Ground

In what is becoming an annual visit, for the fourth consecutive year I took myself up to Ilkley to enjoy a day of the Ilkley Trophy, an ATP Challenger and WTA125 Tour event.

This year I could just get a ground admission ticket, so I spent most of the time on Court #1, where I watched:

Eala v Ryser (Women’s Singles) 6-1, 6-2.
Brooksby v Crawford (Men’s Singles) 4-6, 5-7.
Dart/Lumsden v Marina/Appleton (Women’s Doubles) 6-4, 6-3.

In breaks in play, by turning around from my seat at the top of the stand, I had a good view over Court #4, so also saw a fair bit of the three matches there too.

As it happened, all the matches on #1 were over in straight sets, meaning play had finished well before 3:00. However, they soon opened up the Centre Court to ground tickets, so I was able to watch the closing two sets of a much more competitive match between two British rising stars Jack Pinnington Jones and Billy Harris (main image), with the former progressing to the quarter finals 7-6, 4-6, 6-3 after a three hours.

Rain had been forecast to arrive at some point during the afternoon, but there ended up being only one brief shower and just a five minute pause in play. It was quite windy though, making conditions quite challenging for the players.

Stay tuned to this channel for more tennis coverage from Nottingham next week.