Pete Dickinson has qualified for the IRTPA Players’ Championship main draw, defeating Jack Josephs in Aiken on Saturday, while Ben Dickinson also progressed with a walkover from James Stout.
The only match of the preliminary round was between the Royal Tennis Court’s Jack Josephs and New York’s Pete Dickinson. Dickinson was off to a flying start, leaping at full stretch to volley anything before the back wall and take time out of Josephs’s structured play. He stretched out a two-game lead and was ahead in the third before Josephs shored up his defences, betting that consistency would beat out extravagance. He took four of the next five games as the match evened out. Joseph eked out the 5/4 game before having the rub of the green go his way in the tenth — Dickinson’s shot hit the bandeau direct into the last gallery while Josephs got his side-wall to nick out. Dickinson lost the set with a ball that struck the highest part of the net and refused to drop over.
Dickinson leant further into his attack for the second set, with the increase in intensity catching Josephs off guard as the latter relaxed after winning a tight set. Dickinson took the first three games before Josephs could pin him down again by putting ball after ball down the backhand side. Josephs battled hard to stay in touch, but the early deficit proved too much to overcome. His comeback at 2/5 40-15 was cut short by a tight not-up call on a back wall half-volley, leaving him looking around in disbelief — yet it gave Dickinson the service side from which he was able to close out the set.
Josephs didn’t start the third set in a good mood, arguing with the marker over a ball he thought had been carried during the first game. Even so, Dickinson was still slightly overreaching in his shots, allowing Josephs to take the first two games of the final set. Josephs almost extended it to three — playing deuce and with a short chase already in the bank — but Dickinson’s quick hands recovered a ball off the bottom of the grille bandeau, winning the point before blasting a dedans to beat the short chase. It kicked his set into gear. Josephs was ahead in the following game as well, but a few unforced errors gave the advantage to Dickinson, who won four games in a row. Down 2/4 0-30 and with the match and a main draw place slipping away, Josephs found his cleanest series of strokes in the set. A tight deuce game ensued, with Dickinson’s tambour play from both ends coming up against Josephs’s cuts down the backhand side. Josephs eventually found a short chase to take the game. The following game was just as tight, with long, cagey rallies. Eventually, Josephs succumbed to a couple of backhand errors, putting Dickinson 5/3 ahead. Yet Dickinson could not close it out, with Josephs battling for every ball. Josephs saved match point in the 5/4 game, playing chase better than 2, with a force that caught the neck of Dickinson’s racket. The match went to a deciding game instead. Dickinson laid two short chases midway through the game which Josephs was unable to beat. Dickinson finished the game with a cross-court forehand that died under the grille.
Dickinson’s win puts him both into the Satellite quarter-final as well as entry into the IRTPA Players’ Championship main draw. The other match scheduled for the day was awarded to Ben Dickinson, who received a walkover from James Stout. The Satellite continues on Sunday with the four quarter-finals, while the main draw begins on Wednesday.
Match results:
11:00 AM: Ben Dickinson def James Stout w/o
12:30 PM: Jack Josephs lost to Pete Dickinson 6/4 3/6 5/6
Order of play for Sunday (all times EDT):
10:30 AM: Vaughan Hamilton (2) vs Pete Dickinson
12:15 PM: Josh Dodgson (3) vs Josh Smith
5:00 PM: Max Trueman (4) vs Ben Dickinson
6:30 PM: Lewis Williams (1) vs Henry Henman