Well, Laura's injured and is out for at least the next week. Since I like you guys and there's going to be precious little Laura related discussion until she's back, or more information about her injury comes out I'm making this thread so we can talk about other things. Or ignore it and pretend I never posted it, whichever you'd prefer really.
And regarding her post-Miami schedule, I really hope she enters Kuala Lumpur, same week of Fed Cup. Is Kris Plis still the only top 100 player to have entered there, Spiceboy?
Speaking as a cheerleader, there's a reason nobody wears their cheer gear outside of competitions. There are rhinestones. I think that should tell you all you need to know.
What's worn at training is a t-shirt, Nike Pro shorts and special shoes.
Yay team! Nice routine. How popular is cheering as a sport in the UK? I know there's an international grouping each year at the championships in the US but wasn't sure how serious the competition was to get to there was.
Indulge me. Back in her junior days Laura was sometimes credited on draw sheets as "Laura M. Robson". I've never come across her middle name on the web. What does the 'M' stand for? Marie? Miranda? Myrtle?
Also I think I've mentioned previously that I'm a cheerleader. Recently (I say recently, it was in July) we went to a competition down in Bournemouth. It was the team I was the final ever for the team competition after over 10 years, so pretty emotional. If you're interested in seeing what it is that I do, here's a video from that competition.
Happy Holidays everyone. I hope you have a great time celebrating whatever you do and get to spend some quality time with friends and family. If you don't celebrate anything... well I hope you have a truly great December 25 regardless!
So, I went into GM today and saw a thread that was actually interesting... well the news was. The content of the thread was shit, but that's to be expected.
The WTA are interested in having a mandatory, international team competition to kick off the season. This is honestly interesting for one reason: the WTA's continuing crusade against ITF. This is something that's been going on for years, but has only recently become totally blatant but it's not something I see discussed very often. There's the Challenger events, which are clearly intended to kill off the 100Ks slowly but surely.
Then there's the ongoing war against the Fed cup. By massively disincentivising dropping out from WTA events to play FedCup, scheduling Bogota during playoff week, and the replacement of the Tournament of Champions (which results in many of the players who are likely to be in the FedCup final playing in China the week before, which makes the latter event a less thrilling prospect.
And that brings me onto this planned event. Under the current plans for the event, 3 of the players in the Hopman Cup would have been unable to participate due to scheduling conflicts. Additionally, if you've already got an international team event, then that takes away from the FedCup, as the top women opened the year with an international team tournament.
Maybe I'm seeing connections that aren't there but still worth noting.