5/14/17:
"Kris hosts 4 at C.G. on Mother's Day Sunday!":
As it turns out, there was one session of GTA Mother's Day Sunday Tennis: a small one in the morning at The Cedar Grove Courts hosted by the most frequent host, "The K Man" Kris Srinivasan.
A little later in the morning, "Big Kaz" Mike Kazlauskas sent an e-mail to the group once he arrived at Albion Park in Clifton and was surprised to see nobody there (he must have missed the Friday memo from "Hollywood" Frank Samara stating that he would not be hosting a session there no matter the weather). "Spin Doctor" Dan Martinelli said he did a drive-by past Albion (not sure what time) only to see no one there either.
We now turn this report over to Kris.
It was a beautiful Sunday and we capitalized on the lovely weather to play some GTA Tennis in the morning as Suresh Poosala would be flying back later in the afternoon. The morning session started around 10:30am and ended by 1:15pm.
The Cedar Grove Results:
Sairaj Srinivasan over Suresh Poosala, 7-5! No Aces.
Sairaj and Suresh were the first to hit the tennis courts and a Singles One-Setter between them was already planned. We were curious to see if Sairaj would play a consistent game and, more importantly, handle Suresh's smart and tricky play. As expected, Suresh did get to Sairaj with his slices and placements. To Sairaj's credit, he was not flustered but figured out his opponent's game after the initial three games.
When I hit the courts with Jay, the match was in balance tied at 3-All, but soon it would be 4-3 with Suresh leading. A tight game ended in 4-All, but it was Suresh again leading 5-4. It was all confident play by the kiddo as he ramped up his game and went onto win the next three games. Besides an attacking backhand, Sairaj came up with some attractive forehand shots as well. He was mixing it up well by showing variety in his play to showcase multiple skill sets. It was a well-deserved win for Sairaj that was acknowledged graciously by Suresh.
Kris Srinivasan/Jay Srinivasan over Sairaj Srinivasan/Suresh Poosala, 7-5! No Aces.
We started off planning to play a Best of 3 Sets to see who was going to come out stronger. It was a break of serve in the first round as each player lost his serve. Jay, on his second service game, double faulted thrice for an easy break. Sairaj was the first to hold and we were catching up from there on in until we got to hold and get a couple of breaks to lead again and ended by winning the last game which was a lengthy battle.
Sairaj Srinivasan/Suresh Poosala over Kris Srinivasan/Jay Srinivasan, 6-4! No Aces.
It was another set that saw a see-saw battle for many points. It was a good start with everyone holding their serves. We then lost our footing and were behind 2-4. We could have easily gone down 2-5 as the next game went for multiple Break Points on my serve. We dug in hard and ended up holding the crucial game. Careless errors cost us the next game. Down 3-5, we needed the break on Sairaj's serve. It was a marathon battle as the game went to multiple Deuces. We had 8 Break Points and blew them all! Some of them were easy put-aways. We then saved a couple of Match Points. The penultimate point was an agonizing miss of my topspin shot which was played carefully, but went just long. The winning point was a lovely winner from Suresh as Jay returned Sairaj's serve straight to Suresh. We could have won this game quite a few times, but the most painful loss of point was Sairaj's return to my deep shot that wouldn't have cleared the net but Jay put it away going across our opponent's court. But it was good to see both teams win a set, each thus keeping the match in balance.
Samara's Notes: My guess is that Kris is trying to say Jay broke the plane of the net to hit the return from Sairaj which would not have cleared the net anyway. Not sure exactly what Kris means in that breakdown of "the most painful loss of point." Anyway, we go back to Kris for his final thoughts.
We had to wind up for the day as Suresh would be flying off shortly. It turned out to be good fighting tennis all through the day with plenty of noises echoing off the courts. Cheers!
Samara's Notes: As always, thanks to Kris for all he does for the GTA up at Cedar Grove.
All the best,
Frank Samara
862-596-3354
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