ANDY Murray may be lost to this year’s Wimbledon but he still has some chips in the game.
So it was yesterday when Katie Swan, one of the first players signed up to the Scot’s 77 Sports Management Agency, sailed serenely into the second round with a 6-2, 6-2 triumph against Irina-Camelia Begu, the No.36 seed from Romania. It was comfortably the biggest win of the 19-year-old’s career.
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After celebrating the moment with family and friends, the third-youngest player in the 128-strong draw this year celebrated went off into the night pledging to consult her phone to see if her mentor had been in touch, before settling down to a spot of Love Island, the ITV2 reality show which she mischievously revealed this week that the former world No.1 is also a sneaky fan of. As for the biggest cheque of her career, the £63,000 for being a first round winner, could go towards a new case for her phone. Which only leaves the remaining £62,990 to be accounted for. “I haven’t actually checked my phone yet, so I don’t know if he [Murray] has been in touch,” said Swan. “What will I do tonight? I’m staying in the house just five minutes away in Wimbledon with my family, my parents and my brother, and Diego [Veronelli, her coach] is there as well.
“Some really close family friends and my best friend from school came up today. I don’t know if my friends are still here but hopefully I can see them a little bit. Maybe a bit of the “Love Island” as well tonight too. I definitely need a new phone case, so that’s the first thing. My phone case is, like, falling apart. That’s what I’m going to do first. After that, I don’t know yet.”
Whatever Swan is doing right now, it would seem prudent to keep doing it. Born in Bristol, brought up in Kansas, the youngster has been known to the Murray clan since the days when Judy was the Great Britain Under-10 supremo and Andy was handing out the medals after a tournament in Raynes Park. Fast forward nine years and here she was celebrating a moment she had long dreamed of.
“I definitely wouldn’t say I was nerveless,” she said. “In fact I was really nervous. I was shaking, more because I was playing -- like, this is my favourite tournament in the world. I knew that I was close to winning. I just wanted it so much. The good thing was that I kept playing my game throughout, even when I felt those nerves.”
There was enough resting on this match without the extra friction caused by Begu’s part in a bad-tempered Fed Cup tie against Romania back in April 2017. Swan was a callow reserve and hitting partner as that tie descended into chaos, mainly caused by the antics of Ilie Nastase, who called Konta and captain Anne Keothavong “f****** bitches”. Konta took exception and play was briefly suspended before she returned to win the rubber and Begu felt she had exploited the situation to her advantage. “I did experience that. But to be honest, I didn’t think much about it today. It was just another opponent. I did what I had to do.”
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Of the 11 Brits taking part this fortnight – now Murray has gone – Swan was the only one of the four in action who lives to fight another day.
At one stage it looked as though Cameron Norrie, the kilted kiwi with the Glaswegian dad, would join her. Born in Johannesburg, brought up in Auckland before becoming a student in the USA, his was a strange battle of Britain against Aljaz Bedene, the Slovenian who spent eight years living in Welwyn Garden City and playing under the British flag, in front of a busy Court No.14 crowd.But advantageous situations in the next two sets couldn’t stop them both going to the big-serving Bedene in tie-breakers. The left-hander kept pushing to the last but the Slovenian had the answers and ground out a 4-6, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4), 6-4 win. "I think I handled the occasion a lot better than I did when I played here last year," he said. "I played well, I was aggressive when I needed to be, he was just more clutch than me in the tie breaks and showed his experience. But I am happy with the way I played today. I have no regrets.”
Elsewhere, there was no disgrace either that Liam Broady went down to a resurgent Milos Raonic, the former finalist here from Montenegro on Court No.1, and Harriet Dart went down in three sets to former world No.1 Karolina Pliskova.
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