greatness. Townsend ended up making the Semifinals of that tournament in Pelham before winning a $50k tournament and making the Final of two other $50k tournaments (which got her a French Open wildcard). In addition, earlier in the year at Indian Wells, Taylor won the pre-qualifying tournament, then qualified for the main draw.Townsend also won a round at the French Open and qualified for the US Open. 2016 could definitely be seen as a great stepping stone for Taylor Townsend's career.
So, where does Townsend stand in 2017? Townsend started off the year in decent form, winning a couple qualifying matches in both Auckland and the Australian Open, but failing to qualify for either tournament. Townsend played two Australian $60k tournaments, making the Semifinals of one and losing in the First Round of the other.
Townsend's season, however, is definitely on an upwards trajectory. In Auckland, she qualified without losing a set. Townsend then beat Jennifer Brady, who had beaten Taylor in the same round at the Australian Open earlier in the season. While Townsend lost to Christina McHale in the next round, after struggling to qualify for tournaments earlier in the year, it was great to see Taylor qualify and win a round at a WTA tournament. The fact that she beat a player she had lost to previously in the year was an added bonus.
Taylor struggled in Indian Wells, losing in the First Round against Magda Linette. I watched a good portion of that match and Taylor was not getting a lot of power on her shots. In addition, Townsend's shots were just landing too short in the court to really gain the upper hand against Linette in rallies. However, Townsend's fortunes changed in Miami.
In Miami, Taylor not only qualified without losing a set, but she beat a very accomplished player, Mona Barthel, in the process. In the main draw, Townsend came back from a set down to beat Anisimova and then scored a huge victory against Roberta Vinci, only losing five games in the process. And while Townsend did lose in straight sets to two-time Grand Slam champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, she was up a break in the first set, and the tournament can definitely be seen as a huge success.
As one can see from the trajectory of Taylor's recent years playing professional tennis, Townsend certainly goes through some ups and downs in terms of results. Take the past three tournaments she played. She went qualifying and winning a round in Acapulco, to easily losing in her first match at Indian Wells (she got a wild card into the main draw), to qualifying and winning two matches in Miami.
Townsend can certainly play at a high level, but for her to breakthrough once again, it will take consistent good results. Townsend is a very talented player, she certainly has a very good net game. However, at number 103 in the WTA live rankings, Townsend does not have a lot of room for error, especially if she is looking to make the main draw of the French Open without qualifying. Taylor needs to bring her A-game every week, no matter if she is playing in a $25k tournament or a Grand Slam.
However, I think that Townsend can breakthrough once again and become a top 50 player. When Taylor is playing well, as players such as Cornet and Vinci learned, she is tough to beat. Hopefully she is very confident from her run in Miami and takes this confidence with her into the clay court season, which suits her game very well.
In sum, I believe that Taylor Townsend is finally set to breakthrough once agian.
Showing posts with label Taylor Townsend. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Taylor Townsend. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 29, 2017
Monday, May 2, 2016
Regarding the USTA Pro Circuit Roland Garros Challenge
On paper, the USTA Pro Circuit Roland Garros Challenge looks like a brilliant idea for all parties. The challenge revolves around three Har-Tru American clay court ATP Challenger Tour events for the men and three ITF Pro Circuit American Har-Tru events for the women. Players' results are given a point value based on how big the lower level event is, and one's best two-of-three point values are added up to get your "score". The American woman and man with the highest score gets the reciprocal wild card to the French Open main draw. You can see the standings here.
For the tournaments, this ensures that lots of Americans are in the draw, which ensures interest from fans and higher attendance at events. For American players who cannot get into the main draw based on the ranking, there are massive point and financial incentive from a potential trip to Paris, so playing these smaller tournaments are a great idea. So, from this perspective, the wild card challenge is only a good thing, for the fans in attendance who want to see Americans battling on court, for tournament sponsors, for the players themselves, it seems as if having a wildcard challenge, rather than just handing out the reciprocal wildcard, is a brilliant idea. There is also something very rewarding about winning that wildcard as opposed to being gifted with one.
However, as is common with Twitter, everyone has an opinion, and so I stumbled upon an interesting tweet from a poster named Tyler Green, questioning the USTA for their wild card challenge on the women's side, specifically referring to whether the player in the lead right now, Taylor Townsend, deserves the wild card more than Louisa Chirico, who will not be given direct acceptance to the main draw, but is doing very well in European, WTA-level, clay court events. And he does bring up an interesting, and valid point. Why should players challenging themselves in Europe be punished for that by having to go through the qualifying draw in Paris, while players competing in smaller tournaments in the United States get rewarded. Let me try to dissect the reasoning behind it as best I can.
I think that there are multiple reasons why the wildcard is given in this manner. First of all, like I've mentioned earlier, I commend the USTA for wanting players to work for the wildcard as opposed to just being handed one, based on some internal discussions that the public will never hear. The proces of obtaining the wildcard is very clear, and there is no subjective discussion for "who is more deserving than who". Rewarding the wildcard in this manner would open up a huge hornets' nest of subjective wild card selections previously only reserved for the US Open if the USTA stopped their wildcard challenge in lieu of an opinionated process with no clear standards.
In addition, like I touched on before, the USTA is also helping the American tournaments involved by having the wild card. Instead of going to Europe, a lot of players are enticed to stay in America and compete in these smaller prize money events now, giving the tournaments more American players to advertise, and the fans more American players to watch compete. Sponsors are also helped as more eyes means more potential financial gain for them. And if sponsors are happy and butts are in sears, then tournaments can flourish. So, beyond the players themselves, the USTA is helping the actual American tournaments by bestowing the wildcard in this fashion. Ultimately, it's a lot better, and certainly more enticing, for the casual American fan to watch a Final between Taylor Townsend and Grace Min, or Bjorn Fratangelo and Jared Donaldson, than between two lower-ranked foreigners who the casual fan might not know, and if more Americans are in these tournaments, the probability of that occurring decreases, and probability of increases ticket sales increases.
Ultimately, though, for a player like Chirico, she knows the rules of how to get the wildcard, and seeing her level of play in Europe, would definitely have had a huge chance at getting it, but decided not to. This isn't a knock on her, but rather, the recognition of a conscious decision on her part. Because higher ranked players, such as Shelby Rogers and Anna Tatishvili, did stay home to compete in these tournaments, but Louisa decided against it to go to Europe. And, based on her results in Stuttgart and Madrid, it seems like a brilliant move so far. She has gotten a lot more money and a lot more ranking points than she would have gotten by staying in America. And based on her level of play in these tournament, she seems like a good bet to make the main draw of the French Open anyways.
However, let's not pretend as if Chirico didn't know about this wild card challenge. She knew the parameters for receiving the wild card and chose not to participate, which is totally her choice, but the wild card rules are clear, and she chose to go to Europe anyways. And while this is absolutely her right, it just means that she 100% did not deserve the wild card. I liken it to this, let's say a teacher gives you two choices for a final paper, and for the class, either paper topic is totally fine totally ok to write on, however an outside company is giving $100 for writing the best paper for only one of the topics. If you write the best paper in the world about the topic the company doesn't care about, while it's absolutely your right to do that according the specifications for the class itself (in this case, the ATP/WTA), it doesn't still mean that the outside company (in this case, the USTA), should give you the $100. Just some food for thought here.
This article is not a dig at Tyler Green, nor is it a dig at Louisa Chirico. This is merely a careful analysis of why the USTA gives out the wildcard in this format. And trust me, I don't agree with every decision the USTA makes, but in this case, the wildcard is definitely handed out in a just format.
For the tournaments, this ensures that lots of Americans are in the draw, which ensures interest from fans and higher attendance at events. For American players who cannot get into the main draw based on the ranking, there are massive point and financial incentive from a potential trip to Paris, so playing these smaller tournaments are a great idea. So, from this perspective, the wild card challenge is only a good thing, for the fans in attendance who want to see Americans battling on court, for tournament sponsors, for the players themselves, it seems as if having a wildcard challenge, rather than just handing out the reciprocal wildcard, is a brilliant idea. There is also something very rewarding about winning that wildcard as opposed to being gifted with one.
However, as is common with Twitter, everyone has an opinion, and so I stumbled upon an interesting tweet from a poster named Tyler Green, questioning the USTA for their wild card challenge on the women's side, specifically referring to whether the player in the lead right now, Taylor Townsend, deserves the wild card more than Louisa Chirico, who will not be given direct acceptance to the main draw, but is doing very well in European, WTA-level, clay court events. And he does bring up an interesting, and valid point. Why should players challenging themselves in Europe be punished for that by having to go through the qualifying draw in Paris, while players competing in smaller tournaments in the United States get rewarded. Let me try to dissect the reasoning behind it as best I can.
I think that there are multiple reasons why the wildcard is given in this manner. First of all, like I've mentioned earlier, I commend the USTA for wanting players to work for the wildcard as opposed to just being handed one, based on some internal discussions that the public will never hear. The proces of obtaining the wildcard is very clear, and there is no subjective discussion for "who is more deserving than who". Rewarding the wildcard in this manner would open up a huge hornets' nest of subjective wild card selections previously only reserved for the US Open if the USTA stopped their wildcard challenge in lieu of an opinionated process with no clear standards.
In addition, like I touched on before, the USTA is also helping the American tournaments involved by having the wild card. Instead of going to Europe, a lot of players are enticed to stay in America and compete in these smaller prize money events now, giving the tournaments more American players to advertise, and the fans more American players to watch compete. Sponsors are also helped as more eyes means more potential financial gain for them. And if sponsors are happy and butts are in sears, then tournaments can flourish. So, beyond the players themselves, the USTA is helping the actual American tournaments by bestowing the wildcard in this fashion. Ultimately, it's a lot better, and certainly more enticing, for the casual American fan to watch a Final between Taylor Townsend and Grace Min, or Bjorn Fratangelo and Jared Donaldson, than between two lower-ranked foreigners who the casual fan might not know, and if more Americans are in these tournaments, the probability of that occurring decreases, and probability of increases ticket sales increases.
Ultimately, though, for a player like Chirico, she knows the rules of how to get the wildcard, and seeing her level of play in Europe, would definitely have had a huge chance at getting it, but decided not to. This isn't a knock on her, but rather, the recognition of a conscious decision on her part. Because higher ranked players, such as Shelby Rogers and Anna Tatishvili, did stay home to compete in these tournaments, but Louisa decided against it to go to Europe. And, based on her results in Stuttgart and Madrid, it seems like a brilliant move so far. She has gotten a lot more money and a lot more ranking points than she would have gotten by staying in America. And based on her level of play in these tournament, she seems like a good bet to make the main draw of the French Open anyways.
However, let's not pretend as if Chirico didn't know about this wild card challenge. She knew the parameters for receiving the wild card and chose not to participate, which is totally her choice, but the wild card rules are clear, and she chose to go to Europe anyways. And while this is absolutely her right, it just means that she 100% did not deserve the wild card. I liken it to this, let's say a teacher gives you two choices for a final paper, and for the class, either paper topic is totally fine totally ok to write on, however an outside company is giving $100 for writing the best paper for only one of the topics. If you write the best paper in the world about the topic the company doesn't care about, while it's absolutely your right to do that according the specifications for the class itself (in this case, the ATP/WTA), it doesn't still mean that the outside company (in this case, the USTA), should give you the $100. Just some food for thought here.
This article is not a dig at Tyler Green, nor is it a dig at Louisa Chirico. This is merely a careful analysis of why the USTA gives out the wildcard in this format. And trust me, I don't agree with every decision the USTA makes, but in this case, the wildcard is definitely handed out in a just format.
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