Month: July 2022

(The cropped versions and all originals of photos used in all 2022 tournament reports are available from here.)

After a day’s rest from matters relating to tennis, we were all ready for the climax of the West Heath 2022 Tournament. The weather was fine, not too hot, with no rain forecast until the evening, and even then, there were only a few spots of it!

Men’s singles final

This was fought out on grass court 2 between Cedric de la Chaise, the second seed, who has missed two years of the West Heath Tournament during the coronavirus era, and Marcio Sugui, who took full advantage, in Cedric’s absence, to take the title twice. Marcio plays for a league team in Harrow, while Cedric plays in the West Heath men’s first team.

Greg Lim was the umpire.

Marcio is a leftie, with an awkward slice serve, while Cedric has a good all round game and super mobility, though an injury had prevented him from playing and training for some months until the last few weeks.

Sultan Gangji says that this match was the first played at West Heath with a complement of linesmen covering all lines with appropriate rotation!

The first set started with a service break to Cedric, who held his own game for a 2-0 lead. There then followed a marathon Marcio service game which seemed to last the whole of the first set of the ladies’ singles on the parallel court 1. Marcio won this eventually, but it was symptomatic that his serve was always under pressure. The difference seemed to be that Cedric was comfortable varying things and hitting close to the side lines to put Marcio under pressure and force errors. While Marcio seemed to be using an awkward but similar first serve which Cedric could move to return with few errors in the end, and a lot of Marcio’s groundstrokes in the first set were down the centre or a few feet away from the side lines. Marcio had another service hold to give Cedric 3-2, but after that, Cedric ran away with the set.

In the second set Marcio played better and took a few more risks. The score reach 2 all, and then Marco held, broke Cedric and held again to lead the set 5-2. During this game there was an odd occurrence. Marcio was carrying 3 balls, plus the one he served with, but it was noticeable that, for some unknown reason, he put both of the spare balls in the same pocket of his shorts, instead of one in each of the left and right pockets, as you would expect. During the play one of a ball came out of this pocket, and Cedric lost the point. Cedric could have asked for a “hindrance” as shedding a ball is distracting, but didn’t, although there was a discussion about it afterwards. Clearly the incident wasn’t deliberate, and wasn’t likely to have made any difference to the outcome of the game. Either way, Marcio was on a roll and took the set 6-2. Cedric appeared to be cramping up (or injured), which was confirmed when he stretched one leg against the back of his chair during the interval between sets.

At the beginning of the third set you would have expected the momentum to be entirely with Marcio, but something changed. Marcio seemed to ease up and make more errors, and Cedric got a fresh wind, which resulted in him breaking Marcio a couple of times for a 3-0 lead. This was too much for Marcio to overcome, and although Marcio held and broke Cedric towards the end of the set, it wasn’t enough to stop Cedric winning 6-2 2-6 6-2 to restore his reign of supremacy after the two year break.

Marcio is planning to move back to Brazil before next summer, so this may be the last battle between the two that we see.

Ladies’ singles final

This was between Jen Ehr, second seed and ladies’ first team captain and Rebecca Vaughan, top seed and 20212 champion and also a first team player. Rebecca is very consistent and makes few error, but doesn’t have as much pace on her potential winners as Jen might have, while Jen has a solid all round game with heavy and accurate ground strokes. Jen said she was confident if she could serve well.

In the event, it turned out that way. Rebecca was able to hit consistently anything within reach, but Jen was able to serve and return well to put pressure on Rebecca and to hit winners beyond Rebecca’s reach. Though Rebecca won a game when 2 down in the second set, Jen won 6-0 6-1, which is Jen’s first West Heath Tournament win at the second attempt at the singles!

Men’s doubles final

The first set was relatively even, with one net break, won by Will and Cedric 6-4. In the second set, Will and Cedric were often able to take the net position against Alex’s service, and this resulted in more breaks for Will and Cedric to take the set 6-2 for a 6-4 6-2 victory.

Ladies’ doubles final

This took place between the mother and daughter team Margaux & Elena Valarche, third seeds, and Jen Ehr & Katie Baston, top seeds. Katie and Rebecca Vaughan won it last year.

Barbara Thomas did the honours as umpire.

Elena has a an aggressive net game though less dynamic than the others, and Margaux has excellent mobility and is excellent at the net with good all round strokes. Jen and Katie both have heavy serves and are good at the net and Jen has very accurate heavy topspin groundstrokes. And they are an established partnership, battle hardened in many league matches for both Oxford University and West Heath.

The net of all this is that Elena and Margaux had less difficult in holding Elena’s serve with Margaux at the net than the other way around. Margaux chased a lot of balls and returned them well, but couldn’t beat Jen and Katie enough of the time. Elena stationed herself at the net and hit anything that came within reach, putting away a decent proportion.

But it all wasn’t enough to beat Jen and Katie, who won 6-2 6-2.

Jen and Katie thus became the only top seeds in any event to actually become champions. Sultan’s record to the semis (quarter finals for men’s singles) of only one pair of seeds being beaten (and one withdrawal) to that stage looks less good when it comes to the allocation of rank within the seeds themselves. However the top seeds should normally be the previous year’s champion, so there isn’t much leeway there, and the injury to Stephen Cooke threw out a lot of the careful consideration of seeding.

I will admit now to holding an informal draw in which the early spectators (those who arrived before matches started) were invited to tick the winners of each Finals Day event on a draw slip. Perhaps it was too easy, because the majority of the raw slips contained correct predictions. Katie Baston drew one slip from the hat containing the correct predictions, but it produced Sultan’s slip. He turned down the prize on the grounds of being the tournament referee, and Katie drew Jane Boyle next, who received the £5 prize, ending her claimed run of not winning anything!

After the ladies doubles had finished, the traditional extensive Finals Day tea was served

by a special visitor

who also helped out with the presentation of trophies.

In the evening was the Finals Day barbecue. Thanks to everyone who brought food and drink and to those who manned the barbecue. If anyone has any more pictures of the barbecue, please WhatsApp them to me.

It emerged during the evening discussions, that Margaux Valarche and Jasper Tresidder, the 2022 mixed doubles champions, had known each other from school, as they were in the same year group at school.

That is all for this year. Thank you to all the tournament organisers, chefs, players and attendees. And thank you for coming to watch the matches and for reading the tournament reports.

The temperature was a little warmer than the previous 2 nights, but not enough to avoid having to put layers on to eat outside.

Moira Duncan prepared a delicious lamb tagine dinner for the last Gourmet Dinner, but was unable to be present, so Lesley South and Marjan Denis kindly helped out with the culinary work at West Heath (as opposed to the main preparation and cooking at home). Many thanks to all those involved.

Mixed Doubles Final 2022

This was played between Margaux Valarche & Jasper Tresidder, unseeded, and Posy Frederick & Logan Mair, third seeds. The umpire was Greg Lim.

Margaux played steadily and kept the ball away from Logan at the net, while Jasper’s shots were a little more hit and miss, and included trick shots including an underarm serve that was not even noticed by anyone, let alone being ruled out by the tournament referee well after the event. Posy played consistently throughout and was particularly impressive for her court coverage around Logan who poached and got drawn wide, requiring her to move to cover well before the opponents hit the ball. Logan hit some good fast serves and shots, but also missed a few that we all expected him to put away, presumably as a result of his foot injury.

Margaux and Jasper broke within the first few games, to take the score to 4-2. At that point there was a fascinating “cat and mouse” point where all four players placed balls to probe what they saw as the weaknesses in the opponents positioning. Both Margaux and Posy demonstrated excellent anticipation, reactions and court coverage. The score reached 5-3. In the next game Posy did a lot of running to cover for Logan, but was unable to prevent the loss of the first set 6-3.

The grass courts are closed on Friday 29 July to give them some chance to recover, and on the morning of Finals Day, Saturday 30 July to prepare them.

On court 2 the first match was between Joseph Rigal & Alex Vallmajor, fourth seeds, and Sultan Gangji & Greg Lim, top seeds and defending champions. This was the only men’s doubles semi final played, as Stephen Cooke’s withdrawal gave Cedric de la Chaise and Will Maslen a walkover in the other.

Joseph tends to have a high error rate on his serve and shots, but a compensating ability to hit winners, a couple of which memorably seemed to occur under Sultan’s racket. Alex is very mobile with good anticipation – very similar to Stephen Cooke in that regard, but with less (or choosing not to make use of) an obvious killer serve. Sultan whacks flat serves down, inducing some errors and when stationed at the net picks off anything reachable with excellent anticipation, winning a number of points that way. Meanwhile Greg hits pacey, mostly flat strokes and uses his height to dominate at the net – he is very difficult to lob.

In the first set, Joseph lost his first service game, and the pair did not recover from that, losing the first set 6-3 on a net break of serve. The second set was must more fiercely contested, with more breaks, and reach 5 all, at which Joseph held and then the pair broke to take the set 7-5 to set up the Champions Tie Break (first to 10 plus winning by two points). This was fairly even at first, but Alex and Joseph started to get the upper hand when it started to matter, taking it 10-7 to win the match 3-6 7-5 [10-7] to dump the 2021 champions out.

The remaining match was the only mixed semi-final played, as Stephen Cooke’s withdrawal led to a walkover to Margaux Valarche & Jasper Tresidder in the other. Posy Frederick & Logan Mair, third seeds, took on Jen Ehr & Sultan Gangji, the second seeds.

Posy and Jen played consistently, serving and returning well, and often having to fill in the gaps behind the man. Both generally were able to keep their returns well away from the opposition net player, though not all the time. Despite his ankle injury from Sunday, Logan moved around the court, poaching in the front of the court whenever he had the opportunity, though not all of these attempts resulted in winners. He also made use of his fast flat serve wherever possible, and it was likely more effective than normal in the increasing gloom. Jen hit at least a couple of passes down the line past Logan when he went too soon for the interception.

The first set was close, though Posy and Logan got a net break to take it 6-4. In the second set, there were some brilliant points where all four players had to anticipate to dynamically back up their partners to ensure coverage of the whole court when one was pulled out of position by a good shot from the opponents – no waiting to see where the ball had been hit then starting to run for it. It is what good doubles have to do from time to time. Posy and Logan looked like they would run away with the set and match after getting to a 5-1 lead. But Sultan held his serve to bring it back to 5-2, then Posy was broken to give 5-3.

At 20:51, with the overcast sky, it was getting very difficult to see, particularly for the older players who might not have been eating their carrots! After a conflab, the decision was to resume in better light the following day.

(Picture will follow on conclusion of the match).

The weather was a little colder than it has been, and the Gourmet diners mostly had jackets on. Brian prepared a sumptuous Mediterranean chicken and fruit compote, which went down very well indeed. The boost of the night was when a further tray of chicken pieces was produced after everyone thought seconds was finished!

On grass court 1, the first ladies singles semi-final was between Elena Valarche and Jen Ehr. On grass, Elena always prefers to play her tennis from the net, and so it proved today. Jen has good and, more importantly today, accurate ground strokes and a heavy serve.

The match thus tended to consist either of Jen serving, putting Elena under pressure, and moving her off centre enough to hit a winner, or of Elena hitting an approach shot and being passed by Jen either to the left or the right. Elena won points, but no games, for a 6-0 6-0 victory to Jen. Elena asked for another jumping photo, this time with knee kicks to get further off from the ground, and Jen was happy to oblige.

The second ladies’ doubles semi-final was then played between seasoned campaigners Marjan Denis & Ros Norkett, the fourth seeds, and the first team “under 30s” Jen Ehr & Katie Baston, the top seeds. Marjan and Ros have dependable strokes, but not the consistency and organisation of Jen and Katie. Jen often issues tactical commands such as “net” during play to ensure the pair present the strongest formation. However, neither of the top seeds were on top form for this particular match, so Marjan and Ros won a lot of points. That included just about every point I followed whenever it was safe to take your eyes off the close men’s singles on court 2. Marjan and Ros got to a number of deuces, and Katie lost her serve in the first set. But, surprisingly from my random sample of points, yet unsurprisingly from the form and rankings, Jen and Katie won the match 6-1 6-0.

The final men’s singles quarter final was between Logan Mair, seventh seed, and Stephen Cooke, third seed. Both have big serves and groundstrokes, though Stephen’s are more standard than Logan’s. There were a number of service winners, and some more extended rallies where both were jockeying for court position to hit a winner. However, Stephen has longer legs and can get to and return some shots you really think he has no right to reach!

In the first set, Logan started serving. Stephen secured a break around half way through the set, and held on to it until he reached set point. During this rally Stephen slipped when running to reach a short high ball down the centre of the court, and ended up on his backside. He attempted to play the ball from on the ground and just got his racket to it with a fairly feeble shot, whereupon it landed on top of net and just dribbled over to Logan’s side for a winner to take the set 6-4.

In the second set, Logan came into his own and broke Stephen mid set, getting to a 5-2 lead. Stephen fought back to 5 all, then 6 all to force a tie break, but various observers noted afterward that he had started massaging his groin. Stephen reached 6-3 in the tie break, but then let out a groan and had to have a short break to see whether he could continue. Logan felt afterwards that the injury was unfortunate because Stephen had three match points with two serves to come and would normally expect to win from there. After a few minutes play resumed, but Stephen was immobile and thus tried to ace Logan with the four serves he had available. However, it didn’t work, and Logan took the tie break 8-6, at which point Stephen had to withdraw because of the groin injury. Logan thus won “4-6 7-6^8-6 retired”.

Sorry, no photo for this one!

In theory, that left the needle mother v daughter mixed doubles match between Margaux Valarche & Jasper Tresidder and Elena Valarche & Stephen Cooke. But, very clearly, with Stephen’s groin injury, this wasn’t going to be played at this time. Margaux & Jasper had a friendly eight games against Jen Ehr & Katie Baston so at least they got some tennis in, after warming up a couple of times.

On Wednesday morning Stephen Cooke confirmed he had to withdraw from all subsequent tournament matches, so the unseeded Margaux Valarche & Jasper Tresidder get a walkover into the Mixed Doubles Final on Thursday evening, and the third seeded Will Maslen & Cedric de la Chaise get a walkover into the Men’s Doubles Final on Finals Day Saturday.

To quote Sultan Gangji, “It has been a busy hectic morning dealing with numerous phone calls. There have been more actions/ decisions in the last 2 days than in the past 40 years of refereeing the West Heath Tournament!!!”

As a substitute for the report on the unplayed mixed doubles semi-final match, here is a picture of the West Heath finalists in the Summer Middlesex Cup division 3 team, narrowly losing to Harrow in the final.

The tournament has just reached the break point where only seeded players should remain. Sultan Gangji’s selection of who should be seeded has proved almost perfect this year. The only defeat of (as opposed to withdrawal by) seeds has been the victory of Margaux Valarche & Jasper Tresidder over Marjan Denis & Greg Lim. In the men’s singles, no unseeded player got more than 2 games off a seed in a set.

Yet there are signs that the younger players are challenging strongly. For their men’s doubles quarter final victory, 10-8 in the Champions tie break, Sultan Gangji & Greg Lim had to rely on a forehand error by Steve Yoo and a good serve by Greg Lim – had those two points gone the other way, Sultan and Greg would have been dumped out! Some of the younger men and women are improving fast, as you might expect.

On the Monday evening, it was just about warm enough to dine outdoors. After three fascinating men’s singles matches and a ladies’ doubles, Rachael Gangji provided delicious fish pie and pavlova.

There were parallel men’s singles quarter finals on courts 1 and 2 for the growing crowd of spectators to watch.

On court 1, Ed Fitzgerald, the 7th seed, played Marcio Sugui, the 2021 champion and top seed. Ed is quite a few inches over 6 feet, and has the serve to prove it, along with some powerful ground strokes to match his frame. The only question was whether he could get his forced and unforced error rate down to that of Marcio Sugui, who plays in external tournaments and now has his part 3 coaching qualification. Marcio is a leftie with a tricky leftie serve.

There wasn’t a lot in it in the first set, with Ed’s serve and groundstrokes forcing the win of points and service games, but the statistics were always in favour of Marcio’s more consistent game. Marcio got enough of a look in to force one net service break, which gave him the set 6-3. Marcio produced two service breaks in the second set for a 6-3 6-2 victory to Marcio.

In the second quarter final, on court 2, and easily the longest match, Joseph Rigal, the eighth seed, played Greg Lim, the fourth seed. Joseph is now the men’s second team captain and has improved his consistency a lot over the years, to add to some powerful serves and spin strokes. However, Greg can usually generate more raw pace from his often flat serves and strokes, which should come with a higher error rate. But Greg has excellent timing and a good eye for the ball to compensate. The match was a good battle. Both players approached the net at various times, challenging the opponent to hit a good passing shot or lob, though the latter is often difficult on a grass court with a variable bounce.

The first set was very tight, going to 6 all for a set tie break, which Greg won 7-2 after a few errors from Joseph early on. However, Joseph was pumped up and roared back in the second set, to take it 5-7. However, Greg dug in, and Joseph could not sustain the momentum, resulting in a victory for Greg 7-6^7-2 5-7 6-1.

My money would be on Joseph to improve enough in the next 12 months to be able to win such a tight match.

A ladies doubles semi-final took place on court 3 between Anna Ganev & Penny Isaacs and Margaux & Elena Valarche. Anna is determined and Penny has a variety of groundstrokes including lobs and crosscourt short shots. But Elena has a trick low serve and is a demon at the net and Margaux has both good serves and plenty of fire power in all her other shots.

At one point in the match, Anna was heard to call out “four all”, when all eyes were on the tight men’s singles matches, but it turned out later that she had been joking! There were some noticeable rallies where Anna and Penny got the upper hand and won points, but not enough to make up any games! So it was a decisive “victory to the Valarches“!

There were only two doubles matches played today.

In the first of the matches, Moira Duncan & Lesley South took on the third seeds, the mother and daughter pairing of Elena & Margaux Valarche, supported by a rare appearance from husband/father Antoine. Moira has a strong forehand, and Lesley is famous for her out of reach, angled shots from anywhere on the court. Elena’s main strength is at the net, while Margaux is highly mobile with excellent anticipation and good shots all round.

Elena and Margaux were generally on top, but Moira and Lesley were able to force errors. Although Moira and Lesley could also move the opponents around to create gaps, they tended to miss when going for the resulting winners. In the first set, they got one game on Moira’s serve. In the second set they broke Elena and won one game on Lesley’s serve for a 6-1 6-2 win for the Valarches.

There was then an hour’s gap until the second match, which was a men’s doubles between Gideon Stone & Geoff Isaacs and Joseph Rigal & Alex Vallmajor, the fourth seeds. Gideon and Geoff are experienced players, with plenty of match experience. Joseph is captain of the men’s second team and Alex plays regularly in it. In this match, Joseph in particular seemed fired up, and made a number of unexpected interceptions at the net which produced points.

Gideon and Geoff played consistently and won a number of points with accurate placement, but generally could not match the fire power of Joseph and Alex. The result was a 6-1 6-0 victory to Joseph and Alex.

For a day when rain was predicted, but did not materialise, there were a number of matches scheduled and played, including one which was the upset of the tournament so far.

The early men’s singles was between Rob Curtis and Joseph Rigal. In his men’s doubles with Dan Dalton against Steve Yoo and David Hirst, Rob and his partner had played well in the second set, with some good serving, but they lost 7-5. However, it looks like Joseph’s pace and increasing consistency were too much for Rob on this occasion, and Joseph took the match 6-0 6-0.

Matt Wasser played Cedric da la Chaise, but couldn’t get any traction in the match. Cedric won 6-0 6-0.

In a mixed on court 1, Sally Tornow & Richard Nightingale played Penny Isaacs & Aaron Watkins. Sally is a demon at the net, and Richard has a good serve and plays very consistently. Penny’s ground strokes are rock solid and her repertoire includes accurate lobs and cross court short, semi-drop shots. Nowadays she also ventures to the net at times for volleys, and is very mobile moving forward. Aaron both has strong serves and strokes, and is also fast about the court. But this had disadvantages when he tried to poach a deep ball belonging to Penny, who ensured she took it, but made an error due to the interference.

The strategy of Sally and Richard was to play on Penny wherever possible, but she was equal to the task, with an appropriate shot selection to avoid any cheap points for Sally and Richard. Aaron was able to step in to put the ball away from time to time, but generally left Penny to hit her groundstrokes. Sally and Richard were able to win points but not games….

As the UK hit record temperatures of 40.3 degrees C, which are 1.6 degrees C higher than the previous record in 2019, some brave souls with plenty of liquids to hand still turned up to play. Fortunately the humidity was low today (less than 20%).

There were two men’s doubles matches and one men’s singles match played.

The first men’s doubles was between Gavin Stanton & Leo Colle vs Joseph Rigal and & Alex Vallmajor. Joseph and Alex play in the men’s second team, of which Joseph is now the captain. Gavin and Leo don’t play regular team tennis, so are not match tight though Leo is tall and has a decent first serve. The seeds won 6-1 6-1. (Regrettably no picture)

After his exertions in the doubles, Leo Colle next had to play Steve Yoo in the singles. Both have decent first serves, and Steve can play pretty well, but it seemed as if he was a bit rusty for this match. Meanwhile Leo was well warmed up from the doubles, although presumably not as fresh, and he was the more consistent of the pair. In the first set, matters were pretty even up until 5 all, but then Leo broke to win the set 7-5.

It wasn’t that obvious what changed that much in the second set, though Leo seemed to be coming in more, including later in the rallies on Steve’s serve and Steve just didn’t get any form of passing shot or lob going. Leo won the set 6-1 for a 7-5 6-1 victory.

The last match to finish was an exciting men’s doubles between Nicholas Sweeting & Eugene Bellin vs Gideon Stone & Geoff Isaacs. Geoff and Gideon are wily, experienced players while Nic and Eugene had not played together before. Eugene has a good variety of service and good groundstrokes when on form. Nic hasn’t played so much competitive doubles, though he did play in the second team the other day. Meanwhile Geoff and Gideon are both consistent, while Geoff has a particularly good forehand.

In the first set, Gideon and Geoff very much had the upper hand, winning it 6-1. However, the second set was an altogether different matter. Although Gideon and Geoff were a break up with (I think) Gideon serving for the match at 6-5, Nic and Eugene were 0-30 up, though Gideon and Geoff levelled it to 30 all, but Nic and Eugene were not to be denied, and took the set into a (set) tie break in the increasing gloom. Had they won it, there probably would have had to be a resumption at another time, as the light was going. But Gideon and Geoff put pressure on to force a few errors and won the tie break 7-4 to take the match 6-1 7-5^7-4.