Ballarat's Marleen Gort is ready to make her Ballarat Open Platinum AMT debut, which coincidentally will begin with a match-up against a familiar face.
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In the first round of qualifying, Gort takes on training partner Milla Fraser.
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The pair train and compete together at the Ballarat Regional Tennis Centre.
They also competed in the Ballarat Regional Open Championships ladies' singles final earlier this month, Gort coming out on top.
"I feel ready for this match, I know what her weak points are and I'm definitely going to use them, I'm not going to be nice to her just because she's my training partner," Gort joked.
"I would rather see her in the later rounds, because this means that one of us is going to lose the first round, so obviously I would rather face her in the final."
This is Gort's first appearance in the tournament since moving to Ballarat two years ago.
It has been quite a journey for Gort, who spent four years in the United States on a full college tennis scholarship.
Residing in Alabama from 2013-2017, she recounted a positive college experience as a student-athlete.
"America has been great because I received training everyday and I played against people from all over the world, even here playing in Australia I faced some people that also played college tennis in America," she said.
"It has been a great experience being able to combine study and playing tennis.
"Now coming out of university, I can still compete on a high level."
Gort studied a business management degree and now works full-time in Ballarat.
She said that considering the last two years of COVID-affected play, it is nice to have a high-level tournament back in Ballarat.
"It's great that we have such a big tournament in Ballarat and we don't have to drive up to Melbourne like we do every single time," she said.
"Unfortunately it has been really inconsistent due to COVID, we were playing a Melbourne Pennant every weekend and after five (weeks) it pretty much got cancelled for the following 10 weeks, which really sucked.
"Comps have only been back the last couple of months and pretty much we've barely played any matches the whole year, so I'm very happy now we're back at it and there's a couple of tournaments again."
The return of defending women's champion Jaimee Fourlis headlines strong main singles draws in the men's and women's competitions.
She will face one of the four qualifiers in the first round.
If she wins through, she will either face Eliza Dunbar or another qualifier in the quarter finals.
Defending men's champion Harry Bourchier is not returning to the tournament this year, however 2019 runner-up Jacob Grills is.
He enters the tournament as the number two seed and will face Cihan Akay in the first round.
Men's number one seed Omar Jasika takes on Cooper Errey to kick-off his campaign.
Ballarat competitors James O'Sullivan, Jarrod Joyce, Milla Fraser, Marleen Gort and Emily Tinker will be in action on Saturday.
They will all try to win through the qualifying round and make their way into the main draws.
MEN'S DRAW
Omar Jasika (1) v Cooper Errey
Qualifier vs Thomas Pavlekovich-Smith
Josh Charlton (4) vs Qualifier
Qualifier v Lewis Miles
Hien Pham v James Hartson
Stefan Bianchet v Aaron Addison (3)
Nicholas Jovanovski v Qualifier
Cihan Akay v Jacob Grills (2)
WOMEN'S DRAW
Jaimee Fourlis (1) v Qualifier
Eliza Dunbar v Qualifier
Erica Layton (4) v Zali Morris
Leann Serna v Sienna Leeson
Qualifier v Elicia Kim
Jane Haeusler v Tamara Bajagic (3)
Qualifier v Taya Powell
Jelena Cvijanovic v Alana Parnaby (2)
MEN'S QUALIFICATION DRAW
Tom Evans (1) v Asbjorn Williamson
Charlie Vinen v Nicholas Miloi
Gavin D'Souza v John McDonald
Andrew Ziaras v Teal Studer
Luka Vranesevic v Zac Hamill
Jordan Batis v Alex Mcdonald
Sam Scala-Mcneill v Timmy Karpinski
Zachary Adam-Gedge v Matthew Woerndle (8)
David Qariaqus (2) v Dimitri Bagaric
Shubh Purohit v Petar Jovic
Sam Kaplan v Charlie Snow
Nicolas Tremblay v Glen Dawes
Dylan Vaughan v Alexandre Jaulin
Taj Hibbert v Andre Filep
James Elia v Stevie Young
Rhys Edwards v Luke Sorensen (5)
Darcy Nicholls (3) v Sven Baric
Diordan Macababbad v Taj Cayzer
Jacob De La Paz v Jarrod Joyce
Jera Staley v Flynn Caruana
Samuel Mcgregor v Kerem Bekir
Jett Leong v Mineth Nawarathna
Andrej Tasev v Kamil Kozlowski
Akter Rana v Jiayang Dong (7)
John Amato (4) v David Poole
Thomas Patton v Hugh Winter
Benjamin Ancheta v Aaron Osmond
Jayden Lewindon v Luc Mascitti
Ram Mude v James O'Sullivan
Hanival Kahsay v Hugh Callaghan
Brian Capalnean v Drew Cahill
Yuri Mijic v Jack Bruce-Smith (6)
WOMEN'S QUALIFICATION DRAW
Hayley Riessen (1) - bye
Tara Aksentijevic v Sarah Prescott
Prisha Baliga v Chelsea Elliot
Milla Fraser v Marleen Gort
Tamara Pudelka v Lisha Dhulipalla
Ella Simmons - bye
Sienna Opray v Canaan Ameya
Grace Darcy v Irene Prescott
Kate Brzostek v Anjali Narikuzhy
Megan Markov v Kate Smith
Gabrielle Villegas v Rebecca Leahy
Hayley Sibbald v Alice Tanner
Georgia Plunkett - bye
Shenali Rajendran v Skye Vandeleur
Emily Tinker v Kiah James
Jaimin Mandi v Simone Dunker
Kirra Bond-Scott v Alyssa Cameron
Nina Krecklenberg v Felicity Wei
Chelsea Evans v Nithesa Selvaraj
Jemma Carbis - bye
Nessa Pratt (bye)
Erin Stojcevski - bye
Charlotte Vanstone Mcgrath v Bridget Mihulka
Ria Mehta v Neha Maria Sibi
Sonia Prescott v Wambui Taylor
Darcy Parke (8) - bye
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