Quiz question: What does former British Futures player Oliver Golding have in common with Andy Murray and 2014 Wimbledon semi-finalist Grigor Dimitrov?
Answer: They all won the US Open junior tournament.
This statistic reminds us that there are no guarantees in tennis. Director Luca Guadagnino captured this point well in his recent film Challengers, in which the fates of two promising young players diverge radically upon their arrival on the main circuit.
Guadagnino also recognized the relative value of instinctive talent and daily application by making his character Art — the dogged self-improver — a major champion, while the mercurial shot-maker Patrick finds himself sleeping in his car during a series of country club mini-events.
All of which brings us to Charlie Robertson. The 17-year-old Scot, which was supervised by the Murray familycame out on Friday to play his junior semi-final against Norwegian Nicolai Budkov Kjaer.
As a dress rehearsal for Jack Draper’s semi-final later in the day, this match was not very encouraging. Robertson’s diminutive stature (he claims to be 5’8″ but looks shorter) was a clear disadvantage in his 6’6″-6’6″ defeat to the burly 6’6″ Scandinavian.
Can early success be detrimental to aspiring players?
But the value of winning these junior events is debatable. On the other hand, they could help to gather a few more sponsors for a promising youngster and bring the big agencies – IMG, for example, or Octagon – to the negotiating table for a possible management contract.
But there is also the danger of placing too many expectations on the shoulders of young people, while simultaneously placing a giant target on your own back.
Take Laura Robson, for example: a player who rose to fame very early, after her unprecedented feat of winning the women’s event at Wimbledon at the age of 14.
It’s not as if Robson’s senior career has been a failure: she peaked at world No. 27 and reached the second week of Wimbledon and the US Open. But she might have been better off without all those scrutiny and media hype who followed his every move.
Emma Raducanu, whose victory in the main tournament of the US Open arriving just nine months after he ceased to be eligible for juniors, now finds himself in a similar position – but to an exaggerated degree.
Stojsavljevic wins women’s final
It wasn’t just Robertson who carried the British flag all the way to the semi-finals here at Flushing Meadows. On the girls’ side, we lost reigning Orange Bowl champion Hannah Klugman, our most anticipated teenager, in the second round. But her training partners Mingge Xu and Mika Stojsavljevic fought back to knock off the No. 2 and No. 1 seeds respectively en route to the semi-finals.
On Friday, Stojsavljevic went one better by becoming the first British girl to reach the junior final since Heather Watson, who won the title here in 2009. At 6ft 1in and wearing size 10 shoes, Stojsavljevic has a stature that Robertson would surely envy, and she uses it to intimidate the ball.
She exited her semi-final against No. 3 seed Iva Jovic with nine aces and 36 clean winners, while the powerful Jovic hit just six winners. It was only a brief moment of brain freeze in the second set, when Stojsavljevic double-faulted three times in quick succession to give up a break, that extended the contest to three sets in a 6-0, 3-6, 6-3 victory.
The predictive value of women’s Grand Slam tournaments is somewhat higher. We rarely look at the list of past champions and ask “Who?”, as we might with Zsombir Piros (boys champion, 2017 Australian Open) or Geoffrey Blancaneaux (2016 French Open).
Granted, not all winning girls become serial champions, but almost all of them at least manage to try their luck on the WTA Tour, rather than in second-tier Futures and Challengers events.
It’s easy enough to explain. Women reach physical maturity earlier, so the power gap between women’s and men’s events is much less noticeable. Klugman, for example, has been serving at nearly 115 mph for some time, a speed that would put her in the top half of the main draw.
In the boys’ category, however, there is a big gap in style between the different age categories. It is much easier to make a career out of speed, agility and defensive skills at the junior level, where consistency is the most valuable asset. On the main circuit, however, you have to be able to scare your opponents. With the exception of a unicorn like Diego Schwartzman (1.70 m), no one makes it into the top 20 without having punching power.
