Latest news with #CatyMcNally
Times
2 hours ago
- Sport
- Times
Sorry, boffins, but there's no such thing as an unforced error in tennis
Thursday afternoon and I am in a small booth above Centre Court with three university students contemplating why we screw up in life or, more to the point, why you might get knocked out of Wimbledon. My three new friends are part of the IBM data analytics crew. There are 65 of them here, covering every match on every court. They deliver the stats that record why you lost: your double faults, your number of points won against first serves, the number of points won in rallies between five and eight shots. The lot. And they're not any old rag-bag students trying to pay off the debt for all the cider they couldn't afford last term. You can only qualify if you've played county tennis standard, minimum. Then there's an interview process from October to Christmas and training sessions from January to May. Some decent players have done this job; Henry Patten, a reigning Wimbledon men's doubles champion, for starters. Here above Centre Court we are watching Iga Swiatek's second-round match against Caty McNally, the American. Of the IBM trio, the middle man is calling the point: 'Serve down the middle, backhand return', etc. His team-mates either side of him are inputting the different sets of data. They take turns exchanging the roles because their concentration cannot drop. At 5-5, first set, 15-30 on Swiatek's serve, we finally get to the nub of it. Swiatek and McNally are rallying hard, McNally is tenacious and Swiatek, trying and failing to break her resistance, starts pushing it, closer and closer to the lines. Finally, in the 18th shot of the rally, the ball sits up, Swiatek plants her feet and is able to go for broke; she unleashes a forehand angled across at McNally's left but she is inches into the tramlines. The IBM crew calls it: forehand out. 'Unforced.' But hang on boys, that wasn't unforced. At least that's where my mind is. Swiatek has only made that error because McNally has been grinding it out, making the Pole play when she is increasingly stretched physically and forcing her to load the risk in her shot selection. This was a forced error. McNally forced it. Whether it is an unforced error, in other words, is utterly subjective. An ace is an ace, period. What forces errors is an entire essay subject. By necessity, IBM requires parameters that are as specific as possible and has thus reduced forced/unforced to a number of physical factors: did the power or positioning, for instance, of the shot you received force your error? If not, your error may be unforced. But tennis doesn't work like that. In the big Thursday evening upset, Jack Draper made far fewer 'unforced errors' (22) than Marin Cilic (34), which might suggest that Draper was playing the more accurate tennis. Yet Draper lost in four sets and the reason that Cilic made more unforced errors (I'll stop using the inverted commas here) was because his tactical approach was to load the risk, hit the lines, play for winners — and that worked. His 34 unforced errors look bad but they actually reflected the success of his bold approach. Earlier in the day I watched Alex de Minaur beat Arthur Cazaux in a match where the final two sets slipped rapidly away from the Frenchman in a cascade of what were recorded as unforced errors. While the stats suggest that Cazaux blew it, De Minaur's post-match analysis suggested it was his tactics that were responsible. The Australian No11 seed said his game plan was 'playing a little bit of a lockdown and making him have to try to go for a lot more than he's comfortable to do. The pressure went towards him where he started to feel like he had to go for more and more and more. That's why I think the third and fourth sets showed a lot of errors on his side.' So are those Cazaux's unforced errors, or did De Minaur force them? The guy who really lit up the unforced error count was, believe it or not, Novak Djokovic. That wasn't here at Wimbledon but at the 2016 Australian Open in a fourth-round match against Gilles Simon, where the stats show him as having made 100 unforced errors, which was considered to be a record. Are we therefore to believe that Djokovic suddenly became a record-breakingly crap player that day? Or was it that Simon's game was based so solidly on durability and counter-punching that he was known as 'The Grinder'? Accounts of that match suggest it wasn't just that Djokovic had a bad day, but that Simon forced it out of him. Same thing at the French Open final last month. Aryna Sabalenka made 70 unforced errors and afterwards bemoaned her 'terrible' tennis, ignoring the fact that Coco Gauff might just have had a hand in it. Gauff's resistance forced Sabalenka to shoot increasingly for the lines and the more she missed, the more the pressure mounted and the further the game got away from her. The stats suggest that Sabalenka was responsible for her own downfall, but actually Gauff was the architect of it. When the unforced error count was put under the microscope by The Athletic, it was described as 'a match to test the limits of tennis' most unsatisfactory statistic'. In tennis, you could ask: is there ever an error that is completely unforced? In the Wimbledon rankings, the player with the worst unforced error count is George Loffhagen, a 24-year-old Londoner. The numbers say that 31 per cent of the points he played were lost because of unforced errors. That feels pretty harsh; at least it does to his coach, Ryan Jones, who describes him as 'a Ferrari who can break down' when the circumstances become 'overwhelming'. For a player ranked No293, Wimbledon can be exactly that. So Jones and Loffhagen understand exactly what forced all those errors out of him. Of course, this isn't just a tennis thing. You could say that Rory McIlroy's missed putts in the US Open were unforced errors but you would be completely ignoring the psychology of the moment that forced him to miss. Likewise with England's footballers missing penalties. The most famous unforced error in rugby (arguably) was Gavin Hastings in the 1991 World Cup missing a penalty from in front of the posts that might have put Scotland in the final. The error, he would explain later, was in taking the kick at all. He had just been smashed in a tackle; he was in no fit state to attempt the kick. That is sport: a lifelong story of cause and effect. The question is not whether the IBM lads were correct to call Swiatek's forehand an unforced error, but whether they should be trying to differentiate between forced and unforced error types at all. Life isn't like that. I left home without my house keys yesterday and I guess IBM would have recorded this as an unforced error. Now, I know I could do better — that I was in a rush; that I'd tried to squeeze too much into the previous five minutes and that my personal admin is still not where it could be. But this was all completely self-imposed and definitely not an unforced error.
Yahoo
7 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Sonay Kartal partnership the perfect antidote for Jodie Burrage
By Mohamed Hamza at Wimbledon After a rolled ankle helped bring an end to her singles run at Wimbledon, Jodie Burrage believes her doubles pairing with friend Sonay Kartal is just what the doctor ordered. Having missed most of last season due to injury, Burrage was poised to make her comeback in fine form, only to suffer her latest setback just three days before her defeat to Caty McNally on Monday. Advertisement But the 26-year-old didn't have to wait long for a return to winning ways, partnering pal Kartal in doubles to take down Spain's Jessica Bouzas Maneiro and Yvonne Cavalle-Reimers 4-6 6-1 7-5 to extend her time in SW19. 'It's always nice to go back out there and get a win,' she said. "I needed that a little bit to cheer me up. I was in a foul mood in the morning. I tried to hide it but it didn't go well! 'It's always fun playing with Sonay and when you go back on court you feel better. It was a tight match but we did good to get through. 'The ankle's okay. The physio's not happy that went to three sets but doubles is different to singles. It's not ideal and it will take a few good weeks but that's for after I'm done. Advertisement 'It was a very nice distraction. I wasn't in a great mood and felt disappointed and deflated. If I didn't have doubles, it would've been a tough day.' Burrage and Kartal previous joined forces for runs at Queen's and Eastbourne in the run-up to Wimbledon earlier this season. The pair have also been seen supporting each other's preparations for singles matches, with Burrage helping Kartal warm-up for her second round victory over Viktoriya Tomova. While their personalities are well-matched off the court, Burrage insists they could not be more different on it. 'We've got the same morals, same values and same dry humour but we're completely different in how we perceive ourselves on court and how we are,' added Burrage. Advertisement 'We're completely different but for some reason that works. 'I'm the one who gets pumped up and she's showing absolutely nothing and we need a bit of each other which I think is why we do work and our game styles are different, and that isn't easy for our opponents. 'I would love to keep winning matches with her and we'll do our best to do that.' For the latest action on the British summer grass court season, check out the LTA website.
The Guardian
17 hours ago
- Sport
- The Guardian
Iga Swiatek stays under radar at Wimbledon with win against McNally to reach third round
It should not really be possible for someone who has won five grand slam titles and been world No 1 for 125 weeks to slip under the radar. But at Wimbledon, where she has made the quarter-finals only once and where grass-court nous is still a work in progress, Iga Swiatek somehow seems to go about her business almost unnoticed. If she loses early, it's quickly shaken off; if she goes deep, it's bonus territory and a sign that all is well in her world. On Thursday, the Pole, seeded eighth after dropping down the rankings in the first half of this year, shrugged off a poor end to the first set to beat the American Caty McNally 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 for a place in the third round. Ranked 208 but in the draw on a protected ranking after a long time off due to elbow surgery, McNally chipped and charged and came forward with purpose as she pinched the first set from 4-1 down. But Swiatek steadied the ship quickly and dominated the second and third sets for another morale‑boosting victory. Having struggled in the first part of the clay season, Swiatek started to find her game at Roland Garros, where she has won the title four times. Defeat by Aryna Sabalenka in the semi-finals hurt but she reached her first grass-court final in Bad Homburg and she is just the third woman this century, after Amélie Mauresmo and Serena Williams, to make the third round or better at 22 or more slams. Against McNally, she did not panic when the first set slipped away and in the end she was a comfortable winner. 'I started well so I knew my game was there,' Swiatek said, explaining how she turned things around. 'I just needed to use it, to be more intense and more accurate with my preparation. I'm happy I was able to do it.' There is a lot about grass-court tennis that Swiatek has yet to master. Though her volleys are technically sound, the transition from the baseline to the net is often tentative, still moving backwards at times to let the ball bounce when a smash would be easier. But when her serve is working smoothly, as it was for the most part against McNally, she is still very hard to beat. Swiatek and McNally know each other well, having won the junior doubles title together at Roland Garros in 2018. Swiatek won the junior Wimbledon title that year, but lost to McNally in the semis in Paris, a defeat she described on Thursday as 'one of the most heartbreaking of my junior career'. The two women embraced fondly at the net and Swiatek was delighted to see her on court again. 'I'm happy she's back,' she said. 'For sure she's got the game to do well.' Next up for Swiatek is Danielle Collins, the hard-hitting American who handed her a painful defeat on clay in Rome last time out. Win that, and she's likely to find herself up against Elena Rybakina, the 2022 champion, who eased past Maria Sakkari 6-3, 6-1. The defending champion, Barbora Krejcikova, was made to work before beating Caroline Dolehide 6-4, 3-6, 6-2, setting up a clash with the 10th seed, Emma Navarro, a quarter-finalist here last year. The No 7 seed, Mirra Andreeva, in the same section of the draw, beat Lucia Bronzetti 6-1, 7-6 (4). 'In the beginning I felt like I was playing great, taking the ball early, playing aggressive, but in the second set she also started to play better and I got a little bit nervous,' the Russian said. 'I'm just super-happy that I managed to push myself to fight until the end.'
Asharq Al-Awsat
19 hours ago
- Sport
- Asharq Al-Awsat
Swiatek Fights Back to Down McNally and Reach Third Round
Iga Swiatek may not love the grass but relishes a battle whatever the surface and showed all that fight and bullish determination as she recovered to beat American Caty McNally 5-7 6-2 6-1 and reach the Wimbledon third round on Thursday. McNally, the world number 208, looked poised to cause an upset when she clawed her way back from 4-1 down to take the first set against the five-times Grand Slam champion. At that point Swiatek's mediocre record at the All England Club, where the Pole has never gone past the quarter-finals, seemed to be weighing heavily on her shoulders. But rather than shy away from the scrap, the former world number one flicked a psychological switch that saw her come out for the second set transformed, upping her aggression and playing with a ferocity McNally simply could not handle. She broke early in the second set and never looked back, losing only three more games to set up a clash with another American Danielle Collins. "I started the match well, so I knew that my game was there," said Swiatek. "I knew that at the start of the second set I had to be more accurate. I just tried to improve and I'm happy it worked." The eighth seed may have her sights set far higher than the third round, but by reaching the last 32 she underlined her consistency on the big stage. The 23-year-old is the third player this century to reach the third round in 22 consecutive women's singles Grand Slams after Amelie Mauresmo and Serena Williams. DIFFICULT SURFACE Whether such milestones are enough to persuade Swiatek she can excel on a surface that has so far proven difficult to master is yet to be determined. With four French Open titles to her name, another at the US Open and two semi-final appearances in Australia, her unspectacular Wimbledon record stands out like a sore thumb. A run to the Bad Homburg final in the grasscourt warm-up event showed her game is not entirely unsuited to the surface, though there was a period in the first set against McNally where she may have wondered if this tournament was simply not for her. Having broken early and raced into a 4-1 lead, the wheels briefly came off as McNally did everything to push Swiatek out of her comfort zone. The American pushed right up to the baseline to receive serve, trying to give Swiatek less time to react to the return and for a while it worked. McNally spurned four break points in the seventh game before finally taking her chance at the fifth attempt before breaking again for a 6-5 lead when Swiatek swiped a backhand long. When the Pole fired a wild forehand off target to hand McNally the opener, everything seemed to be going the American's way. But that was as good as it got. DOUBLES PARTNERS Swiatek knows McNally's game well - the pair were doubles partners in their youth, clinching the junior title at Roland Garros in 2018 - and set about dismantling it in double-quick time. She broke for a 2-0 lead in the second set and again to level the contest at one set each. Swiatek then did the same at the start of the third set, breaking to go 2-0 ahead, with a forehand swiped cross-court, while another forehand winner saw her break again to move 4-0 up. It was then straightforward for the Pole, although she did have to save five break points before wrapping up victory with an ace. As well as earning her spot in the next round, the match against her old playing partner offered a pleasing trip down memory lane. "It's pretty funny because I remember these matches pretty well," she said of her junior days. "We know each other pretty well ... She's one of the people who make you feel like you are not only rivals on tour but that you can also respect each other and like each other."
Deccan Herald
21 hours ago
- Sport
- Deccan Herald
Djokovic easing into old routine as seeds hit back at Wimbledon
Five-times Grand Slam champion Iga Swiatek, surprisingly yet to go past the quarter-finals at Wimbledon, is another who will quietly fancy her chances and the Pole looked impressive as she hit back from a set down to beat Caty McNally 5-7 6-2 6-1.
