Session 7 Preview - Brits and Germans to Stake Final Claim
5/01/2010
By Nikki Brown
GREAT Britain’s Laura Robson and Andy Murray come into Session 7 of the Hyundai Hopman Cup looking to take another step towards Saturday’s Final, but Germany’s Sabine Lisicki and Philipp Kohlschreiber are looking just to keep its hopes alive.
Fresh off an exciting win on Monday night, Great Britain will again take to the court, this time in the hope of defeating Germany. While youngster Robson went down in her singles match to Yaroslava Shvedova, her partner Murray stormed through his singles and evened the score against Kazakhstan.
Robson won the first set of her singles against Shvedova but was then outplayed. It was a good effort by the 15-year-old in her first game for 2010 and she was not overly disappointed with the loss. She knew it was going to be a tough match and coped well with the heat and length of the match.
Germany’s Lisicki couldn’t have asked for a better start to 2010, beating world No. 5 Dementieva in straight sets. Yesterday Lisicki hit the practice court in the afternoon and looks to have pulled up well.
That win over the world No. 5 Russian follows her success in 2009 that saw Lisicki win her first career title at Charleston and was a finalist in Luxembourg. It will be a harder match for Robson with Lisicki coming off such a powerful win and being a rising superstar of the game.
Kolschreiber’s task then is even harder as Murray is on fire brushing aside Kazak Andrey Golubev in just over an hour on Monday night. The German went down to Igor Andreev in three sets on Monday and will be looking to leave an impression on Murray in the pair’s first meeting.
After Monday’s game Murray said the tournament layout is great because he has more match time with the mixed doubles and can work on different areas of his game.
The mixed doubles may be played out as the decider match and Murray and Robson looked very comfortable out on the court, even joking between games.
This tournament may have turned Murray into a mixed doubles campaigner. He had fun out on the court and was impressed at how well they played considering they had not practiced before together before.
“In mixed you have to play, as the guy, a little more aggressive when you’re at the net and take a few more chances and that’s good for your movement and gives you confidence on the players if you hit some big ones,” Murray said.
“It was emotional, it was good fun. I think we both enjoyed it. It’s funny because at the start of the match you’re enjoying it and towards the end it gets serious and competitive.”
Murray is now even looking ahead to the 2012 Olympic Games in London where he would not mind teaming up with Robson again.
“I like mixed doubles, I think it’s good. At the major tournaments it’s a good thing. There are some things that need to be cleared up with the etiquette because people talk about how the girls tell the guys to hit hard to them, but nobody really knows because it’s frowned upon a little bit if you do it,” Murray said.
“You just have to go for it though. I will play mixed for sure (at the Olympics). I will definitely play if Laura’s up for it.”
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