Paris Semifinals

Today were the BNP Paribas Masters quarterfinals, which featured two high-quality matches, one of uneven quality, and one washout.

Rafael Nadal and J.W. Tsonga played excellent tennis for two sets, with Nadal proving himself to be the better player by a very small margin, winning 7-5, 7-5. After two very shaky matches against Almagro and Robredo, in which he saved numerous match points and broke his opponents while they were serving for the match (I believe) three times, Nadal has returned to his something resembling his imperious form. This may have been his best match since his injury over the summer, when he missed Wimbledon. It's a shame for Tsonga, who was trying to defend his title and once again reach the last eight in London in a few weeks, but he simply ran into a better play today. Tsonga's only win over Nadal remains in the semifinals of the 2008 Australian Open, where JW mopped the floor with Nadal. Unfortunately for Tsonga, he's never quite been able to recapture that level of play.

The other excellent semifinal was a first meeting between two young players, Gael Monfils and Marin Cilic. Cilic was the steadier player at the beginning of the match, but after the Frenchman made a handful of absolute highlight-reel shots, the crowd got into it and Cilic lost his focus. He began missing forehands and giving Monfils way too many chances. Despite nearly injuring himself going for an impossible shot on his first match point, Monfils won in three and produced some scintillating tennis in the process. He still won despite winning one fewer point than his opponent. I guess some of his must have just counted for more. Seriously, two or three of the shots he made in this match would make it into a top 25 shots of the year compilation.

Soderling-Djokovic was less stellar, with neither player reaching a very high level of tennis for very long. Soderling was 3 for 14 on break points, which is just not an acceptable stat against a player as good as Djokovic. They each won 78 points, but Djokovic came out on top, and he'll look to continue his strong form at the end of this season.

The last match was a pretty big let-down, as the abdominal injury that's been hampering JMDP all week finally caught up with him, and he retired down 0-4 against Radek Stepanek. Here's hoping DelPo can recover in time for the year-end championships.

So for tomorrow, we have a potentially blockbuster matchup between the 2 and 3 players in the world, as well as another match between two of the biggest characters on tour. It seems unlikely that the Nadal-Djokovic match will meet the standard of play that they reached earlier in the year in Madrid. Prior to today's matches, you would have Djokovic as the prohibitive favorite, since he's on a winning streak and just beat Federer on his home turf, while Nadal seemed to have not yet recovered his game completely. But today, Nadal was sharp and Djokovic looked off. So who knows how the match-up will go tomorrow?

As for Stepanek-Monfils, all I can say is that there will be some shot-making guaranteed, a lot of playing to the crowd, and probably some faking injury from one or the other player. It's also a tough match to call, but I'm going to say that Monfils should recreate the Parisian magic that Tsonga enjoyed last year and make it to the final on his home soil.

Paris Masters, 2nd Round

In the last tournament of the regular season for the ATP Tour, the third day of play was deceptively exciting. Considering that only two seeded players were upset and ten made it through, you wouldn't think that would make for one of the most exciting tennis days of the year, and one that compares with the first Saturday of the 2008 Australian Open, which is the most exciting single day of tennis that I can recall.

The two upsets were both thrilling matches, one was shocking and the other didn't come as much of a surprise. Tommy Haas had been struggling with illness - swine flu, in fact - and so there wasn't a lot of expectation for him to win over French stalwart and qualifier Arnaud Clement. But Haas won the first set and took it to a tiebreak in the third, losing a match point before Clement took the win. The shocking result was Roger Federer losing in three to Julien Benneteau, who had never before taken a set in their two previous meetings. Benneteau played out of his mind to win the second-set tiebreak and then break Federer in the third before he served it out.

In the other matches, Del Potro was pushed to a third set in his first match back after the U.S. Open by a retiring Marat Safin, who put on a pretty good show in his last professional match, but seemed to be happy to have it all done. I don't think he'll be back. That ceremony was pretty exciting, and it was followed by an out-of-sorts Rafael Nadal escaping by the skin of teeth against Nicolas Almagro. The older but less experienced Spaniard was dominating the match while Nadal was lagging, and Almagro led by a break in each set. He served for the match twice and was broken both times. Finally, he cramped in the third set and basically stood by and watched Nadal take the match. Almagro, when first serving for the match, had 40-0 on serve, and couldn't close it out. Tough loss for him - you know he'll be working on his conditioning in the offseason.

The other matches were also good, but less stunning than those above. Big servers and frequent spoilers Ivo Karlovic and John Isner could have ended the End of Year Championships hopes for Robin Soderling and Fernando Gonzalez, but both of the giants lost in two sets. James Blake nearly managed to salvage a bit of his season by taking Andy Murray to two tiebreaks, but ended up losing his match in three.

Some very competitive tennis - not all of it scintillating, but all of it exciting. This kind of play this late in the year does not do much for the argument about shortening the season. As sympathetic as I am to the players, as a fan, I wish I could have this every day.

WTA Tour Championships in Doha

Amidst all the complaining among players on the ATP tour about the length of the season, and the inevitable backlash, it's easy to forget that the WTA, which starts at the same time as the ATP, is finishing up its season this week. That is a month before the ATP's year-end championships. A bit curious, don't you think?

The format in Doha is the same as it has been for the past several years - the top eight players are split into two groups, with each player facing the other three women in her group in round robin matches. The top two players from each group then advance to the semifinals, which then plays out like a normal tournament. Understandably, the way the two groups are split ends up being essential to the way the tournament unfolds.

The most interesting thing that happened in the rankings this week (and the top ten were going crazy, as we'll see) was that Dinara Safina moved back ahead of Serene Williams to reclaim the number one spot. I don't pretend to understand the way that the WTA rankings system works - it doesn't make sense to me, since Serena didn't do anything after the U.S. Open in 2008, so I don't know why points would drop off, but in any case, Safina is back in the top spot. But whoever advances further in the year-end championship will finish the year as number one. A draw (should both players fail to make the semifinals, for example) goes to Safina, I think. But again, I could be wrong.

So how are the top two players' chances, from the looks of things? Of course, the competition is going to be tough, since this is the top eight players in the world, but the draw seems very, very lopsided. The Maroon group features both of the Williams, both of the slam winners from the past year who are in the top 8 (Serena and Kuznetsova - Clijsters obviously is not ranked that highly), and the fourth player in the group is the best active women's tennis player to have never won a slam, Elena Dementieva, who participated in the best match of the year on the women's side, in her semifinal against Serena at Wimbledon.

The opposite group, the White group (which doesn't feature the Williams sisters, remember) has wayward world number one Dinara Safina, U.S. Open finalist Caroline Wozniacki, Belarussian teenager Victoria Azarenka, and Jelena Jankovic, who squeaked in to the top eight by a razor-thing margin. Just for the record, the Maroon group has 34 grand slam final appearances, 20 grand slam titles, and 2 Olympic Gold Medals. The White group has 5 grand slam finals and no major titles. As I said, maybe a bit lopsided?

Of course, when things are this lop-sided, the players from the Maroon group might kill each other in the round robin and then be exhausted by the semifinals. But the much younger and relatively unproven group does have some up-and-coming talents, as well as players who are anxious to show the world that they deserve to be respected. These are the best eight players in the world right now, and there's no doubt that there is a possibility for some scintillating tennis. I'm looking forward to it.

Beijing and Tokyo

Between these two Asian tournaments, one is clearly the stronger field. Beijing has Nadal, Djokovic, Roddick, and five of the other top fifteen players among their eight seeds. The number one seed in Tokyo is JMDP, but the rest of the seeds are not quite at his pedigree. While China has Davydenko, Verdasco, Soderling, Gonzalez, and Cilic filling out its top players, all of whom have had strong performances in the last few months, Tokyo has Tsonga, Monfils, Simon, Berdych, Stepanek, Wawrinka, and Hewitt. Now they're all strong players, all in the top 26 at the moment, but with the exception of Monfils and Simon, none has done anything of note during the Summer hardcourt swing.

As for the breakdown of the quarters, Nadal is seeded to meet Gonzo, but his section is packed, so here's hoping he's recovered from his injury. Baghdatis first round, James Blake second, and then he could just as easily get Safin, Acasuso, or Ferrer instead of Gonzalez. Tough draw for the world number 2. The second quarter is less stacked, with Davydenko seeded to meet Cilic, if each can survive the few dangerous floaters, Andreev, Kohlschreiber, and Karlovic.

In the third quarter, Soderling is seeded to meet Andy Roddick, who has never beaten the Swede in two meetings. But they've had three tiebreakers in four sets. If it gets there, it should be interesting. Soderling would have to get through Jeremy Chardy and Tommy Robredo. Roddick should have an easier time against qualifier Lukasz Kubot, who beat Donald Young, who already taken out the much tougher opponent Feliciano Lopez. Strange. After that, Roddick gets either Mathieu or Ljubicic, which should be a good match on its own. The fourth quarter is also strong, with Verdasco seeded to meet Djokovic, but also featuring Victor Troicki, Nicolas Almagro, Robby Ginepri, and Juan Carlos Ferrero.

Back over in Tokyo, JMDP is seeded to meet Hewitt, which should be an interesting match - they've had a few great ones this year already. Santoro is also in that quarter, on his farewell tour. Simon and Berdych are in the second quarter, along with Bellucci and Youzhny. The third quarter features Wawrinka against Monfils, along with John Isner and Dudi Sela. The final quarter has seeds Stepanek and Tsonga, along with Richard Gasquet. Qualifying isn't done yet, but I'm hoping that Gulbis makes it in. Come on, Ernests!

So even though this draw isn't quite as strong, overall, it's still got some good matchups, and should produce some interesting tennis. Both of these tournaments should present an interesting picture of how the run-up to the end-of-year finals is going to go. Five spots have already been settled (Federer, Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, Del Potro) with the sixth nearly a sure thing (Roddick), but the last two are almost up for grabs.

The current top two, Davydenko and Tsonga, have a fair amount of points to defend in the coming weeks. Tsonga could actually drop down to 13 or 14 in a month. The next few (Verdasco, Simon, Soderling, and Gonzalez) all have a chance to grab one of those spots. Let's see how they do!

Asian Swing, part 2

No big surprises in the quarterfinals at either Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok. All eight players in the semifinals are seeded, and at Kuala Lumpur it's the top four seeds. I think the only surprises might have been Troicki over Isner (it's Troicki's first win over a top-50 player since Rainer Schuettler at the World Team Championship in May, and before that it was an injured David Nalbandian in Miami) and the fact that none of the quarterfinals in Kuala Lumpur were really competitive.

So the semis are Davydenko-Soderling, a rematch of their U.S. Open encounter, and Gonzalez-Verdasco, a battle of the Fernandos. I'm guessing it will be a Soderling-Gonzalez final, but it could go either way. In Bangkok, Tsonga and Simon should both come through easily against Troicki and Jurgen "Tuna" Melzer.

Looking ahead to Tokyo and Beijing, there are some great players all set for qualifying. Tomaz Bellucci and Somdev Devvarman are both trying to make it into Tokyo's main draw, along with Marco Chiudinelli, who beat Safin last week and is trying to make Switzerland's list of notable tennis players one name longer. The Tokyo draw is stacked with relatively low-ranking Japanese players, so these guys should be able to make it into the main draw.

Donald Young, who is trying to get in Beijing, may not be so lucky. He was unfortunate enough to draw Feliciano Lopez in the first round of qualifying. Why Lopez, who is ranked 34, is going through the quallies is a bit beyond me. But it's just bad luck for the Donald. Robby Ginepri is also in the qualifying draw, and he has an easier time of it, with a Chinese wildcard in the first round, but Michael Llodra could be a tough opponent in the second round. The Frenchman has not been having a banner year, but he's still a solid player.

It's interesting that the Asian swing is growing in importance on the schedule, even though the men's tour has not had an Asian player break onto the scene in a long time. This is highlighted by Paradorn Srichipan's attempt to start to his comeback in doubles this week, which probably didn't go the way he had hoped. Here's hoping he can return to the tour regularly next year, along with Japanese player Kei Nishikori. These Asian tournaments would be doing even better if the home crowds had some big-name players they could cheer for.

Asian Swing

The time after the U.S. Open is often disregarded by many tennis fans. Particularly for American fans, the U.S. Open is understood to be the end of any tennis that people are interested in. As it is the final grand slam of the year, the tournaments that follow (even the end-of-year championships) can be a bit anticlimactic for your average tennis fan. As in football (up until this year), the Pro Bowl was always played after the Superbowl, but nobody cared.

While I can see why some tennis fans ignore the Asian swing and the European indoor seasons, they're really missing out. This is often the time for up-and-coming or underachieving players to really make their mark, since the top players can begin to feel worn down by the year-long grind - two years ago, David Nalbandian beat both Federer and Nadal in back-to-back tournaments. Last year, JW Tsonga emerged victorious in his first Masters Series event in Paris. And Murray won Madrid's last Master Series shield.

There has already been some exciting tennis this year, just a week and a half into this part of the year. Tsonga played Ernests Gulbis (ranked just inside the top 100) to three tiebreaks, Monfils broke a four year title drought, and Monaco lost in his third final this year in the last clay court event on the calendar, giving him the most clay court wins of any player on tour this year. Still, no titles.

While this week's Bangkok draw may not be the flashiest (Tsonga, Simon, Isner are the highlights after Safin lost and Querrey withdrew with injury) the quarterfinals in Kuala Lumpur are nothing but fireworks: Davydenko-Monfils, Soderling-Berdych, Youzhny-Gonzalez, and Gasquet-Verdasco. That's the top six seeds, all in the ATP top sixteen, and two former top ten players in Gasquet and Youzhny. Despite not having any of the huge names, that's an incredbily strong draw for a low-level tournament in Malaysia. Mouth-watering, really.

I think the higher-ranked player is the favorite in every one of these matches (with the possible exception of Davydenko-Monfils) but all of them could be close. It's good to Gasquet back on the tournament trail, and Youzhny had a good win over David Ferrer. Any of the players left in the draw could pull out a win in this tournament, not only because of the strength of every player remaining, but also because a fair number of these players have been dealing with some injuries over the course of the year.

I'll try to watch as much of it streaming as I can. We'll see how it goes!

Comeback of the Decade!

Despite an unfortunate incident that marred her semifinal (more on that later), Kim Clijsters has completed the most unlikely of comeback tours. In her two warm-up tournaments, she notched wins Bartoli, Schnyder, Azarenka, and Kuznetsova, top 20 players all. She lost to Jelena Jankovic in her first tournament back and Dinara Safina in the second. That was a pretty impressive lead up, but still - I don't think anyone really expected this.

Kimmie notched wins over five seeds on her way to the championship, which is almost as many as she could have faced (six is the maximum, but Kristen Flipkens beat Anabel Medina Garrigues, the 20th seed) including both Williams sisters. Clijsters had beaten both of them in the same tournament once before, at the 2002 end of year championships in Los Angeles. Of course, Venus retired during that match, so there's technically an asterisk there, just like there may be for this match against Serena.

In addition to the sisters Williams, Clijsters beat Bartoli again (seeded 14th), Na Li (18) in the Quarters, and Wozniacki (9) in the final. She only dropped two sets: the first against Bartoli and the second, in a bagel, to Venus. Since she had last played the U.S. Open in 2005, when she won, she has now won her last 14 matches at Flushing Meadows.

Her achievement is stunning, almost unimaginable in any other sport. But it is difficult to say how much of her accomplishment stems from her own talent and effort, and how much is owed to the unusually weak mettle of the players at the top of the women's game, at this particular point in time. Was it a triumph for Kim? Or an indictment of the rest of the talent at the top of the game?

Kim's biggest spoilers when she was in the previous era of her game are either not around to trouble her (Justine Henin, Jennifer Capriati) or no longer at the tops of their games (Sharapova, Mauresmo). And the players who have risen to take their places have proven themselves to be inconsistent. The Serbs, Jankovic and Ivanovic, both made it to number one in the world (Ana even won a slam) but haven't been able to follow it up. The less said about Dinara Safina, the better. Svetlana Kuznetsova frequently beats herself on the court. Victoria Azarenka and Caroline Wozniacki (the two youngest players in the top ten) have shown promise, but Wozniacki's relatively easy run to the final is the best actual result. Perhaps the field really is weaker?

Then again, let's look at Kim. Back when she was playing regularly, she was one of the best. She was expected to win more than the one major she had managed. She had made 12 semifinals or better in the last 19 majors of the first stage of her career. Those aren't quite Federer numbers, but it shows her consistency and talent. It was her own mental fragility that kept her from making the breakthrough that had been expected of her for years - that and her countrywoman Justine Henin's better play in the big matches.

The other aspect of the first stage of Clijster's career that bears mentioning is how frequently she discussed her post-tennis plans. Even as a teenager, dating Lleyton Hewitt (Kimmie might be the only player on the WTA tour not to have dated Radek Stepanek) she talked about how much she was looking forward to getting married and starting a family. That was why she retired, while she was still in the top five.

In order to do that, she must have been unsatisfied with tennis. Professional tennis is a demanding lifestyle, especially when you're a top player. If you're making it to the semis or finals more often than not, you're playing every day in every week that you have a tournament. It's psychically draining, and it can be tough to keep up with the grind.

It seems to me that Kim is in a much better mental state than she was in 2006, and it's because she got her non-tennis life in order. It's exactly where she wants it to be. She has a loving husband and a beautiful child. Of course, that's not what every tennis player (male or female) wants, but it's definitely what she wanted.

I think that a lot of the top players that she's dealing with now are in the same place, mentally, that Kim was before she "retired." They're very talented, physically fit, but their heads aren't in the right place, so it's tougher to string together points, games, and matches. While Serena and Venus had some trouble in this particular tournament, they have been better in the big matches than the other players over the course of the past few years, and that's because they've done a better job of managing their on-court lives with what they do off the court.

In the end, Kim's comeback is not an indictment of the talent of the top players on tour, but it doesn't say good things about the mental states of their games. The other players at the top of the game need to learn how to manage their tennis lives without sacrificing every else. Kim demonstrates how strong you can be on the court, even when shaking off two years' worth of rust, when you're happy off the court as well.

U.S. Open - Day Five

I saw some good tennis today, which turned out to be a day of big matches. Six five-setters out of sixteen matches. Ferrero and Cilic came back from two sets to love to win, against Petzschner and Levine. Istomin-Lapentti and Dent-Navarro both went to fifth set tiebreaks.

But there weren't a lot of matches that were big draws, and it was tough to get a good seat. Also, it's tough to sit through a long match by yourself, especially after a long week of tennis. So I bounced around a lot, checking out bits and pieces of a variety of matches. When I could get a seat, that is. I ended up checking out a bit earlier than usual, so I could keep up with the matches I wanted to see on TV, since they were so ridiculously swamped on the stands. Turns out that may not have been the best decision, because that Dent match was something I would never have expected, but I regret missing out on.

Fortunately, my family is coming in tonight so we can enjoy some tennis tomorrow, which should be fun. We're probably going to hang out in Louis Armstrong, I think, since the tennis on the outer grounds is really starting to get sparse. Basically, I'll be anywhere to see the Verdasco-Haas match.

Tomorrow's schedule is weird, but not in a way that affects me. It turns out that the Tennis Channel has the night session during the first weekend and CBS has the day matches, so here's the lineup for Saturday: Day Session - Roddick, Federer, Sharapova. Night Session - Blake, Safina.

This is not such a big deal, except for the fact that I have tickets to Sunday's night session, and I'm going to (almost certainly) miss out on Murray-Dent and Clijsters-Venus. Any weeknight, those two matches would have been the marquee matches and would have taken place under the lights. However, the tournament organizers are not stupid enough to send those matches out to the relatively sparse subscriber base of the Tennis Channel, rather than the behemoth that is CBS.

On Sunday, they're probably going to put both Williamses and Murray on during the day, and then put Nadal-Almagro and ... Zvonareva-Pennetta on during the night session? I won't lie, if that happens, I'm going to be really upset. When you buy a night session ticket to the U.S. Open, you're expecting the best matches of the day.

We'll see tomorrow, when Sunday's schedule is posted, but suffice it to say that I'm not thrilled at the prospect.

Day four at the U.S. Open

Another day done. I managed to stick to my game plan pretty tightly, this time. I watched the entirety of Safina's match, as well as Kuznetsova's. Kuzzie's was not very exciting, because she was so clearly dominant the whole time. Safina, on the other hand, started out brutally bad, and then got intermittently better. She began the match with two double faults, served for the first set and was broken, then double faulted on set point in the tiebreak. And then she served two more double faults to start the second set - I saw her serve seven faults in a row. That's just... oof.

But when she was on, she was hitting some great balls - heavy and deep, and hard to handle. I can see how she got to number one in the world, and based on what I heard about her first round match, she seemed to be more on top of her game and her mental state (15 double faults aside) today. Which is good to hear! I hope she pulls herself together, because she is actually a really good player when she's not driving herself insane.

It was a fun to match to watch, because after she shook off the worst of the rust (when the crowd was stunned into silence), everyone was really pulling for her. Every rally that didn't end in an unforced error would be rewarded with riotous applause. Safina played pretty clean, with 36 winners and 38 unforced errors. Compare that to 19 and 48 in her last match, and it's definitely an improvement.

I saw Djokovic, too. He looked so, so solid against Carsten Ball. I left after the second set, when it was clear that the Aussie couldn't do anything to Novak. Every part of his game is good, but what's interesting to me is that he doesn't really have a defining aspect to his game. The other top players are 'the best' at something. They're good (or at least pretty good) at every part of the game, but they've got a clearly defined strength. Djokovic is just solid in every aspect of the game, but he doesn't really have anything that defines him.

He used to be a jokester, but his light-hearted ways haven't appeared on-court in a while. Really, the thing he's most known for these days is retiring due to exhaustion or getting nervous before big matches. I'm not sure what he should do about it, but it's interesting to me. I wonder how he'll deal with the expectations at this tournament.

I also watched some of the Querrey-Kim match, but there wasn't too much to see. Both of the players were just about even on winners to errors, big serving, not a lot of long points. I'm surprised not to have seen more from Kim before, because his game looked pretty strong. Nice serve, great backhand, but he's been around forever and not done much. Well, this is a good time to go on a hot streak, but it's just a shame when you run into the hottest player on tour this summer.

I saw a bit of Youzhny, who was looking great while I watched him, but then he went on to lose to Chiudinelli (who?). I also got to see Ljubicic in doubles for a few games, and a bit of Isner in the third set. But I mostly watched matches on Louis Armstrong. It's getting tougher to move around the grounds, since there are fewer matches that are really drawing people out there, and you have to set up a lot earlier for a seat.

This is going to make tomorrow really tough, where there isn't a particular court where I definitely want to spend my time. I do want to see Del Potro and Jurgen Melzer, but I've seen Almagro and Ginepri before. And I would like to see Clijsters, though that match may get moved to Ashe, and I have tickets to the night session on Sunday, which is looking very likely to be a Venus Williams-Kimmie Clijsters match.

Tsonga and Nieminen are on the grandstand, and so's Azarenka and Taylor Dent... but Ferrer-Acasuso are on Court 4, and Berdych-Zeballos are on Court 7. And Court 11 has Cilic-Levine, Bellucci-Simon (could be great), and Monfils-Beck. And Ferrero starts the day on Court 13, which then has Ouanna-Gonzalez, later.

This is going to be tough.

U.S. Open - Day Three

It's officially the middle of the first week. The first round on the men's side is done (and two matches from the second round) as well as half of the second round on the women's side. As excited as I am, I'm beginning to feel worn down. Not while I'm at the tournament, but right now, as I'm getting ready for bed, I am beat. And this is after just three days! I'll try to rest up tonight, maybe sleep in a bit and get to the tennis center at 10:30 instead of 10 tomorrow morning. We'll see.

Anyway, looking at the laundry list of players to see that I posted yesterday, I did a surprisingly good job getting all that done. I watched the entirety of the Monfils-Chardy match, but not because it was great tennis. Mostly because it was short. Chardy was making too many errors - I see from the stat sheet that Gael had a +15 differential while Jeremy had -10. That's ugly. But there were a few occasions for stunning shot-making from Monfils, and I got to see him slide across the hardcourt to an amazing cross-court passing shot.

I watched a bit of Safin against Jurgen "Tuna" Melzer, and I'm glad I at least saw some, because it looks like I'll never have the chance to see Safin live again. Unless he unretires, a la Kim Clijsters. I don't think it's terribly likely, though. But if he takes some time to get his head together, that's really all that (I think) was keeping him from playing at the top level of the game lately, so he theoretically could return. I actually have him pegged to come back as a cyborg and win Wimbledon in 2015. When that happens, just remember - I called it: Robo-Safin!

I was surprised at how easily Kiefer dispatched Llodra, but it was a pretty well-played match, based on what I saw. Kiefer's next opponent is Rafael Nadal, who I'm also surprised at how easily he brushed aside Gasquet. I hope Richard can come back, because he has a beautiful game when he's on. He certainly wasn't, today.

After watching the end of the Kiefer match, I caught some of John Isner and Sam Querrey playing doubles, and those are some big serves. They won, handily, but I only watched about seven games, because it was on a tiny side court and the stands were just full to bursting.

I also saw Daniel Koellerer beat Machado, and I think that Daniel's new nickname should be crazycakes. It's not only his on-court gesticulating and yelling, but also the look in his eyes. That's a look that I have not seen in any other tennis player. But he's fun to watch, as a result.

The new flavor of Australian men's tennis, Carsten Ball, will be taking on Djokovic tomorrow, a match I hope to watch. This leaves last year's Aussie, Chris "Gooch" Guccione, kind of high and dry, losing to Pablo Cuevas in straight sets on a way outer court. He served at 46% today, so he was definitely off his game.

I didn't quite manage to curse Nicolas Almagro this - at last year's U.S. Open, I watched him lose from two sets to love up against Gilles Muller of Luxembourg, in a match with three tie-break sets. It was a great one, and it looked like he was about to do the same against Steve Darcis, winning the first two sets, dropping the third, and then losing a break lead in the fourth, but he pulled it out in a tie-break. He'll play Ginepri next round, after the American beat Andrei Pavel (a match I did not get a chance to see).

I did see a few games of, but did not get to watch too much of the tennis in, Gilles Simon and Jose Acasuso's matches, which they both won. Those are players who are not very exciting to watch against players that they are better than - their style is very workmanlike, constructing points and hitting high-percentage winners. They know when their game is just better. They're fun to watch against top players, because they can really raise their games - Simon did it a ton of times last summer, but his current year has not been as good, so far.

I saw the very end of Bellucci - Lu, which I hoped to see more of, but wasn't too upset about because it was a rout by Tomaz. That kid has no business in the qualifying draw. He'll get a regular entry to the 2010 Aussie Open, I'll bet you.

One of the last matches I watched was Ferrer against Alberto Martin. That guy is definitely a bulldog, because he was down 5-1 in the first set and reeled off the next six games. That's got to be discouraging, and not surprisingly, Martin went on to lose the match.

Tomorrow, I'm not entirely sure about what I'm going to do with the schedule. Doubles is starting to jump into full-swing, and the selection of matches on the outer courts is dwindling somewhat. There aren't a lot of matches that are blowing my mind... unless you look at Armstrong: Safina, Querrey, Kuznetsova, Djokovic? I think I'm just going to hang out there, all day. Sure, I'll miss the Bryans and the Williamses playing doubles on the grandstand, as well as some pretty good match-ups, scattered around the outer courts, but that is a line-up that I'm tempted to enjoy in a very sedentary fashion.

Day two at the U.S. Open

My second day at the tournament proper was a bit less frenzied, and much more focused. I started the day with a gameplan, and with very few exceptions, I accomplished everything I wanted to do. It was a pretty ordinary day, as far as the big names are concerned - after I'd gone home for the night, Ana Ivanovic lost in a third-set tiebreaker.

The other biggest upsets were the elder Lapentti (Nicolas) over Stan "the Man" Wawrinka in five. I had Stan going far in this tournament, so that is quite a surprise. I caught a bit of the match, and saw that Wawrinka's backhand, while still gorgeous (I mean wow, what a wonderful shot to see) was not quite firing as consistently as it usually is. Still, to lose the third and fourth sets in tiebreaks had to be tough. And to think, he was top ten just a year ago.

And the other upset on the men's side was one that a lot of people (players and fans included) were not going to get too peeved about - "Dr." Ivo Karlovic going down in straights to an inspired Ivan Navarro. They had never played before, but Navarro was ranked 91 places lower than the tallest man on the ATP tour. But Navarro played great attacking tennis and came up with some marvelous shoestring volleys. I can't say whether Karlovic's serve was off since this was the first time I'd seen him live. It was a thing to behold - too bad he wasn't on a court with a speed gun, by the way. But he served 22 aces and 71% first serves, better than his average for the year. However, he only won 45% of his second serve points, and he's usually better than that. Andy Murray (in his section of the draw) must be glad to see him gone.

The Dr. lost two tiebreaks, just like Wawrinka, but that's not as bad as one of my sentimental favorites, the hard-luck Seriban Janko "Tipsy" Tipsarevic, who lost three straight tiebreaks. He actually won one more point in the match than his opponent, Florent Serra, but still lost in straights. That's tough. Janko's fortunes are heading south, and I'd like to see him turn it around, because he is a fun player to watch - and he has "Beauty will save the world" tattooed on his arm. It's a Dostoevsky line, by the way. Who doesn't love that?

A match that I really enjoyed watching even though it didn't even come close to a tiebreak was J.W. Tsonga against the youngest player in the men's draw, 18-year old Chase Buchanan. I really hope that Chase doesn't get discouraged by the loss, though, because he played very well and could easily be a top 100 or top 50 player, based on what I saw today. Unfortunately, he came up against one of the most in-form players on tour on his favorite surface and got demolished.

Another player who got beaten pretty badly was Igor Andreev, the seed who lost to American Jesse Witten. I tried to see that match, but the stands were packed with fans rooting for Jesse. Which is why I was so surprised that there was nobody there to support Rajeev Ram while he was getting beaten in a tight match by French hopeful Josselin Ouanna. Ram's more of a prospect than Witten is, but no love for Rajeev, I guess. There was plenty of support for Kevin Kim, another American who rode it to beat an out-of-sorts Dudi Sela today in four sets. Sela is another one that's fun to watch, but I won't be watching him any more this year.

Taylor Dent also pulled off an upset against Feliciano Lopez, but good luck trying to get to see that match. If there's three things that U.S. Open grounds pass fans love, they are: 1 - Americans (natch) 2 - Veterans (good luck seeing Tommy Haas on the outer courts) and 3 - Comeback Stories. Guess how many of these Taylor Dent happens to be. I really wanted to watch him play... maybe he'll be on the grandstand later and I'll be able to get a seat.

I also watched Carsten Ball for a while as he beat Brzezicki (that Aussie's an up-and-comer!) and Victor Troicki as he almost managed to find a way to lose to 30-year old Peter Luczak. Troicki's ranking is moving in rather the opposite direction to Carsten's, at the moment.

The only women's match that I caught much of (not a lot of female players that I knew too well were on the outer courts today) was Carlos Suarez-Navarro, who is not quite following up her breakout year last year the way some people would have hoped. She looked pretty strong, and her backhand is just as pretty as Wawrinka's, but fortunately, she won her match.

Tomorrow, the first match on grandstand is Gael Monfils against Jeremy Chardy. Do you think I'm going to be courtside for that match? You bet I am. After that, I'll try to see Ferrer, Almagro, Guccione, Kiefer-Llodra (that could be a tough one), Ferrero-Santoro (I'll never be able to get a seat for that one, alas), and maybe Bellucci-Lu, Na Li against serial grunter Larcher De Brito, and crazycakes Koellerer is out there, too. I'd also like to see Acasuso and Gilles Simon, if I can get on that court. There's no way I'll get all that accomplished, though.

I'm actually sort of looking forward to later in the week when I can just camp out on the Grandstand or Armstrong and watch entire matches, rather than trying to run around and see everything. On the other hand, I also love the chance to see all these players. I would have really been upset if I hadn't seen Karlovic, Wawrinka, Tipsarevic, or Sela, and they all lost today, so I wouldn't have gotten another chance.

Until next year's open, that is...

U.S. Open Day One

Ah, the first day of the U.S. Open proper. It was a fun one - not a ton of upsets or fascinating matches, but there was plenty to keep me occupied. Here's a rundown of some of the highlights that I didn't get to see first-hand:

Kim Clijsters just destroyed Kutuzova, 1 and 1, announcing herself as a real contender and a danger. Watch out Marion Bartoli, who she has already beaten this summer and who she faces in the next round, after the Frenchwoman trounced Rossana de los Rios (I watched a bit of that match, but at 1 and 0, it wasn't too exciting). That one's a pick-em, but I'm leaning toward the former champion.

Tommy Haas had a struggle but ended up beating Alejandro Falla. I wanted to watch that, but for some reason, whenever Haas plays on the outside courts, it's standing room only. People were literally climbing in trees to get a look at that match.

For reasons that are not quite clear to me, it was almost the same situation on the court where Donald Young was playing Tommy Robredo. I wanted to watch it, but I couldn't get a seat! The Donald won a set, but he ended up losing, predictably. I hope he can pull his game together, because he is incredibly talented, but this isn't the year for it.

I wasn't on the court for it, but I watched the end of the 16-14 tiebreak in the second set between John Isner and Victor Hanescu. The Romanian blew - I think - ten set points in that tiebreak. Several on his own serve. That's just brutal. Good for John, though. He's really playing strong.

Amelia Mauresmo and James Blake, both trying to get their mojo back, had good wins. I actually watched a bit of Blake's match from a distance (Armstrong is a big stadium) and even from there, that guy hits his forehand ridiculously hard.

I also watched part of Lleyton Hewitt destroy Thiago Alves. They weren't even in the same league, which was a shame. Surprisingly, Olivier (the older and smaller Rochus brother) was similarly dominant against Igor Kunitsyn. He was fun to watch, though. His brother Christophe lost a break lead in the fifth set to go down 7-5 to Marsel Ilhan, which was a shame.

Davydenko was not quite as strong against Dieter Kindlmann, but the German (lots of Germans in the draw this year) was never really in the match. It was my first time watching Kolya in person, and he was fun to see.

Speaking of fun to see, I saw Nadal playing a few practice games against a player I wasn't sure if I recognized - it could have been Michael Berrer, another German - but it was insane to be about ten feet from the Australian Open champion. And let me tell you, I could see the spin he put on his forehand, and it was awe-inspiring.

I also watched Potito Starace lose two close tiebreak sets and then completely go away in the third against Marco Chiudinelli, who is the fourth ranked Swiss player at 161 in the world, after Federer (1), Wawrinka (20), and Stephane Bohli (144). Interestingly enough, I think that the umpire for the Starace-Chiudinelli match was Mariana Alves. Anyone remember her? I'm not a hundred percent sure, though. I did see a couple umps that I recognized; namely Norm Chryst and Carlos Bernardes. What were they doing away from the show courts?

Another interesting match I saw was Robin Soderling versus Albert Montanes, which was odd because it was between what I suspect may be the highest and lowest ball-tossers on tour. Montanes just basically places the ball in the air, drops his left hand and hits it with his racket. Soderling, on the other hand, tosses his ball between eight and twelve feet in the air before hitting it.

I also watched the fifth set tiebreak between Simon Gruel and the younger Lapentti (Giovanni), which was as tight as a drum. It was out on court 16, and Lapentti seemed (to me) to be calling his own lines, or at least trying to influence the judges on a close call. I don't know exactly how that worked, but there were a handful of balls that were very close to the lines on the tiebreaks, and Lapentti called them out before the line judges did. Unfortunately, it did not avail him on the last point of the match, when Greul hit an ace past him that was right under the ump's nose.

I was sad to see Dokic go down, as well as Rainer Schuettler and Dmitry Tursunov. They're not quite upsets, but they are players who I thought could go farther. But so far, the biggest upset of the first day was Mikhail Youzhny over Paul-Henri Mathieu. He did his salute to the four corners of the court after winning, which I always love to see.

More fun to look forward to tomorrow. I've got to rest up so I can be back in Queens in time to get a good seat! I don't know whether I'm going to start with Nieminen-Fognini, Witten-Andreev, or Tsonga-Buchanan. It's great having to deal with this problem!

U.S. Open Preview

Thankfully, the nightmare scenario I described in my last post has not come to pass. The weather was sufficiently cooperative yesterday to allow all of the qualifying matches at the U.S. Open to be completed, and the New Haven Pilot Pen tournament finished up, as well.

The most interesting result, from a busy day of tennis, was Laura Robson (the 15-year old British phenom) losing 6-7(6) 6-4 6-7(4) to Eva Hrdinova. That's a tough loss for any player, but if the stats sheet is right (which it may not be, since it's definitely listing break points wrong) then Robson served 22 double faults to only 5 aces. She's got to be better about that. But she'll be back next year - I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't have to qualify when the next USO rolls around. An encouraging performance for the 15-year old.

Verdasco beating Querrey in the final is also interesting. Verdasco (nicknamed "Hot Sauce") has had a good year, but hasn't quite been able to follow-up his excellent run at the Australian Open. Now that he's back on hard courts, will he be back at his form from the beginning of the year? It's also worth noting that he and Federer are the only players going into the open on winning streaks. But Querrey has also been playing well (he surpasses James Blake to be the number 2 American this week) so both could have good Opens.

Looking ahead to the U.S. Open, on the men's side, let's start with Roger Federer's quarter. Federer has the ongoing record of most consecutive men's semifinals, and it looks like that will continue. In his quarter, only three players have a win over him: Lleyton Hewitt (last win in 2003), James Blake (last year's Olypmics), and Rainer Schuettler (in 2002). Since James is on a particularly bad run at the moment, it's tough to see anyone getting out of this quarter except for Federer. If you're really looking for an upset, Sam Querrey is your best bet, but it's still not a very good one.

Even if the outcome is a given, there are still some interesting matches. Donald Young, who did well to qualify, is a bit unlucky to get Tommy Robredo in the first round. Also, P-H Mathieu is going up against Mikhail Youzhny, who holds a 4-1 lead over the Frenchman. The Russian is anxious to get back up to the level he was playing at a few years ago, when he was in the top twenty. His ranking is at 60, now. So this is going to be hard-fought, no question.

The second quarter of the draw is a bit more wide open. Djokovic is the top seed, but he opens with one of the toughest first-round match-ups, against veteran Ivan Ljubicic. And when he (presumably) makes it through that, he should meet in-form Australian qualifier Carsten Ball in the second. Roddick, who is really the favorite in this quarter, opens against German Bjorn Phau, and could get Dmitri Tursunov in the second. Roddick only lost once to Tursunov, but it was in a 17-15 fifth set in a Davis Cup match in 2006. What is it with Roddick and killer fifth sets?

Some of the other interesting match-ups in the first round are John Isner against Victor Hanescu, who has been playing well, Indian qualifying Somdev Devvarman against Frederico Gil, and Florent Serra against Janko Tipsarevic. If Tipsy wins, he could get Verdasco in the second, assuming he makes it through Benjamin Becker. Verdasco is a possibility to make it out of this quarter. "Hot Sauce," Roddick, and Tommy Haas are all in the same eighth, and are all possibilities to beat Djokovic (the main contender in the top half of the quarter) and make it to the semis.

It's crazy to have Nadal in the third quarter and not the last one, but with his time off with injury this summer, his ranking has dropped. Normally that doesn't make so much of a difference with who you play in the first round, but with Richard Gasquet coming back from a doping suspension, he gets Nadal right off the bat. "Baby Fed" will have to be out of practice, but if he's smart, he worked on his fitness. And Nadal is still rusty, so there's an outside chance of an upset here, hard as that may be to believe. Even if Nadal makes it through Gasquet, his second round is against Llodra or Kiefer, both tough. He also has Almagro, Ferrer, Monfils, and Chardy in his eighth of the draw. It's going to tough to see him winning this quarter. Even if he makes it through to the quarterfinals, he'll probably get either Tsonga or Gonzalez. Somebody's going to wear him down, and he won't make it to the semis.

This is a tough quarter, no question. It also features Berdych and upstart Frenchman Josselin Ouanna. Lots of hot-and-cold players here, so whoever goes on a run will make it out of the quarter. Pretty good draw for Tsonga, who has been stymied by the big servers a la Karlovic and Isner lately, and he won't run into anybody like until the fourth round at the earliest, and Berdych isn't quite that type of player. So Tsonga's a good bet to make it through.

The final quarter, featuring new number two Andy Murray, is not quite as loaded as the third, but still has some solid players. Murray opens with a match that people are calling a tough one, but Murray schooled Ernests Gulbis at Wimbledon, and the Latvian is going through one of the worst sophomore slumps I've ever seen. Smooth sailing for Murray, there. He could get Karlovic in the third round, which would be tricky. And then possibly Cilic or a rematch of the Wimbledon under-the-roof match against Stan Wawrinka. Stan would want some revenge, there.

The second-highest seed in this quarter is also good to watch - JMDP, Juan Martin Del Potro. He followed up his miraculous summer last year with another strong showing, but he has a tough couple of opening rounds as well. He opens against Juan Monaco and then could give Marat Safin his U.S. Open farewell. If he makes it to Gilles Simon, that could give him trouble, since Simon plays the same kind of game that Hewitt used to stymie him at Wimbledon this year.

Unfortunately, Mardy Fish has been hobbled with injury, so he probably won't be much of a factor, but Ferrero (who opens against Fabrice Santoro, a great first-round match) could make some noise. So could top-seeded qualifier Tomaz Bellucci. Another first-round to watch is Feliciano Lopez against Taylor Dent. Not sure where Dent has been all year, but if he's going to do anything, this is the stage to do it. All in all, it's tough to bet against Murray to make it through this quarter, but that's why we play the games. It's going to be exciting, no matter what.

I'll admit that I'm just not as familiar with the players outside the top 40 on the women's side, so it's tougher for me to analyze the opening rounds. But I'll jump in for second or third-round analysis, once I've got a better picture of what's going on. I'm interested to see what Melanie Oudin, Kim Clijsters, and Jelena Dokic might be able to do. Keep an eye on them.

Tomorrow, the action officially starts. I'll be on the outer courts, since there's more action to see, and it's cheaper than a stadium seat. I'm absolutely thrilled, and will be there at 10 when the gates open. Hope you're looking forward to watching it on TV!

The scourge of the tennis fan...

The rain delay! So I made the trek up to New Haven today, hoping to catch two men's semis and one of the women's semis, but was met with a full day of gray skies and frustrating drizzle. At the pilot pen, not a single ball was hit today. I hung around and had lunch with my friend and former coworker, waiting to see if the weather would dry up, but signs were not so good. After a few hours, we abandoned the wait. I hung around the city until about six o'clock, just to see if things were going to improve before I hopped on the train and headed back to New York. Alas, they did not. The highlight of the day was that I did see Darren Cahill and Mary-Jo Fernandez, but they were clearly peeved about the delay, so I did not bother them.

Fortunately, I did not miss much by skipping the last round of the U.S. Open quallies, either. They apparently just got in a handful of matches and will have to finish tomorrow. Unfortunately, there are a lot of problems with this plan - first of all, tomorrow is also supposed to be Arthur Ashe Kids Day, and while it might be interesting for kids to be able to see the qualifiers playing on the outer courts, I doubt that the players, who are playing for a guaranteed $19,000 payday and the chance to get much more in terms of prize money and points, are going to be thrilled about the possibility of groups of children wandering around the grounds.

On the other hand, that might not even be an issue! Tropical Storm Danny is working its way up the northeast, and the forecast does not look good for tomorrow or for Sunday. While things should be clearing up by Monday, when the tournament proper is slated to start, this could still wreak havoc with the scheduling.

First of all, if the Pilot Pen can't play both the semis and the finals tomorrow (they seem to have played the women's semis at indoor courts this evening, at least according to the revised schedule), then their play will have to continue onto Sunday. Hopefully, the U.S. Open schedulers will try to accommodate the players remaining in the draw (Querrey, Verdasco, Andreev, and Acasuso, plus whoever is left on the women's side, two out of Pennetta, Wozniacki, Mauresmo, and Vesnina) by giving them Tuesday starts, at least.

This could be complicated if the qualifiers can't finish tomorrow, because if they have to finish up on Sunday, it would be somewhat unfair to make them play again on Monday (ideally, all the qualifiers would have had two whole days of rest), but the quallies are scattered around both sides of the draw, so that would be tough to do the usual top half/bottom half on alternating days.

And it all gets worse if no play can happen in New York or New Haven during Saturday OR Sunday! This is not terribly likely, but it's possible. They have had to leave tournaments unfinished before, but that's certainly not ideal for the Pilot Pen. I'm not sure what their contingency plans are. Regardless, if the forecast holds and the weather clears up by Monday, that could be a very interesting day at the Open. I'll be there, either way!

Even if qualifying play or the New Haven tournament does finish up tomorrow or Sunday, I probably won't make it out to see anything. I have some work I need to finish up in the next few days, since I don't expect that I'll be getting anything done once Monday rolls around.

U.S. Open Quallies - Day three

I skipped day two of the qualifying tournament to get some errands done and to better prepare myself for the two weeks of insane tennis consumption which is about to take place. But I was back today to see second round action (I'll miss the last round, because I'm heading up to New Haven for the semis tomorrow), which was even more fun than the first.

I spent less time hopping from match to match, and sat down to watch more continuous tennis. I watched two matches in their entirety: Bellucci-Dimitrov and Young-Olaso. Dimitrov was occasionally brilliant, but Bellucci was much more solid, and won in straight sets. Still, if Dimitrov can solidify his game a bit, there's no reason he can't be an excellent player. Bellucci is already on his way there.

Olaso, who I had never heard of before, tore the cover off the ball, but also gifted Young an amazing amount of unforced errors, so "the Donald" was able to win even though he didn't play that well up until the very end. He was broken twice, but was able to break six times. But Young will have to step up his game once he makes it to the main draw (I expect he will).

I also watched Laura Robson, the up-and-coming British teen, who played well but showed how young she was - 15, if you're keeping track. Her opponent was a decade older but didn't act like it. It was a fairly petulant match all around, but the tennis was okay. For as young as she is, she definitely could go far.

The other match I watched was Carsten Ball against Rik de Voest, who was impressing me by taking the first set and going strong in the second, so I left to watch some other matches. I came back later to find him in a third set tiebreak, which he really stole from de Voest, who came to the net and made unforced errors on three different points in the breaker.

There was lots of really fun tennis - I got to see Josselin Ouanna, the French player who made it to the third round at Roland Garros this year. He played great, and I think he could make some noise here. I also saw Somdev Devvarman come through a tight match. He could win a round, as well.

I was sad to see Kimiko Date Krumm lose, though. Ah well!

But I watched some excellent tennis, got some great photos, and got mildly sunburned. I will be better about applying sunscreen in the next two weeks.

It's looking like the qualifying tournament is going to be an excellent warm-up. Tomorrow, we'll know who gets those coveted spots, and over the weekend we'll see how they fit into the draw. There are two qualifier-qualifier match-ups in the first round, as well as some pretty safe opponents like Simone Greul, Potito Starace, or Christophe Rochus. But there are also qualifiers who will get rewarded with Nikolay Davydenko, Tommy Haas, or U.S. Open series champ Sam Querrey. That will be a jump in the level of competition, no question.

U.S. Open Quallies!

I know that we're still at the end of the U.S. Open warm-up tournaments, with the Pilot Pen going on this week. But since I moved to New York last year, my focus has shifted slightly. Today was the first day of U.S. Open qualifying, and I got to take in some great matches.

It was heart-breaking to see Ryler DeHeart lose in three after coming back from a break down in the second. Last year, he made it to the second round in the main draw and lost (in a pretty tight match) to Rafael Nadal, so that's got to be disappointing.

It was great to see Kimiko Date Krumm come back from a lousy first set to dominate the next two. The Japanese veteran, back in the game after a 12-year retirement, is looking good! Not so good for Virginia Ruano Pascual, though, who lost in three. Xavier Malisse fell short, as well. Malisse played Horacio Zeballos in a battle of the weird little pony-tails. Also, Zeballos is 76 in the world, despite not having won the only ATP-level match he's played in his career? That's a bit odd. Yeah, he's won four challengers and made three more finals in the last year, but ... come on, win a tour-level match.

I also got to see young Grigor Dimitrov, who showed flashes of brilliance but wasn't quite allowed to live up to his hype in this match, thanks to the excellent play of German Tobias Kamke. He should have a tougher match-up in the next round of quallies, against Brazilian top seed Tomasz Bellucci, whose match was moved to another court and was over before I realized that fact. He won 6-2, 6-0 against Giancarlo Petrazzuolo. Odd that Dimitrov would be unseeded in the quallies, with all the press he's been getting. But other than his wins against Berdych and Navarro and his tight matches against Nadal and Simon, he hasn't really had any results to speak of this year.

I saw Carsten Ball, as well - good to see him get a win, and hopefully the young Aussie can follow-up on his great run at Los Angeles.

I also saw Stefan Koubek, Somdev Devvarman, and I saw Ekatarina Bychkova have an easy go of it against Coco Vandeweghe. And what was Vaidasova doing in the quallies? And losing! Yikes.

I also saw a couple young collegiate players who were unfortunately outclassed, but still played hard and had some fun styles to watch. I'd really like to see Blake Strode and Ryan Lipman tighten up their games and go pro.

Tomorrow looks like it should be fun, too. I hope everyone else is looking forward to the Open!

Montreal Rogers Masters 2009 Semifinals

In the quarters, three out of four went pretty much as expected: Roddick frustrated Djokovic, Murray frustrated Davydenko, and Nadal showed he wasn't totally match-fit yet against Del Potro. The surprise - shocker, really - was the way that Federer gave away his match against Tsonga. Up 5-1 in the third set, after winning the second 6-1 and losing the first in a tight tiebreak, Federer went on to lose in a third set tiebreak. Credit to Tsonga, but this will certainly add fuel to the fire of the questions about Federer's dedication.

In the semis, we have Tsonga-Murray. They haven't played since the 1st round of the 2008 Australian Open, when Tsonga surprisingly dumped Andy M and went on to make the final. It goes without saying that a lot has happened since then. Their head-to-head is tied at one apiece, but Murray has been vastly more consistent over the past two years (and less plagued by injuries, so here's hoping Tsonga's wrist is alright). Murray is the odds-on favorite 1.24:5, but Federer was a bigger favorite before that match. Tsonga is a streaky player who can take down the best players in the world when he's playing at his best, but he can also stumble when he should be winning the match. I think this will be closer than some might expect, but it's tough to bet against Murray.

The other match, between Andy Roddick and Juan Martin Del Potro) is much closer (nearly even money on betfair, with a slight advantage to JMDP). Juan Martin is up 2-0 against Roddick lifetime, including a win just last week in the Washington final. However, I think Del Potro may be starting to get a little jaded, and even though the second set against Nadal was a quick one yesterday, the match still didn't end until late. I also think that Roddick and coach Stefanki will have had time to examine last week's final to see what strategies didn't work (don't give him a running forehand!) and will come into this match with a revised gameplan. But Juan Martin could definitely continue his great run and make it to his first Masters Series final.

Whatever happens today, the odds are the final is going to be part of a great narrative. If it's Andy-Andy, the Brit will be looking for revenge after the Wimbledon semifinal defeat. If it's Roddick-Tsonga, Roddick will be looking to avenge a tough loss at Paris last year (which Tsonga went on to win) in which Roddick ended up with nine more points total (126-117) but was 3 for 17 on break points. If it's Del Potro-Murray, they've got some great history. Del Potro won their last meeting, but Murray broke Del Potro's 4-tournament winning streak at the U.S. Open last year. And, of course, at their first meeting in Rome in 2008, Del Po uttered the immortal line "You and your mother. You are the same always." And Tsonga has never beaten Del Po, most recently losing to him on his home soil at the French Open.

Some tennis fans may be disappointed that the top two guys are out of the tournament, because they prefer the game when one or two people is dominating the field. I would much rather have an eight-way race for every tournament, so I hope that these top players can continue to make the rest of the year look this exciting.

Rogers Cup Montreal - Historic QF Lineup

For the first time in ATP history, the top eight players in the world rankings are the eight players left in the quarterfinals of a tournament. This is exciting, by itself, because it has never happened before on the tour, but it is much more exciting because it guarantees that the remaining seven matches are going to be marquee caliber.

To start the day off, world numbers 3 and 8 meet in the first quarterfinal, Andy Murray against Nikolay Davydenko. Davydenko is probably under-ranked, having missed so much of the year with his heel injury. But since he's been back he's won two tournaments in a row and is riding the second longest-winning streak on the tour (after Federer). But Andy Murray loves the U.S. Hard Court swing, and made his first serious impression around this time last year. They're 4-4, so even though Murray seems like he ought to be the clear favorite (he's 1.34:1 on Betfair), this could be a tight match. I think Murray's dink-dink tennis could frustrate the Russian, or Nikolay could just hit through him.

The following match has the potential to be the most one-sided (1.19:6.2 on Betfair) between world numbers 1 and 7, Roger Federer and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. As noted above, Federer is on the longest winning streak in the ATP, going back to his loss to Djokovic in Rome, which was in April. Tsonga has not been having the best middle of the season, after getting off to a spectacular start. After winning the Paris Masters last year, he hasn't really posted any comparable wins - his only top ten victories since then have been against a slumping Djokovic and Gilles Simon, the accidental top-tenner. A win over the world number 1 would certainly turn his season in the right direction. And for Federer, the question remains - after achieving so much in the past few months, completing the grand slam, breaking Pete's record, and becoming a father - will he be able to maintain his desire? Only time will tell.

The night matches are even more exciting. We start off with the closest match-up, ranking-wise, between Roddick and Djokovic, the 5 and 4 seeds. Roddick has won their last two meetings, but Djokovic clipped Roddick at the U.S. Open last year. Djoker also beat Roddick two years ago at this very event, at this very stage. Djokovic is looking to turn around a modest (for him) season, with two wins at minor tournaments, while he's stumbled in the finals at several Master's events. Roddick is having a much better year than he has had in a while, but he still hasn't made an impression at these Master's events. His last final was in 2006. Before he won the U.S. Open in 2003, Roddick won the Canada-Cincinnati double, which I'm sure he'd love to pull off again. In order to do that, he'll have to get through the toughest quarterfinal field ever. Interestingly, even though he is ranked lower, Roddick is a slight favorite over Djokovic, 1.89:2.12.

Finally, the evening will close with Nadal-Del Potro, perhaps the most anticipated match. Even though we're into the quarters, we don't really know how Nadal is feeling. His first match was basically a walkover from Ferrer, and all credit to Petzschner for making it as far as he did, but that's not the toughest test for the world #2. Del Potro, on the other hand, is one of the most in-form players on tour. He also won his last match against Nadal, back in Miami. If Nadal is really recovered, then he should be able to fend off the big Argentine. But if he isn't at 100%, and Del Potro isn't over-tennised, then Del Po should come through. Still, Nadal is the odds-on favorite, 1.69:2.42.

Lots of great stories in play today, with a lot of questions to be answered. But it's time to just sit back and enjoy a day of great match-ups. It's going to be tough for the tennis to live up to the billing, but no matter what happens, it will be exciting.

4th Round at Wimbledon 2009

The best day in Tennis: the rounds of 32 at the All-England Club. All of the remaining 64 men and women will be in action after a day off on the middle Sunday. Since the first week didn't present us with too many big upsets, we start off the business end of the tournament with some excellent matches.

On the men's side, there are three sure bets, brought to us by the tourney's top three seeds:
Federer vs Soderling (1.08:13)
Murray vs Wawrinka (1.08:12.5)
Djokovic vs. Sela (1.08:12.5)

To start us out on Center Court, a rematch of the French Open final, where Soderling didn't put up much of a fight, seemingly content to play his small part on Federer's march to immortality. Afterward, though, he paraphrased the late, great Vitas Gerulaitis by saying, "Nobody beats me eleven times in a row!" He was just joking ("yolking" as he said), and Federer will beat him eleven times in a row.

And to finish on Center, the next step in the two-week long coronation of Britain's greatest hope. His record against Stan "the Man" Wawrinka is nearly even, but two of the three losses took place in 2005 and 2006, and the other was on clay, Murray's weakest and Wawrinka's strongest surface. This match has the biggest potential for upset out of these three, though. As much as he hasn't acted like it thus far, the pressure on Murray has got to be difficult, and a stern test from the 19th seed could put him to the test.

Djokovic, who is flying under the radar, continues to do so at the start of the second week, as the anonymity of his opponent has sent him all the way off to Court 3. His opponent is the biggest surprise in 4th round, diminutive Israeli Dudi Sela, who is only playing his second Wimbledon and hadn't won a match at his previous attempt. Granted, he made it through two of the weaker seeds in the draw, clay-court specialist Tommy Robredo and last year's shock semifinalist, veteran Rainer Schuettler. The Djoke will appreciate the opportunity to continue moving along quietly - he didn't deal too well with being one of the favorites last year, dropping in the second round to Marat Safin.

Surprisingly, three of the remaining five matches are likely to be upsets, according to the odds-makers. In almost half of the men's matches on Monday, the lower-ranked player is the better bet:

Hewitt [ranked 56] vs Stepanek [ranked 23] (1.31:4.2)
Ferrero [ranked 70] vs Simon [Ranked 7] (1.9:2.06)
Karlovic [ranked 36] vs Verdasco [ranked 8] (1.69:2.4)

Hewitt's recovery from hip surgery is building steam. After being stymied by unlucky draws in the first two grand slams of the year, hitting former finalist Fernando Gonzalez in the 1st round at his home slam and then-undefeated at RG Rafael Nadal in the second round at the French, his draw has been kinder this time around, due in no small part to Nadal's withdrawal. He beat an overawed and underperforming Juan Martin del Potro in the second round, but Stepanek won't be similarly struck with hero worship. "The other Radek" (say it aloud) plays a very frustrating game that is perfectly suited to the grass courts, and he used it to great effect to beat David Ferrer, whose game bears no small resemblance to Hewitt's. Both players are veterans, and this match will really come down to a question of Hewitt's fitness, both physical and mental, after not having been to the quarters at a Grand Slam since 2006. On the other hand, Stepanek has never been there...

Despite some commentator's bafflement over Ferrero's victory over Fernando Gonzalez (I'm looking at you, Brad Gilbert), he is one of the very few Grand Slam winners left in the field (count them, there are four) and this is his fourth trip to the second week at SW19. Simon, on the other hand, has only been to second week once in his career, and it was earlier this year at the Australian. All signs point to the sun swiftly setting on the irascible Frenchman's accidental run to the top 10 which began just after Wimbledon last year, but he could do himself a great deal of good by winning another couple of matches here, and he won't get a better chance the 28-year old Ferrero, currently ranked 63 places below him.

And one of the biggest surprised of the tournament is not that "Dr." Ivo Karlovic is back in the 4th round, but that he hasn't been past the first in his past four attempts! He's lost some heartbreakers to unworthy opponents on what should be his favorite surface - 10-12 in the fifth to Daniele Bracciali in 2005, 9-11 in the fifth to a rising Stan "the Man" (see above) in 2006, 4-6 in the fifth to Fabrice "the magician" Santoro in 2007, and 5-7 in the fourth to Simon "Who?" Stadler last year. There was no reason for him not to have won a match at Wimbledon in so long. As you may recall, he beat defending champion Lleyton Hewitt in the first round at his Wimbledon debut in 2003! So he's very excited about his run this year, and I'm glad to see him do it, even if it was a shame to see him take out Tsonga in the process. If he has a good serving day, then Verdasco is toast. If not, then he doesn't have much hope against Hot Sauce.

Finally, the last two matches have the potential to be the most exciting:

Haas vs Andreev (1.38:3.55)
Roddick vs Berdych (1.67:2.46)

Haas and Andreev played in two of the best matches of the tournament thus far, each held over from Friday to Saturday for failing light. Haas bested youngster Marin Cilic (saving two match points in the process) 9-7 in the fifth. Andreev beat Seppi in a fourth set tiebreak. Andreev hasn't been past the fourth round at a GS since the French Open in 2007. Haas hasn't done it since the USO that same year. Both of these players can be total headcases, but in this case, I'd think that Andreev's five years on the veteran German would make all the difference in the world, but with Wimbledon's day of rest on the middle Sunday, that may be enough to give Tommy the edge. The odds-makers seem to think so.

The last match also has the potential to be very exciting. Berdych and Roddick have an even record thus far, and Tomas has the potential to blow anyone off the court, if he can keep his head together (see Federer at the Australian Open this year, down two sets and break point). This will be the best test to see if Roddick can reach the semis or final this year, because if waits for Berdych to let up, he's probably going to lose. He's going to have to fight back in order to win, and that's a plan that Roddick has had trouble executing in trouble spots, these past few years. This could be an excellent barometer for Roddick's chances in the rest of the week. Obviously, if he loses, they'll drop precipitously.

Aussie Open 4th Round

The third round of the AO had it's share of disappointments, but on the whole, I'd say it lived up to its potential. The hype over the Federer-Safin match was entirely unjustified, and the way the match ended up reflected that. Safin circa 2005 bears basically no resemblance to Safin 2009.

The biggest surprise of the third round, at least to me, is that realization of how well Fernando Verdasco is playing. He's played three complete matches and lost only 12 games. In comparison, Andy Murray has played two and a half matches (since Pavel retired) and has lost 19 games. They're going to play in the fourth round, and even though Murray is far and away the favorite (8:1 at BetFair, and for comparison, Baghdatis is 3.65:1) the other Fernando could really make this a match.

Of course, the Gonzalez-Gasquet match was also spectacular. Match of the tournament, thus far. Gasquet has now been paid back twice over for coming back from two sets down to beat Roddick at Wimbledon in 2007. Andy Murray did it to him at Wimby in 08, and now Gonzo's done it to him again. It's a shame someone had to lose, because it was just a stellar match, lots of drama, incredible shotmaking, injuries, and to go to 10-12 in the 5th. Whew. Let's just hope Gonzo recovers so he can show up for his match against Nadal.

The upsets of the third round were neither that exciting or surprising, but it's good to see Baghdatis, Berdych, and Cilic all playing well. I think Ferrer, Fish, and Wawrinka are all on a downward slide.

Looking at the matches in the fourth round, the only players who I don't give more than a 10% shot to are Tomas Berdych against Roger Federer, and Tommy Robredo against Andy Roddick. Robredo is actually getting pretty good odds (5:1 on Betfair), but I really don't think he's going to do much against Roddick, who has never lost to Robredo. Similarly, Berdych is going to have to play at a level that he's never played before in order to beat Federer. As for the other matches...

Cilic-Del Potro: Two big, tall young guns. These guys will probably play a lot in the next five to ten years, so this first meeting should be exciting. Cilic just beat Ferrer, but it will be very interesting to see him against Del Potro. Juan Martin has the advantage in this match, as he's more accomplished than Marin, but I imagine that this rivalry-to-be will get closer down the line.

Djokovic-Baghdatis: The sense is that this is the most likely upset of the top four players in this round. It's certainly possible, but Baghdatis is going to have to play the way he played two years ago. Djokovic hasn't been at his best this tournament, so it's possible. But I see Djoko coming through this.

Blake-Tsonga: Oh my goodness. This is going to be great. Both of these guys are incredibly exciting shotmakers and tons of fun to watch. Tsonga says his back is in good shape, but Blake has been playing very well this tournament, too. I like JW in this one, but James could come through if he plays solid throughout. He's prone to dips, and that could be his downfall.

Monfils-Simon: Another potentially stunning match from two up-and-coming French players. Monfils is a lot more fun to watch than Simon, but Gilles has had better results last year. Regardless of who wins, they both beat Nadal the last time they played him, and he's their likely next opponent, unless Gonzalez makes the enormous upset.

Basically, any of these matches could go either way without surprising me too much, with the exception of Roddick and Federer. It would take a meltdown from either of those guys to lose those matches. The nice thing is that no matter what happens, basically any set of quarterfinals should be exciting, too.

Australian Open underway

I don't know if you've been able to watch any of the Australian Open thus far, but if you haven't ... then you haven't missed much. It's been a pretty boring tournament up to this point, in my opinion. All of the favorites are rolling without much trouble, and while there have been some very close and exciting matches (Gilles Muller beats Feliciano Lopez 16-14 in the fifth set!) they were between people who aren't really going to make it that far into the tournament.

And the only upsets of consequence were of Venus Williams and David Nalbandian, who apparently did not do too much training in the off-season. The announcers jokingly referred to him as a "teletubby" because of his paunch. Another interesting one was Fabrice Santoro (the magician!) over Phillip Kohlschreiber in the fifth set. And for his victory, Santoro gets to play Andy Roddick, who demolished him last year at the U.S. Open. Much better for Andy than Kohlschreiber, who beat Roddick a year ago in the third round! Andy now has a clear route to the quarterfinals against Djokovic, and it will an incredible disappointment if he loses before then.

Today is the first day of the third round, and we're starting to get some potentially interesting match-ups:

Safin-Federer: If Safin plays out of his mind, we could have one set of tennis that looks like 2005, but don't expect much more than that from the Russian who is playing his last year on tour, or so he says.

Cilic-Ferrer: The young Cilic is a tough competitor on the rise, and Ferrer has had some trouble with young guns lately. He lost recently to Sam Querrey and at last year's U.S. Open to Kei Nishikori of Japan. It depends on how much Cilic steps up, because you can bet Ferrer will be solid.

Muller-Del Potro: Gilles Muller has no right to be ranked so low, with his ability to pull off astounding wins every now and then. As I said, he won a 16-14 in the fifth first round match against Feliciano Lopez, and he has a tendency to win that way, after winning about four matches at the U.S. Open last year in five. I think Del Potro is just too big of a hitter for Muller, but he's pulled the upset before.

Fish-Baghdatis: Baghdatis is making good, with some solid wins over Soderling and Benneteau, while Fish's opponents haven't been of as much consequence. Still, these are both guys who are dangerous to go deep, once they get a match or two under their bet. This one could be a cracker.

Dudi Sela-J.W. Tsonga: After Tsonga toughed out a really good win over Ivan Ljubicic, he's rewarded with what should be an easy match on paper. The little Israeli did manage an upset of 30th seed Rainer Schuettler and Hanescu, but he also played his way through qualifying. If Tsonga's having some back trouble (not unlikely) then Sela could make this close.

Blake-Andreev: This is Blake's first real match of the tournament, after getting two no-names in the first two rounds. He played really well in his first two rounds, but he didn't hit much resistance. Andreev can be streaky, but he can play with the best players on his best days.

Stepanek-Verdasco: Radek "the Worm" Stepanek is on a good streak, but Fernando Verdasco has one of the best forehands in the game. To me, this is almost a toss-up.

Gilles Simon-"Super" Mario Ancic: Ancic beat big-serving "Dr." Ivo Karlovic in the 2nd round, and he gets rewarded with eighth seed Gilles Simon, who historically does not fare very well at the slams, but after the run he made in the second half of last year, I'd be shocked if he doesn't make a deep run at some point. I think Ancic's career has been unfortunate so far, with a lot of underachieving (at least in terms of tennis play, he got his law degree while he was out with illness) so his ranking should go up this year.

Monfils-Almagro: Almagro is a solid player who doesn't have the big wins in his career, while Monfils is streaky and occasionally thrilling. Will the Frenchman's talent and flashy play be enough to disarm the Spaniard? I bet so, but we'll see.

Gasquet-Gonzalez: This is a great one. Gasquet has also underachieved, so he may need to start proving himself, as he's now the #3 French player in the world. Gonzalez beat Hewitt and Canas, two baseline-running counterpunchers who aren't as mobile as they used to be. It will be quite a change to go up against the unevenly-brilliant shotmaker Gasquet. And the winner of this one gets Nadal.

Nadal is playing Tommy Haas, which should be closer than his first two matches, but I don't give him much of a chance. And Djokovic is playing Amer Delic, which is only going to be interesting because Delic grew up in Croatia, and there could be trouble when the Serbian and Croatian fans get together.

This is just the third round? Things are looking good, from this point on.

Surprisingly Good Quarterfinal Day!

Considering the strength of the draws in Auckland and Sydney this week, I'm really surprised at how good the quarterfinals are today.

All of the seeds are through in Auckland, except for Juan Monaco and Albert Montanes, who lost to Viktor Troicki and John Isner, respectively. I already know the outcome of one match, and American Sam Querrey upset Nicolas Almagro. Good for the big-serving American! We've also got Kohlschreiber (defending champion) against number two seed David Ferrer. Troicki is up against Juan Martin del Potro, who should move through comfortably, and Isner is up against Robin Soderling. Lots of aces are on the way in that way, but Soderling is much more solid in the rest of the game, so I'd expect him to move through.

In Sydney, you've got some big upsets - Gasquet over Gilles Simon, Hewitt over Fish and then Tipsarevic, and Mario Ancic over Tommy Robredo. Jarkko Nieminen also beat Chris Guccione, who ousted Tomas Berdych earlier. Three spectacular semis: Djokovic-Ancic, Tsonga-Nieminen, and Nalbandian-Hewitt. Gasquet has the easiest time with surprising quarterfinalist Jeremy Chardy. I'll take Djoko, Tsonga, Nalby, and Gasquet into the semis. And that's a pretty enticing pair of matches, too!

In Kooyong, Ljubicic is having some trouble - his best days are definitely behind him, as he even lost to slumping Marcos Baghdatis. Federer is currently in the process of thumping Fernando Verdasco, and later in the day we'll see Moya v. Cilic (two players at opposite positions in the arc of their careers) and, presumably, Wawrinka v. Gonzalez, even though it isn't on the schedule. It's quite a motley crew of players out there, this year. Not a lot we can glean about the AO from the play at Kooyong.

I'm getting a DVR for my cable tomorrow so that I can watch as much of the Australian Open as is humanly possible. I'm rather excited.

A note on the state of tennis broadcasting

I don't have a lot to say about play from today. The problem with the tennis season while it's taking place in Australia at the beginning of the year is that play is already taking place when I get home from work and want to write about it. Do I write about the day before? Or the play that's already started? It's just tough for me to quite work out, so I can't do the end-of-day summaries that I like.

As for the updates for today, Del Potro beat Gulbis and Querrey beat Gilles Muller in three. Tipsarevic beat Fish yesterday, who is now 0-2 on the season, and is currently up a break on Lleyton Hewitt, who struggled in his first round Julien Benneteau. Gasquet beat Tursunov, and Stepanek retired against qualifier Jeremy Chardy. It kind of interrupts your momentum if you win a tournament and then retire during you next match. Australian number 2 Chris Guccione upset perennial underachiever Tomas Berdych, as well. Djokovic managed an easy win against Paul-Henri Mathieu, which is good for him.

As for Kooyong, I know that the first two rounds are completed, but I have no idea who won them. I'll bet Federer beat Moya, but I don't know who would win between the badly-streaking pair of Baghdatis versus Wawrinka. I'll take both Fernandos to win later in the day, Verdasco over Cilic and Gonzalez over Ljubicic.

I'm cheating a bit on that prediction, though, because I'm watching live, streaming Kooyong action on www.channelsurfing.net, and I can see that Cilic is a bit flat while Verdasco is playing very well, so far. It may be shocking, but this is the first actual tennis I've been able to watch this year.

Unfortunately, I live in a building where my internet and cable providing options are extremely limited. Limited to one, in fact. And the one that I have does not offer the tennis channel, no matter how much I could offer to pay them. In addition, they don't make me eligible to enjoy the live streaming of espn360.com. That means that I don't have a lot of options to watch tennis, even though as you can see I'm a raving fanatic.

Fortunately, there are often chances to watch streaming tournaments of varying quality and dubious legality, and I take advantage of them whenever I can. Last year, I purchased live streaming for Wimbledon and the Masters Series events, and I would have done it for every Grand Slam (and almost every tournament) if I could have. This year, the ATP is expanding the scope of tournaments that their official video website will broadcast, and I couldn't be more happy. If ESPN doesn't want to show tennis, and if my cable provider doesn't want to show the Tennis Channel, I'm happy to get my fix however I can. I would pay $200 a year to watch streaming video from a tournament every week. Maybe more.

Kooyong Classic!

Surprisingly, both Andys are taking the week before the Australian Open off. This may not be too odd for Murray, but Roddick has played the Kooyong Classic exhibition for as long as can remember. He's the three-time defending champion there, and he's not playing it, this year. It's not as strong a field as it has been in the past, and Federer is leading the group. If he doesn't win every match he plays at this tournament, then his odds at the AO drop drastically.

He's up against Baghdatis, Marin Cilic, Ivan Ljubijic, the two Fernandos, Verdasco and Gonzalez, Carlos Moya, and Stan Wawrinka. Nobody in that group has beat him in the past year, if I'm not mistaken. Gonzo beat him at the end-of-year Masters in 2007, but that's it. Fed should decimate this field, if he's even a shadow of his former self.

In other news, the opening rounds at Auckland and Sydney have some interesting things going on. Sadly, Frank Dancevic (a player I root for whenever I get the chance) lost in the first round to Igor Andreev. The Canadian number one really deserves a break-out performance, one of these days. Nishikori retired with an injury agaisnt Juan Carlos Ferrero, and I hope he recovers in a week.

While Dancevic didn't do so well, both John Isner and Gilles Muller won their opening round matches in Auckland, with Isner beating seventh seed Albert Montanes. Ernests Gulbis also won his first-round match, which means he'll be playing Juan Martin del Potro, soon. Gulbis may have beaten a rusty Djokovic last week, but I'm not sure that lightning is going to strike twice.

Murray first victor of 2009!

Murray emerges from the battle of the Andys the clear winner, not being bothered by his back even a little bit. I think Murray might just be the favorite, going into the Australian Open, which is unusual, since he lost in the first round last year and there are about a half-dozen grand slam champs in the field that have a reasonable shot.

Schuettler pulled out of the tournament in Chennai, sending local wildcard Devvarman to the final in less than thrilling fashion, but it's still exciting for his run to continue! He's now up against Cilic in the final, and I think that Marin has to come out on top on this one. In Brisbane, Verdasco is a set up on Stepanek even as I type. I expect Fernando to win it. It should be a nice start to the season for both of them.

Fernando is also in the doubles final, against Marc Gicquel and Tsonga. That should be an interesting match. In Chennai, Wawrinka and Jean-Claude Scherrer (who?) are up against American duo Eric Butorac and Rajeev Ram. I'm impressed to see Tsonga and Wawrinka stick to their doubles play even after they lost in singles. It paid off for Nadal - can it pay for them, too?

Looking ahead to next week, Djokovic asked for a wildcard into the tournament in Sydney, so he could get some more match play. A good idea, since it's probably not too terribly wise to start off the first Grand Slam of the year having played one match and lost it. He'll start against either P.H. Mathieu or Andreas Seppi. If he makes it to the semis, he could find Tsonga - they've got a fun rivalry going, so that would be fun.

The bottom half of the draw is relatively loaded, with Gasquet, Simon, Stepanek, Nalbandian, Fish, Hewitt, and defending champ Tursunov. It's tough to pick a likely semi from that group. But looking at some exciting first-round matches, you've got Gasquet-Tursunov and Fish against Tipsarevic. Nieminen against Feliciano Lopez could be fun, too.

In the Sydney quallies, there's only one round left to play, but one of my favorites is still up for a spot. Canadian Frank Dancevic just has to beat Alberto Martin. Go Frank! Kevin Anderson lost a tough three-setter to Denis Gremelmeyer, and Xavier Malisse has some good wins, too.

The other tournament taking place next week is in Auckland, and it features Juan Martin Del Potro as the number one seed. It isn't the most dynamic field, but there are some very interesting players that I hope to see do well. Kei Nishikori opens up against former number one Juan Carlos Ferrero. That's a tough first-round for the Japanese teen. Sam Querrey opens against a New Zealand wildcard ranked 463. Sam had better win that. Robby Ginepri also opens against a local wildcard ranked outside 400. Lucky draws for the Americans.

The other first-round matches I'm interested in are Viktor Troicki against Igor Kunitsyn and Ernests Gulbis against Marcel Granollers. If Gulbis can win that, he'll be rewarded with a match against Del Potro. Can he knock out the number one seed in two consecutive weeks?

As for the Auckland quallies, Gilles Muller, Bobby Reynolds, and John Isner are all one win from the main draw. I'd like to see them all in it. After Muller's fantastic run at the U.S. Open last year (I watched two of his wins in person), I want him to get a ranking where he can get some direct entrances into these tournaments.

Some players are resting up for the AO, which starts in a mere week's time. Others are getting some match play in. It's funny that the first major tournament of the year comes so quickly, once the season gets started. That's why, I think, the Australian Open has a tendency to produce more surprise winners than the other three grand slams. We'll see what happens this year.

Murray the next number one?

Murray beat Federer in three sets, but it wasn't as tight as it sounds. It was tight in the first set, which Fed won in a tie-break, then he started spraying errors off his forehand and the Scot won the second and third sets 6-2, 6-2. Much more surprisingly, Andy Roddick was able to beat Gael Monfils. Apparently, Roddick's steady high-level of play was enough to get him past an intermittently spectacular Frenchman.

However, Roddick will need to be more than steady to beat Murray in the final. He'll have to play out of his mind, serving at least 70% and having a lot of success at the net. I really think Roddick's best chance is if Murray's back trouble, which seemed to be a problem for him in the Federer match, keeps him from playing at the top of his game.

Props to Nadal for continuing in the doubles, and eventually winning the Doha title. He could have pulled out and headed to Melbourne for some extra AO training. And beating Nestor & Zimonjic? That's a serious pair of doubles players, right there. Maybe Nadal could add a doubles Grand Slam to his title list?

The Brisbane final is also set - Stepanek against Verdasco? Weird. I don't know who to pick in this one, since I would have bet against both of them in the semis. They're both very talented players who can just go away for no good reason, so it will go to whoever holds it together.

In Chennai, the hometown hero Devvarman continues his improbable run, managing to hold Karlovic to only 10 aces and beating him in two sets. He's up against Schuettler, who is also impressing. I'd love to see the wildcard continue on. The other semifinal is Cilic-Granollers, and this should really go to Cilic. It would be interesting if Schuettler could win, since he hasn't even been to an ATP final since 2004.

Kudos to Elena Dementieva, who won the first women's title of the season. Maybe she'll get back to her first slam final since 2004 this year. It was a real shame to see Mauresmo retire against Bartoli trailing 4-0 in the first set. That does not bode well for the Frenchwoman's chances at a career Renaissance this year. Azarenka-Bartoli should be an intriguing final.

A bevy of upsets

The 2009 tennis season is well underway, and the narratives are already getting interesting. The biggest story of the day is Rafael Nadal losing to Gael Monfils, who won in straights, despite having never won a set off the ATP number one in their previous three meetings. I wondered if that meant Nadal wasn't in the best physical shape still, especially after he went out for his doubles match and lost the first set 6-1. But then he and his partner Marc Lopez (no relation to Feliciano, it seems) won the second set in a tie-break and then won the super tie-break 11-9. Tomorrow, Monfils plays Roddick, and Monfils has to be the favorite, coming off such a convincing victory.

The other Doha semifinal is the one I've been waiting for all week: Murray-Federer round seven! I wish it were being broadcast, because it promises to be a stellar match. Since Murray won their last two meetings, he probably has the edge, but since their last few matches have been incredibly tight affairs, it's not much of an edge. Federer wants this win really bad, I'm sure. It's more important to him than it is to Murray, just like the other semifinal is probably more important to Roddick than Monfils. Unfortunately, I'm picking both of them to lose.

In Chennai, there was a lot of catch-up play today. The most exciting story is that Karlovic (beating the other Ivo with no trouble) dodged a bullet when his likely next round opponent, Carlos Moya, lost to a wildcard Somdev Devvarman, currently ranked 202. I attribute this more to Moya's body not being able to hold up to his style of play, but it's always fun to see a local kid making the run of his life. Unfortunately, he's about to run into a brick wall - a wall that will pummel him with 138-mph serves over and over again.

Other than that, things are going about as one would expect in Chennai. Tomorrow, Tipsarevic is going to play Marin Cilic, which is definitely the most exciting match-up they have to offer. I predict that either the winner of that match or Ivo Karlovic is going to win the whole tournament.

In Brisbane, the two quarterfinals we had today went much as expected. Mathieu had too much experience for Nishikori, and Verdasco recovered from losing the first set to blow Serra off the court. By the way, have you seen his forehand? When it's firing on all cylinders, it's one of the best on tour. For tomorrow, we've got that enticing Tsonga-Gasquet match to look forward to, as well as a less-thrilling quarterfinal between Robin Soderling and Radek "the worm" Stepanek. I'll take Soderling in that match-up, but you never know with Stepanek. He's quite an enigma.

Also in Brisbane, Amelie Mauresmo really showed me by beating Ana Ivanovic in two pretty easy sets. It may be more that Amelie recovered from her tough three-setter the day before more quickly than her younger, Serbian opponent, but sometimes that's all it takes. Ana may need to work on her fitness. Mauresmo may be able to make something out of this year - that was her first win over a top 10 player since 2006, and that's a fine way to start out 2009. She plays Marion Bartoli next, who had no trouble with Tathiana Garbin, so we'll see how Mauresmo deals with a well-rested opponent.

The biggest match tomorrow - the biggest match of the whole week - is Murray v. Federer. I expect we'll see them play again this year, at more significant tournaments. Murray wants Federer to know that the next time they meet in a slam final, Federer can expect more resistance. And Federer wants everyone to know that he doesn't have mono this year. It should be great.

The AO's first casualty

Even though rain in Chennai prevented any matches from being played to completion, the top seed still managed to find his way out of the tournament: Davydenko pulled out with an injury to his heel, which also takes him out of the Australian Open. It's inevitable that somebody is going to be unable to play at each of these big tournaments, but Davydenko is such a decent, steady, fit guy that I'm surprised it's him. Here's hoping for a swift recovery.

While it rained in India, there was some very interesting play in Australia and Qatar. In Brisbane, Gulbis couldn't follow up on his victory over Djokovic, and lost to Paul-Henri Mathieu. Does that mean that Djoko's loss had more to do with Novak being rusty or with Gulbis not being mature enough to perform up to the same level after securing the biggest win of his career? Probably a bit of both.

Kei Nishikori continues to impress, beating fifth seed Tomas Berdych. Ancic fell to Verdasco, who was always the favorite, but I bet Ancic's marathon of a match yesterday didn't help his chances. Speaking of marathons, Tsonga had to win the second and third sets in tiebreaks after getting bageled in the first by Nieminen to avenge a loss that the Finn dealt the Frenchman almost exactly a year ago.

Tsonga will be rewarded with a day's rest and then a match against his countryman Richard Gasquet, who will have had two days off after a much-easier match against Taylor Dent. The pair are 2-2, and while Tsonga has been playing better tennis of late, I bet that Gasquet would like to remind French fans that he's still around. That one could be good.

But as for tomorrow in Brisbane, the headline match has to be Ana Ivanovic against Amelie Mauresmo, who both had tough three-set victories today. Mauresmo will have to return to her 2006 form to win this one. The Frenchwoman has been on the verge of retiring for quite a while, but it would be great to see her have a late-career resurgence.

The other highlight is to see if Kei Nishikori can continue to roll, as he comes up against the guy who beat the guy who beat Djokovic, P.H. Mathieu. I'd love to see the Japanese teen continue to win, but I figure that at some point, he's going to run into somebody with enough experience to stop him, and Mathieu may be just the veteran to do that. Also, keep an eye on doubles team Chris Guccione and Carsten Ball, who are (I believe) the only local players left in this Aussie tournament. Don't expect them to last long against top-seeded Mirnyi and Ram.

In Doha, things continue much as one might expect, but interesting clashes are coming up fast. Today, all the seeds won and Youzhny had his expected slump after beating Andreev yesterday, falling to Victor Hanescu. None of the matches in Qatar were terribly thrilling, although Kohlschreiber had to lose a second set tie-break before beating Kristof Vliegen in three. Here's hoping he keeps it close enough with Roger Federer to lose a tie-break.

Tomorrow, Roddick and Murray should both come through easily against Hanescu and Stakhovsky, respectively. Roddick in particular needs to get as much momentum as he can before the season's first major in two weeks. The real exciting match tomorrow is Nadal against Gael Monfils. The Frenchman has never beat the Spaniard, but Monfils is getting better and better, so this is probably the best shot he's had yet. Really, that ought to be headlining match tomorrow, but they had to put it at mid-day, so Rafa could have a little time to recover before he went back to play doubles against Santoro (who he's already beaten once) and Youzhny. Unless Monfils really tires him out, he should win that one, too.

In addition to Nadal, Tsonga is also still in both the singles and doubles draws, as are Verdasco, Tipsarevic, and Schuettler, thought some of them haven't even played a doubles match, yet. I'm pressed with these guys that can play singles and doubles and do well at both. The game is much more physical than it was in the 80's, when guys like McEnroe would win both the singles and doubles grand slam titles at the same tournament, multiple times.

We also have Ivo against Ivo to look forward to, but unfortunately, Aleksandra Wozniack lost before she could play Caroline Wozniacki. To have Ivo-Ivo and Wozniack-Wozniacki on the same day would have been just too good.