by VillaJ100 » Thu, 27 May 2010 21:53
had a fun match vs olitchno, he was cannon and i was burns playing on clay, i managed to win through 7-6 4-6 6-2. the 1st set was very serve dominated with nobody really making an impression on each other's serve, but he was getting more points on my serve than i was on his, i was volleying well though so that was good to know. in the tiebreak i went 0-3 and 2 mini breaks down straight away, but i regrouped and got it back with some errors from cannon's backhand. i managed to get another mini break and volley out the set.
In set two it was more of the same, until i was serving at 4-4, when suddenly thanks to some excellent returns the 1st break points of the match appeared for cannon, at 15-40 and he took his 1st one and comfortably served out for 4-6.
In set three i was worried, stamina was becoming low and i wanted a quick victory because of this. However in game 2 on the 3rd cannons mighty serve went and i found myself with break chances, which i took with a cross court forehand. i then held again to go 3-0, and raced to 0-40 on cannon's serve, but couldt get the double break. we then both held serve and olitchno claimed a break back with some more great returns, but i served it out at the second time of asking to win through.
If cannon had more speed he would have won for sure. Even though this was clay, the longest rally was maybe 7 shots, and i took some time to get used to the power. however my 1st serve percent was 98%, which is impossibly high for me and probably the key to winning, i normally serve 70%.
Proud serve and volleyer!