Alicia Ortuno, the 22-yearold number one seed from Barcelona for the Rover-sponsored Irish Women's Open Tennis Championships at Riverview, was rescued by the rain from a potential second round drubbing yesterday.
Unseeded Australian Lisa McShea's flow of winners was abruptly halted by the weather while she was leading Ortuno a merry dance.
McShea's power and confidence was a notable factor and she was in front by 5-1 after 25 minutes when all matches on court were called in.
In all, four other second round singles matches were rained off and a number of court inspections followed throughout the day.
It was felt that matches could be resumed by 6 p.m. but a final inspection by the tournament referee, Steve Mehigan, ruled otherwise. The courts were found to be sodden and dangerous.
It means that players will be obliged to play twice today, weather permitting.
The $25,000 ETA event dictates that singles play remains on outdoor courts at this stage, but doubles on the indoor courts are acceptable and some matches were decided under cover.
Top seed Ortuno attributed her vulnerability to her lack of experience on the synthetic grass surface. If she can survive McShea's challenge when play resumes this morning she would play either Luci Ahl of Britain, the sixth seed, or French girl Karolina Jagiednak. Ahl leads Jagienak 4-3 in the first set and has no objections to playing twice if required today: "It will mean that if I have to play twice I am still in the tournament and that suits me."
In two other matches to finish, Germany's number three seed Syna Schmidle leads Sweden's Miroslava Vavrinec 3-2 with the strong Italian, Alessia Lombardi, on level terms, 3-3, with Australian Trudi Musgrave.
The first round doubles matches played resulted in no joy for the top Irish pairing of Gina Niland and Claire Curran. They went down tamely to Lissie Jelfs of Britain and Mareze Joubert of South Africa 6-0 6-4.
Doubles, first round: L Gabai (Isr) and S Schoeffel (France) bt M LeSauer (France ) and J Oaman (Britain) 7-5 6-2; I Heise (Ger) and A Lombardi (Ita) bt R Hudson (NZl) and L Kramer (US) 6-1 6-1; Ortuno and K Freye (GER) bt M and N Dittmann (Aus) 6-1 6-1, L Jelfs (Brit) and M Joubert (RSA) 6-0 6-4.
