Rolle it, girl! A special day at the 2007 US Open Tennis

If you are involved in sports, you often wait for those days when you feel that you are witnessing something great, or someone who is bursting onto the scene. You may not be right, but the sense that this is happening is something special. Today, at Flushing Meadows, 22-year old, Ahsha Rolle, had one of those days. She had entered the tournament as a "wild card", being ranked as the world #109, and had already caused a major upset by beating the #17 seed in the tournament in the 1st round (see blog from August 28). Today, she played a 20-year old Italian, Karin Knapp, who is ranked #57 in the world, and won again. I focus on Ahsha mainly because, though listed as American, her family hail from The Bahamas (the islands of Exuma and Andros).

When Ahsha played on Monday, many things were different, not least the atmosphere, as she played on one of the outside courts, without all the hoopla that is associated with playing on the big stage "show" court. Today, she had to deal with the big stage, playing on the Grandstand court, and did so very well. This is not the place for a play-by-play analysis, but here is a flavour of the key parts of the match. After a rocky 1st set, which Ahsha lost 3-6, the 2nd set was tense and delicately poised at 3-2 in favor of Ahsha. The next game was for me the turning point, as the players fought to win and the score was tied at 40-40, 10 times, if I recall correctly, and the game seemed to go on for at least 10 minutes before Ahsha got the winning point. Ahsha wasted many chances but kept on getting help from her opponent's inability to serve well. When the game resumed, things remained tense and Ahsha tried everyone's hearts dearly by wasting more chances to win easily, though finally got the set at 6-4. The third set was equally tense, but one had the feeling that the Italian realized that she was up against an opponent who had found a deep conviction to win and it seemed clear that the tables had been turned.

When Ahsha won the final point of the set, she collapsed on the court and enjoyed her moment of glory sprawled alongside her racket, perhaps because the match had been over 2 1/2 hours (the longest women's match of the tournament so far).
She soon made the customary waves and started to enjoy the victory as she should. On Monday night, she had been ready to sign almost anything presented to her and had stayed on court a long time trying to satisfy the fans. This time, she was not allowed the same luxury, but she did a good amount of greeting and appreciated the well-wishers from The Bahamas, Barbados and Jamaica. Her parents, grandmother, other close relatives, coach and friends were there and understandably ecstatic.

Ahsha has a very tough 3rd round match ahead, against Russia's Dinara Safina, the #15 seed. One could say that nothing should be expected of Ahsha, but I'm beginning to wonder if we should expect much more of her. This could be her time to burst out.