McHugh remaining grounded after recording first senior win
IDAN McHUGH’S first-ever match win in the main draw of a senior event was greeted with the kind of nonchalance yesterday which suggested there may be many similar victories ahead.
The 16-year-old from Bearsden, fresh from a winter visit to Miami where he and fellow teenager Ewen Lumsden spent time with both Jamie and Andy Murray, ran out a 7-5 6-3 winner against Scott Clayton of England in the first round of the AEGON Pro Series at Scotstoun Leisure Centre in Glasgow.
Perhaps the simplicity of it all had something to do with the familiarity of the surroundings: McHugh is used to turning up at this venue at 7am when it is deserted most mornings in the company of just his coach Toby Smith.
Whatever else happens this week — McHugh will face Tobias Simon of Germany or Hugo Grenier of France next — the teenager will possess his first ever senior ranking, between 1500 and 2000, when the next lists are released.
The win justified the wild card he has been granted in his home city this week, not to mention the hard-headed decision to decline a spot in Australian Open juniors last month in favour of focusing on his five Higher prelims and a Grade 4 Junior tournament in snowy Prague, where he claimed the title. His big moment was marked with nothing more spectacular than a handshake with Smith and a fist bump with new national coach Colin Fleming.
“I don’t tend to celebrate loads,” said McHugh. “This is my first ever win in a main draw seniors. It is a good win, but not a fantastic win. I am happy but I don’t tend to throw myself on the ground when I win.”
McHugh is academically bright as well as smart on the court but his life should become simpler if he can get the exam results he wants this May then put his studies on the back burner to concentrate on a life on the tennis tour.
Aside from his Miami jaunt, he has only recently done his first fitness block and embarked on a proper strength and conditioning programme, but it will be instructive to see whether he can make inroads into the other junior Slams.
Tennis Scotland has been criticised in the past for operating in silos but the appointment of Fleming and increased board input from Leon Smith means there is more of a scene up in Scotland for the nation’s top players to rub off each other. Jonny O’Mara, who returned to his native Arbroath after three years at the NTC in Roehampton, is another man in action here this week, even if his comprehensive first round singles win against Britain’s Luke Oakley was promptly followed by a shock reverse for he and Clayton, the No.1 seeds in the doubles.
Ranked 516 in singles and 317 in doubles at the age of 21, O’Mara finds himself in a similar predicament to Fleming during his career and feels the advice of the national coach is invaluable. “It is great to have someone like him who can give you advice,” said O’Mara. “At the start of his career he played some great singles then went into doubles. I am kind of at that stage now. He has been there done it and there is nothing better. But so much of tennis is what you do when no one is watching and for the last few months I have been putting in a shift.”
Maia Lumsden, big sister of Ewen, was another celebrating a moraleboosting win at the AEGON Pro Series yesterday. A junior Orange Bowl winner who was previously training at IMG Academy in Florida, Lumsden is a junior no longer, and tragically lost her father last year but she showed signs of her best form as she came through 6-4 6-3 against the imposing Iva Primorac of Croatia. Currently ranked No.723 in the world, but hoping to break the world’s top 400 by the end of the year, she faces the No.1 seed, Arantxa Rus of the Netherlands, next. “Last year was my first year playing pro tournaments and I feel like I started the year well then it was quite a hard year after that,” said Lumsden, who combines her practice with a degree in sports studies at the University of Stirling.
Ali Collins, back in Scotland after a stint in the US, had her work cut out against Tess Sugnaux, the World No 431 of Switzerland, in a 6-3, 6-2 defeat.