[2] Olivia Weaver (USA) 3-0 Melissa Alves (FRA) 11-7, 11-4, 5-2 rtd (26m)
What a shame for the French woman today as she was starting to really find a way to push the American under pressure by taking the game to her, volleying everything under the sun, and forcing Olivia to do a heck of a lot of work.
But in the middle of the second, Melissa clearly displayed signs of dizziness, as she was going to faint. She stopped competing, and went to her corner to try and settle down. Grégoire Marche, who was coaching her, felt she was going to pass out – I could see it from my seat in the crowd, went to fetch the physio and then went to the ref asking for 3 minutes injury times
“Did she ask for injury time? I don’t seen any evidence she is injured. Tell her to come and see me.” And when Melissa managed to stand up to come and talk to the ref, he repeated that “no evidence she was not well”.
The French girl therefore had to come back on court, but as she again nearly passed out on court, she had to forfeit the game, and was then put on the floor at the back of the glasscourt, with her legs up to try and get the blood back to a normal flow.
Olivia
“It seemed at a couple of points throughout the match she wasn’t herself when I looked over. Melissa [Alves] is one of my closest friends on Tour, we train a lot, we know each other’s games well and I could tell something wasn’t right physically and I’m not quite sure what it is. She wasn’t feeling great and it’s better to be safe than sorry, I hope it’s nothing serious and I hope it’s a speedy recovery. Never the way you want to get through a match, especially against a friend who is such a good player.
“This is my first event in about three or four weeks. I’ve been here a couple of days now, and I’ve been excited to get on this court. It’s funny playing Melissa here as last time we were on this court, I think I won a 90-minute battle, 17-15, and that was to make it to my first round of 16 so it was a very memorable match for me. It’s always a blast playing Melissa, it’s always clean, she’s a great player and today I was just trying to get a feel for the court as it’s really lively. I was really pleased with my movement and I felt like I got my feet going early on. Hopefully I can play better and better as I go.
“Working with Rod Martin has been great. We’ve done a lot of work on the physical side, playing at a faster pace was a big focus throughout the summer, physical training so I can play at that pace for longer and longer and do it consistently. I definitely had a few kinks to my swing that he’s helped me iron out. Always a work in progress and always things to work on, but it’s been a blast working with him, I’ve learned a lot from him and it’s been great.”
