On Murray Mountain

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We were back in Melbourne after another overnight on the XPT for the start of the 1 Day cricket series. As the Australian press put it with the advent of this series and the Twenty20....now for some real Pommie bashing..... and so it proved, as Gilchrist in particular proceeded to test the catching skills of the 78,625 crowd. After the contest the became irrelevant, the so called "feral minority" of the cricketing public (probably numbering 20,000) proceeded to make everybody's life uncomfortable by hurling plastic beer glasses (not always empty) and other debris to hand during the irritating Mexican waves.

We thought it best to change sports at this point - so it was off to the Australian Open tennis. The qualifying rounds at Melbourne Park are free and in amongst the hopefuls scrambling for the final places in the singles, the big names are on court getting last minute practice on the surface in between their promotional obligations.

The first day of the competition on Monday 15th had an unexpected twist, as the battle for Balkan supremacy re-emerged at an international tennis tournament. Tennis Australia described them as "unruly patrons", but it had all the hallmarks of Dinamo Zagreb v Red Star Belgrade complete with flares and assorted weapons as they laid into each other!

We've listed the matches watched for the record as follows:

MS Andy Roddick (Seed 6) beat Joe Tsonga 6-7, 7-6, 6-3, 6-3
WS Nicole Vaidasova (Seed 10) beat Jill Craybass 6-4, 5-7, 6-1
MS Mardy Fish beat Ivan Ljubicic (Seed 4) 4-6, 7-6, 6-4, 6-4
WS Nadia Petrova (Seed 5) beat Tam Tamasugan 6-3, 6-2

The twist on the second day was the temperature - it reached 41 degrees by 4.24 p.m. (with on court temperatures apparently topping 50 ) and play was suspended for several hours until at 8.15 p.m. it was below the 35 degrees for play to continue. When it did resume, they played on under lights in some cases up to the early hours of the next day. Whilst a lot of people just melted all day and saw no tennis, we'd checked the weather forecast and knew that there was a possibility of a play suspension. We got a seat early on the Vodafone Arena and they just closed the roof after the first game, turned on the aircon and kept playing. We were also fortunate that they switched Andy Murray's match into that court, but by that stage most people had wilted and gone home. He crushed a Spaniard in front of a sparse crowd and four Scotland flags.

Once again, we've listed the matched watched for the record as follows:

WS Ana Ivanovic (Seed 13) beat Vania King 6-2, 6-0
MS Oliver Rochus beat Chris Guccione 3-6, 7-5, 7-5, 6-7, 9-7
WS Martina Hingis (Seed 6) beat Nathalie Dechy 6-0, 6-2
MS James Blake (Seed 5) beat Carlos Moya 7-6, 6-2, 6-4
MS Andy Murray (Seed 15) beat Alberto Martin 6-0, 6-0, 6-1

The time in Australia has come to an end and we are off to Asia on Thursday 18th.

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Photos

Rod Laver Arena
The view of the Rod Laver Arena, if you only have a Ground Pass!

Vodafone Arena
....by far and away the best place to be on Day 2, when temperatures soared to 39 degrees

Australian Open
Alize Cornet makes the 1st Round draw

Australian Open
...another one out of the Eastern European tennis factory practising to dominate the world.

Australian Open
Germany's Kristina Barrois crashes out in the 3rd Qualifying Round

MCG
78,625 at the MCG for the first One Day International against England

Shrine of Rememberance
View of downtown from the balcony of the Shrine

Telstra Dome
Flying cows outside the Telstra Dome

Andy Roddick
Men's No 6 Seed

Nicole Vaidisova
Women's No 10 Seed

Ivan Ljubicic
Men's No 4 Seed about to crash out of the tournament

Martina Hingis
Women's No 6 Seed

Andy Murray
No 15 Seed....looks a bit focussed and so it proved - his opponent only won one game.

Vodafone Arena
A sparse crowd at the conclusion of Andy Murray's match