Fed Cup: Overhead, Mommy!

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by Bobby Chintapalli, Contributing Writer

San Diego - We know all that the action at a tennis tournament doesn’t just occur during the matches, so I cruised around the San Diego Sports Arena yesterday during the official team practice sessions and draw ceremony for the Fed Cup tie, and jotted some notes to share with you. The matches begin in just a few hours.

THE PLAYER

If there's an Italian equivalent of a chatty Kathy, it's Flavia Pennetta, because the woman can talk. And talk and talk and talk. You see it in singles matches, but in doubles matches the chatter is non-stop. Chatty Flavia can talk when she’s serving or receiving, before and during points, to herself, to her partner, pretty much to anyone, often and constantly.

She also knows how to use her words off the court. I saw it on a practice court in Cincinnati, where she and Daniela Hantuchova sat, leaning in towards each other, and chatted away like gossiping schoolgirls; meanwhile their coaches kept looking over to see if they were ready to hit tennis balls again.

Pennetta is her usual talkative self here in San Diego; it was especially evident at the draw ceremony, which was held at SeaWorld (a sea lion named Clyde made a special appearance, naturally). On stage, as several officials gave speeches, Pennetta chatted up her teammates. She’d turn to Roberta Vinci on her left, commenting perhaps about something in a speech, a gesture from a member of their camp, or the impact US midterm elections will have on healthcare reform.

Sometimes, Chatty Flavia turned to Francesca Schiavone. Once, after a quick conversation with a relatively serious-looking Schiavone, Pennetta reached behind Schiavone to tug at the elbow of captain Corrado Barazzutti, who decided against having a protracted conversation with her at that moment. That was fine with Pennetta, who had other thoughts to express later and simply turned to share them.

Often the words were just part of the fun. During practice in the morning, after a spirited game of mini-soccer, Pennetta and Vinci collected tennis balls. Pennetta took one ball, lined it up as if her racquet were a golf club, and took a tee-off stance. She took a big swing, driving the ball past Vinci’s baseline, resulting in an exchange of wisecracks in Italian. They were having fun.

I asked an Italian radio journalist about Pennetta’s ability to talk often and much. “Italians talk a lot!” she said, laughing. Does she talk more than the average Italian then? The journalist didn’t hesitate: “She is from South Italy,” she said, adding hand gestures this time. “And they talk and talk and talk.”

THE UMPIRE

I noticed chair umpire Alison Lang – at the draw ceremony she was in a long lavender dress topped with a black blazer and what looked to be pointy, four-inch black heels – but it’s suave Carlos Ramos whose name I happened to tweet. I got one response right away, and I wasn’t surprised. Ramos is quite a popular man with the ladies.

Ramos, in dapper brown leather shoes, and Lang, in flats that looked more comfortable than her earlier footwear, showed up later at the practice courts to survey the scene. They talked to a few officials, checked out the court and got a feel for the lighting. Ramos even sat in the umpire’s chair for more than a few minutes. As Coco Vandeweghe practiced hitting forehands, Carlos Ramos practiced watching Coco Vandeweghe hit forehands.

When they were close by, I asked him about those female admirers.

“Where are they?” he asked, a little surprised and more mildly amused than wildly curious.

They’re on Twitter for one thing, I said.

Ramos isn’t on Twitter and doesn’t know much about it.

“What do they say?” he asked.

I mentioned the response to my tweet. “She wanted to know if you’re as sexy in person as you are on television,” I summarized.

Lang let out a big and hearty laugh, and we more or less left it at that.

THE COACH

Few people spent more time on the court than US team captain Mary Joe Fernandez.

In the morning, during Liezel Huber’s practice, Fernandez placed cans of balls for Huber to aim at in the service box, then went about returning her serves (or trying). She didn’t say much. A few times she moved the cans. Frequently she watched over her daughter, who also wore a Team USA jacket and red baseball cap, as she picked up tennis balls and piled them on her racquet in the back of the court.

In the afternoon Fernandez hit with her two young kids, as Oudin ran warmup laps around the court and Bethanie Mattek-Sands stretched courtside. (Incidentally, Tracy Austin took it all in, staying for a good spell.) Fernandez hit with her kids as she did with Huber – calmly and quietly. She was more relaxed perhaps, letting balls double-bounce before she hit them and gently obliging when her son said “overhead, Mommy”.

Once the Oudin/Mattek-Sands hitting session began, Fernandez sat in a line judge’s chair in the back of the court, racquet in one hand, chin in the other. Mattek-Sands played with confidence and seemed to win more points. She was on Fernandez’s side of the court, and Fernandez said a few words when needed. Oudin, for her part, seemed discouraged after quite a few points. When Oudin won a point, Fernandez made it a point to yell out “good shot” or “good return.”

Fernandez was more voluble in the next session, the one with 18-year-old Coco Vandeweghe. (In a move that surprised many people, Fernandez selected Vandeweghe to play tomorrow’s singles match against Italy’s top seed, Schiavone.) As Vandeweghe hit groundstrokes from the baseline, Fernandez suggested she move in. “Up, up, up, up, up,” she said quickly and loudly. Another time or two, as Vandeweghe hit a forehand or backhand, Fernandez urged her to “stay low, stay low, stay low.”

Maybe she watched as closely during the other practice sessions but said a bit less. Was it because, in less than 24 hours, Vandeweghe would be playing the first match of the Fed Cup final – her first match in a Fed Cup ever?

Or did it have to do with what Billie Jean King told her?

“The best advice is, every person is different, you have to treat them differently,” Billie Jean remarked. “Some people like to be talked to. Some people don’t like to be talked to. It’s a learning curve.”

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