[oh yeah i guess]

Very encouraging match everywhere excluding the DFitis. Lovely W/UE stats. Made very few needless errors off the ground, and hit some very nice winners.

I watched the Kuznetsova match and based on that, Vika should win this.

[hurricanejeanne]

Only fuckery on the second serve. Hopefully that means she was going for them more considering ESPN was busy showing the men's match.

Sveta will be tough but I think Vika should win that if she keeps her head. She's much more aggressive than Caro.

[oh yeah i guess]

Most of her DFs landed a little past the service box, as opposed to the net.

[Vikapower]

Well it was a case of Victoria needing a wake up call, she was totally asleep in the 2 first rounds.

Much better, proactive, assertive, hitting with purpose whatever describes best..., aggressive serving (much better racket head speed and penetration, at least on her first serve) [...] the tournament really starts for me here.

Victoria really needs to develop a much more effective spin on her second serve (slice, kick..) or whatever, her second serve is not that fast and she's obliged to play with the length in the box a lot for her not to get attacked which forcefully results in many loss of control and double-faults (outside of the box) -- her second serve is really too plain and she clearly doesn't have the control yet to place it as aggressively as she would like.

Anyways, I'm extremely happy Kuznetsova won, should give her certainly a good challenge and help her fine-tune the needed stuffs before that much anticipated SF.

[Patrick345]

Serve still shit. Ground game much better. The serve still need to be much better for the next few matches.

[Igor_Biscan]

Much sharper today, got into position quicker especially on the backhand, still can do better though. First serve was pretty good by her standards, regularly pushing above 100mph.

Vesnina played quite well for 10 games then fell away.

[architennis92]

Hi, been lurking for a while, I've been a big vika fan for a few years but reached fanatical stage after I got to see her win her first grand slam live last year.

Just thought I would start posting because I am in Melbourne again this year and have been able to see vika practice a few times as well as her first 2 matches so thought I could share some things. Her practice on the first day was pretty good esteemed pretty happy. Managed to hit Sam with a forehand right where a man doesn't want to be hit lol. It was pretty funny she burst out laughing and put her hand over her mouth to hide it then asked Sam if he was ok then laughed some more. The next practice I saw was the day before the Hampton match and she didn't look too happy with her game. She got angry and stopped grunting and just started pummeling the ball on a couple of occasions. Honestly made me question how much power she sacrifices for consistency because she was absolutely smacking it. Last practice I saw was yesterday, was in a much better mood and did a lot of work on the forehand making sure she accelerated her racket head through the ball. Also there was no red foo present for this one which is a bonus even though I have to say he was very supportive and totally into both of the matches I saw. Evenyelled out to her a few times, so that's something. He seems like a nice guy and was good with the fans even though I absolutely detest his music.

Also have to say vika was very good with the fans, signing for quite a while after all her practises. And even gave out a few balls and sweatbands the other day. Anyway they are just a few of my observations, I have more but don't want to turn this into a really long essay.

[Exordes]

Originally Posted by Igor_Biscan

Vesnina played quite well for 10 games then fell away.

In theory only Vika and Aga have beaten Elena Vesnina this year, still 10-2 for her after three tournaments.

[Igor_Biscan]

Originally Posted by architennis92

Hi, been lurking for a while, I've been a big vika fan for a few years but reached fanatical stage after I got to see her win her first grand slam live last year.

Just thought I would start posting because I am in Melbourne again this year and have been able to see vika practice a few times as well as her first 2 matches so thought I could share some things. Her practice on the first day was pretty good esteemed pretty happy. Managed to hit Sam with a forehand right where a man doesn't want to be hit lol. It was pretty funny she burst out laughing and put her hand over her mouth to hide it then asked Sam if he was ok then laughed some more. The next practice I saw was the day before the Hampton match and she didn't look too happy with her game. She got angry and stopped grunting and just started pummeling the ball on a couple of occasions. Honestly made me question how much power she sacrifices for consistency because she was absolutely smacking it. Last practice I saw was yesterday, was in a much better mood and did a lot of work on the forehand making sure she accelerated her racket head through the ball. Also there was no red foo present for this one which is a bonus even though I have to say he was very supportive and totally into both of the matches I saw. Evenyelled out to her a few times, so that's something. He seems like a nice guy and was good with the fans even though I absolutely detest his music.

Also have to say vika was very good with the fans, signing for quite a while after all her practises. And even gave out a few balls and sweatbands the other day. Anyway they are just a few of my observations, I have more but don't want to turn this into a really long essay.

Thanks for posting this and welcome. You're welcome to post more observations (MORE VIKA)

You're right she does have power in reserve, you see it sometimes when she's tired or a bit injured and wants to end the points quickly like in Tokyo last year or late on in the Istanbul semifinal. I'm glad she plays sensibly most of the time, trying to find a balance between aggression and reliability, as it's good enough to put away 98% of players she faces.

I think she recognised last year after the olympics that this isn't going to work against Serena and she needs to go more all out. Almost worked in New York, and the YEC match was more competitive than the score suggested, considering she'd just come off the Kerber marathon and Serena was fresh.

[Natural Joe]

Originally Posted by architennis92

Hi, been lurking for a while, I've been a big vika fan for a few years but reached fanatical stage after I got to see her win her first grand slam live last year.

Just thought I would start posting because I am in Melbourne again this year and have been able to see vika practice a few times as well as her first 2 matches so thought I could share some things. Her practice on the first day was pretty good esteemed pretty happy. Managed to hit Sam with a forehand right where a man doesn't want to be hit lol. It was pretty funny she burst out laughing and put her hand over her mouth to hide it then asked Sam if he was ok then laughed some more. The next practice I saw was the day before the Hampton match and she didn't look too happy with her game. She got angry and stopped grunting and just started pummeling the ball on a couple of occasions. Honestly made me question how much power she sacrifices for consistency because she was absolutely smacking it. Last practice I saw was yesterday, was in a much better mood and did a lot of work on the forehand making sure she accelerated her racket head through the ball. Also there was no red foo present for this one which is a bonus even though I have to say he was very supportive and totally into both of the matches I saw. Evenyelled out to her a few times, so that's something. He seems like a nice guy and was good with the fans even though I absolutely detest his music.

Also have to say vika was very good with the fans, signing for quite a while after all her practises. And even gave out a few balls and sweatbands the other day. Anyway they are just a few of my observations, I have more but don't want to turn this into a really long essay.

Hi.

I'm sure everybody here welcomes long essays on Vika. It's particularly interesting for those of us (most of us I guess) who are not on site to support her. So please keep posting.

On today's match: Vika did very well to fight off Vesnina when she started to play better. It's one of Vika's great qualities to win with two breadstick or a similar one-sided score when you have the feeling that her opponent was actually more competitive. However, one thing that got me worried was when she played some really good points to go 40-0 in the first game of the second set and still got broken. I feared she might lose her focus again like in the match against Hampton but she did better this time (might have learned from her previous round). She absolutely needs to avoid games like that though if she wants to reach at least the SF. And then there was her second serve which was a mess once again. On a more positive note, she also hit some nice first serves especially out wide and hit 4 aces which isn't bad for her standards in such a short match.

[Break My Rapture]

Originally Posted by architennis92

Hi, been lurking for a while, I've been a big vika fan for a few years but reached fanatical stage after I got to see her win her first grand slam live last year.

Just thought I would start posting because I am in Melbourne again this year and have been able to see vika practice a few times as well as her first 2 matches so thought I could share some things. Her practice on the first day was pretty good esteemed pretty happy. Managed to hit Sam with a forehand right where a man doesn't want to be hit lol. It was pretty funny she burst out laughing and put her hand over her mouth to hide it then asked Sam if he was ok then laughed some more. The next practice I saw was the day before the Hampton match and she didn't look too happy with her game. She got angry and stopped grunting and just started pummeling the ball on a couple of occasions. Honestly made me question how much power she sacrifices for consistency because she was absolutely smacking it. Last practice I saw was yesterday, was in a much better mood and did a lot of work on the forehand making sure she accelerated her racket head through the ball. Also there was no red foo present for this one which is a bonus even though I have to say he was very supportive and totally into both of the matches I saw. Evenyelled out to her a few times, so that's something. He seems like a nice guy and was good with the fans even though I absolutely detest his music.

Also have to say vika was very good with the fans, signing for quite a while after all her practises. And even gave out a few balls and sweatbands the other day. Anyway they are just a few of my observations, I have more but don't want to turn this into a really long essay.

Welcome. Nice to read your observations, I sometimes also ask myself why Vika doesn't hit the ball harder because I know she can.

When was the last time Vika hit 4 aces in such a short match? Must've been a year ago, hopefully the serve keeps improving.

[saul1333]

http://www.breakingnews.ie/bizarre/t...ck-581995.html

[VIKA-GOAT]

Originally Posted by saul1333

http://www.breakingnews.ie/bizarre/t...ck-581995.html

Ohmygod, REALLY?

[Temperenka]

I opened the article, saw the headline and closed it.

I have been a bit disconnected throughout the AO so far... can someone update me on the rankings? Is Serena pretty much guaranteed #1? Will Vika still be ahead of Maria if she makes the SF and Maria makes the final?

Thanks for any help.

[Andreas]

At least he is only referred to as her friend