Citi Open Quarterfinal Preview

Source: This Week in Tennis

Today is quarterfinal day at the Citi Open in College Park, Maryland. The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 8th seeds all survived early rounds and are ready to battle their opponents on the other side of the net and the heat. It was a suffocating kind of heat yesterday afternoon when I arrived at The Tennis Center at College Park, but after the first match and a half it seemed to cool off a bit. This afternoon, Shahar Peer plays Alberta Brianti in that first match (3 PM Eastern) and it's followed by Virginie Razzano vs. Irina Falconi.

Yesterday, the match of the day was Heather Watson vs. Stephanie Dubois. Heather Watson played well in the first set, but Dubois came roaring back and took advantage of Watson's sluggish performance over the next two sets. I was extremely blessed to be able to watch the last two sets of that match with Elena Baltacha's coach, Nino Severino. It was a very informal conversation that ranged from his star student to how some players find it annoying that ball kids aren't trained to be more flexible if a player only wants to receive balls for serving from one side of the court or the other. A lot of players are superstitious and that's just one of the many quirky habits on tour. It must be said that without Twitter, my invite to sit with Coach Nino wouldn't have happened and that's why I think Twitter is such a great service. There are a ton of tennis players tweeting every day and I'm glad there are coaches like Coach Nino that have followed suit and given their followers a different perspective on the sport we all love. Next up for Coach Nino and Elena Baltacha is next week's Mercury Insurance Open in Carlsbad, California.

Citi Open
(College Park, Maryland)

Quarterfinal
Order of Play

3:00 PM (Eastern)

• [1] Shahar Peer vs. [8] Alberta Brianti
  (Head to Head: 1-0)
  • 2nd Round Results
    • Peer d. Alla Kudryavtseva  6-1, 6-4
    • Brianti d. Varvara Lepchenko  6-1, 6-2

• Virginie Razzano vs. Irina Falconi
  (Head to Head: 0-0)
  •  2nd Round Results
    • Razzano d. [6] Elena Baltacha  6-4, 6-2
    • Falconi d. Shuai Zhang  6-4, (retired-head illness)

Not before 6:30 PM (Eastern)

• [3] Tamira Paszek vs. Stephanie Dubois
  (Head to Head: 1-0)
  • 2nd Round Results
    • Paszek d. Madison Brengle  6-3, 6-1
    • Dubois d. [Q] Heather Watson  3-6, 7-5, 6-1

• [2][WC] Nadia Petrova vs. [5] Bojana Jovanovski
  (Head to Head: 0-0)
  • 2nd Round Results
    • Petrova d. [WC] Eugenie Bouchard  6-2, 6-2
    • Jovanovski d. Jill Craybas  6-4, 5-7, 6-4