“From Kaja to Kayla, through the resurrection of Anastasia” – the whole hoping that my Latin still works fine after a couple of decades I haven’t practiced it. Fine, I realise the heading sounds a bit too serious for my purposes and I know that Potapova did not die (and, thus, she could not resurrect): she just lost a match against Kaja Juvan last December. On the contrary we’ll see that Anastasia is alive and kicking, as Kaja Juvan and Kayla Day are.
All this to say that I decided to write a couple of pieces to recap what happened, during these first two months of 2017, to players ranked from 1st to 6th spot at the end of last year Junior Tour and who, of course, started (or continued) to play more regularly on the Pro Tour this year. In particular, this piece will focus on Juvan, Potapova and Day. And If you wonder why to write on players ranking from 1 to 6 and not from 1 to 5, there are two reasons: the main one is that I have a beloved player and the other one is that her name and her 2016 Orange Bowl’s results justify most of this silly heading.
So, let’s begin from the end, i.e. from n. 6 of the Junior Tour, who is – as you would never guess – Kaja Juvan: she started 2017 nearly as positively as she ended 2016. Kaja, during the third week and fourth week of February, played two consecutive events of the continuous ones held in Hammamet. The first event was not great for her: having won not too comfortably the first round against Rumanian 16 year old Prisacariu, who ranks over 300 as a junior and over 1100 as a pro, Kaja was dismissed in the second round by 4th seed Kerimbayeva, losing in 3 sets (7-6 0-6 6-2): which is fair enough, since the 21 year old Kazak ranks around 350 in the world. The second event went much better for Kaja, since she reached the finals, which she lost in three sets against Italian Camilla Scala, whom I judged, though, to be the underdog between the two: as a result of this defeat I “was right on the verge of a nervous breakdown and/or of drowning myself in the Naviglio in Milan” (cit. Marucci).
Notwithstanding the unexpected loss, it should be noted that to reach the finals Kaja has beaten a couple of good players, such as the strong 19 year old Egyptian Sandra Samir (ranking around 440, with a noticeable highest junior ranking of 13) in three sets in the second round, and Nastassja Burnett in the quarter finals, beating her 4-6 6-1 RET. I don’t know why Burnett retired; though the girl, who currently ranks around 440 WTA, has been (a former) Italian hope and managed to reach a best ranking of 120 a couple of years ago: in her good days she is still a tough player to compete against. You know that, judging by what I recall of Kaja – and it’s a long time I don’t see the girl playing – I consider her first serve to be her weak spot: I must say that her serve’s stats have been shaky again in Hammamet: Kaja won less than 50% of points on her first serve in 6 sets over the 17 played during the 2 tournaments she competed in (and, to be fully honest, 4 of the sets in which she showed good stats in this respect were played against opponents – Prisacariu and Elmi – who seemed not to be real testers). In the match she lost against Kerimbayeva, Kaja conceded 25 break points – 21 in two sets (she won the second 6-0), having served overall 13 times; she conceded further 10 break points against Burnett, having served 9 times; she conceded another 15 against Scala, having served 13 times. There is still some work to do for her, it seems, to improve this part of her game; but she has all the time she needs to fix whatever is missing, and even more. In any case, this is the third final (one of which won) this girl reaches in six 10/15K events she has played in up to now (she played a further one in 2015, but at the time she was indeed too young and I don’t consider it): it is a very impressive score. Let’s see if in the next future she will try a couple more of 15Ks or if she will step up and go for some 25Ks.
Though, the big result of last week has been achieved by Anastasia Potapova: as we know, Potapova quitted playing the Junior Tour, since she basically won everything she could, and now she focuses only on the Pro’s. In 2016 Potapova already started to play some 15K events, 2 of which held in Greece and one in Russia: she did not perform brilliantly, having failed both times to qualify to the main draw in Greece and having lost in the quarters in Russia, where she was admitted directly to the main draw, benefitting from a wild card. But as she focused only on the Pro tour, results became immediately outstanding: she’s already decided to drop the 10Ks and to give a try with some 25Ks: first two attempts, one in Florida and one in Arizona were not bad: both times she was able to qualify to the main draw and to win the first round: in Florida she was beaten in the second round by Robin Anderson, currently ranked 301 WTA, in Arizona she lost in three sets against current 216, but former 35 Karatancheva (Karatancheva reached rank 35 12 years ago – she was only 16 at that time! – but she’s been used to rank between 100 and 150 throughout all her career).
Then Anastasia tries a third time and… third attempt was the good one. Last week she has won her first pro title, a 25K in Curitiba, Brazil.
Anastasia did not play the qualifications of the tournament, since it was one of the three events she chose in which to be granted with a place directly in the main draw, even if lacking of the necessary ranking: a privilege reserved to players ending the previous Junior season in the top 20 spots. Anastasia’s choice was wise, it seems: in the first round she beat 7-6 6-2 current 184 WTA, former top 50 (in 2015) and 2nd seed of the tournament, Teliana Pereira; two rounds a bit easier followed (especially the third one, against Cengiz, a Turkish player ranked over 600) and then two great matches: in the semis she beat by 6-1 6-1 Jil Teichmann, a 20 year old Swiss player ranking just over 200, and in the finals her peer Amanda Anisimova, in three tight sets, by 6-7(7) 7-5 6-2: a real battle – at least for two sets – between two 15 year old girls who dominated the tournament and performed so well on 2016 Junior Tour. I followed the live scores of the match and the stats of the 2 players were very, very close (of course), the most meaningful difference between the two being that Potapova won 56% of points on her second serve, while Anisimova only 30%. In the third set such gap increased a lot, with Potapova winning five points over six on her second serve, whilst Anisimova only one over seven.
Anastasia performed well also in the following week (i.e. this week), playing another 25k in Sao Paolo, this time: starting from the main draw (having won an event held in the immediately previous week) she easily won the first round by 6-1 6-1 and she battled well in the second, against former top 50 Torro Flor: she lost the match 6-3 6-4, a result which seems to be more than fair, also considering the CV of the Spaniard and that she has already won three 15ks this year.
From Kaja to Kayla, finally: Kayla Day is playing just stunningly well, and she has being doing so throughout last year: currently, she is a top 200 at 17 year old; in 2016 she won a 50k in Macon, during which she beat, within the others, Samantha Crawford, Grace Min (i.e. two top 150) and Karatancheva; she reached a semi-final in a 50k in Scottsdale; she even qualified for New Heaven’s main draw, having beaten in the qualis players as Sevastova and Flipkens, and for the second round of the US Open (she was granted a wild card), having beaten in the first Madison Brengle. New year starts and, after missing the qualification in a 100k in the US, Kayla reaches a final in a 25k in California, losing, in the re-match of last year’s Junior US Open finals, to Bianca Andreescu, the 16 year old Canadian player who ranks 235 WTA (another “devilish teen”, who won the tournament without losing a set and having beaten, beside Kayla Day, 3 other players ranking around 200th spot). As per Kayla, there is not much else to say: the fact that she started 2016 in 1000 spot WTA and ended last year in the 195 spot explains it all; plus, she achieved this whilst playing a lot, in the meantime, on the Junior tour. The finals reached in a 25K is not a surprise at all, then, but it’s just what one can expect from her; indeed not even her loss against Andreescu – as tough as it was (6-4 6-1) – can be defined as a surprise, since the Canadian is as strong as Kayla: last year Andreescu was able to win a first 25k and to reach the finals in a 50k. Whilst in the 25k played in mid-February this year, in Surprise, Arizona, she lost 5-7 in the third set to current 109 in the world Duque Marino. And do not forget that in 2016 the girl reached a best ranking of 3 in the Junior Tour, on which still she enjoys to compete.
This little final digression on Andreescu does not fit the title of my piece, I know; I deliberately decided to sacrifice coherence in her honour. In the next piece we will see how Masarova, Anisimova (already mentioned here) and Pervushina are doing; and who knows whoever else.
Tommy Hemp
