Anastasia Potapova became the first player to reach a 2014 Junior Masters final after scoring a straightforward 6-3 6-4 win over Britain’s Francesca Jones. Potapova, the European 14 & Under #1, is looking to add the Junior Masters title to the European Championships crown won in Pilsen in June and was feeling better than in her quarterfinal match, after which she required medical treatment. “I am happy now because I won and I think I played pretty good. So tomorrow it’s the finals and I hope I will win again,” she told us.
Potapova will next play Adela Joldic of Bosnia & Herzegovina, who fought back from 0-3 down in games to win a nail-biting second set tie break and edge past Romania’s Selma Cadar 6-2 7-6(7). “I’m exhausted, but happy,” she said. “The second set was very long but now I will focus on preparing for tomorrow.”
Top seed Alexey Zakharov of Russia handed Nicola Kuhn a place in the boy’s final when he was forced to retire after suffering a left abductor sprain at the end of the second set of their match, which opened the day’s play on centre court. Zakharov started well, taking the first set 6-3, but could not carry on once his German rival had levelled the match.
Kuhn will next play Serbia’s Marko Miladinovic, who came from a set down for a second consecutive day to beat Daniel Michalski of Poland. He explained that he had extra motivation for tomorrow’s final as he wanted to keep alive a winning streak on Italian soil. “I’m very happy because this means I am still unbeaten in Italy after winning in Treviso earlier this year,” he said.
In the 16 & Under event, defending boys’ champion Mate Valkusz of Hungary overcame a lapse of concentration in the first set to beat Rrezart Cungu. The top seed led 5-1 in the first set before the player from Montenegro stormed back to lead 6-5. Valkusz recovered to take the tie-break before storming through the second set for the loss of just one game. “It was not an easy match, but it was a short one.” I did my best in the first set, I lost a little control at 5-1 and then it was 5-6. I don’t know what happened but I recovered and after that it was ok. It was not an easy match but a short one.”
Bojan Jankulovski booked his place in the final with a straightforward 6-2 6-2 win over Vladyslav Lobak of Ukraine. The second-seeded Macedonian expressed satisfaction with his game afterwards, explaining; “Today I played better than yesterday, it was an easier match than yesterday. Until 2-2 it was very tough but after that I broke and I found it easy after that. In the second set I was leading all the time so I felt comfortable.”
The 16 & Under girls’ final will see Germany’s Eva-Marie Voracek take on Kristina Miletic of Serbia. Voracek extended her win/loss record on the Tennis Europe Junior Tour this season to 33-7 with a 7-5 6-3 win over Elizaveta Volodko of Russia.
Miletic had to work a little harder to overcome Hungary’s Csenge Furak, winning a 16-point first set tie break before establishing her dominance. “I played a bit better than yesterday,” she said. “I saved some set points to win the tie break 9-7 and then I started to play more aggressively in the second set.”
All four finals scheduled for Sunday will be the first meetings in each match-up. Play is scheduled to start at 9am, though with rainy weather forecast contingency plans are being made to move the matches indoors if necessary.
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Draws and Schedule
Boys 14 & Under | Girls 14 & Under
Boys 16 & Under | Girls 16 & Under
Order of Play