ATP 250: Brisbane, Chennai, Doha

I hope you have all had a nice Christmas and are ready for another tennis season  

The break was just right for me and I can't wait for the action to start! 

On this very first day of 2015, everything looks so new and possible, like the freshly snowed field ready for our fooptrints and snowballs!

We are starting the New Year with three 250 tournaments across the world with all top players taking part.  

(Regrettably, Del Potro is still not ready to join tour as he has pulled out of Brisbane citing discomfort when hitting BHs  at the tour level.)
Get better and ready soon Delpo, we have missed you 

So...here  we go!!!!! 




Held from 4-11 January, 2015, the Brisbane International presented by Suncorp will be the seventh edition of the event located at the Queensland Tennis Centre in close proximity to the Brisbane CBD. Andy Murray won back-to-back titles in 2012-13 and is undefeated on Pat Rafter Arena. The 2013 runner-up Roger Federer is set to return, while US Open champion Marin Cilic and runner-up Kei Nishikori are also confirmed. The Brisbane International has built a reputation for delivering world class entertainment, both on and off the court.


Players:
Federer, Nishikori, Raonic, Dimitrov, 
Draw tba
Order of Play tba






The Aircel Chennai Open, India’s only ATP World Tour stop, is one of three tournaments held in the opening week of the season and will celebrate its 20th edition in 2015. The ATP World Tour 250 event, first held in 1996, has built a strong legacy for being a “Springboard of Champions”, with former winners including Grand Slam champions Pat Rafter and Carlos Moya.

Players:
Wawrinka, Lopez, Agut, GG Lopez, Goffin
Draw tba
Order of Play tba






Many of the world's best tennis players open their season campaigns at the Qatar ExxonMobil Open, one of two ATP World Tour events held in the Middle East. Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray, Tomas Berdych and David Ferrer went to the traditional marketplace, Souq Waqif, to launch the 2014 ATP World Tour Season. The players were surrounded by Arabian horses and traditional Qatari falcons.


Players: Djokovic, Nadal, Berdych, Ferrer, Gasquet, Gulbis, Kholschreiber, Thiem
Draw tba
Order of Play tba

...and happy New year all!

back on OTF soon!

Nole-Stan and Nadal-Murray are playing SF exo matches in Abu Dhabi today (1 PM).
Naturally, Nadal's return is the most interesting following all that went on last year.
This is what he says:

"I did a lot of treatment on my back since Australia last year.

Some worked for a few weeks, other ones for a little bit longer, and one didn’t work. We always tried to fix the things we need to fix to be competing at 100 per cent.

In general, the feeling physically is okay and I hope to be ready to compete well in Abu Dhabi and Doha and Australia.

It wasn’t a negative season in terms of all results, it was a negative season in terms of mentality because it was hard for me to accept that I wasn’t able to compete for the whole year." 

Call me cynical, but I don't believe any of it.
He's definitely carried some injuries, I'd suspect tendonitis on all joints more or less, esp knees and then the wrists.
Just look at poor Delpo!

I don't know much about stell-cell treatments, but I don't think I've ever heard it able to cure back problems.

Most recently, Murray has had a surgery and Federer dealt with his through strenghtening the core.

I also think appendicitis and the rest was just a smokescreen and a buying-time exercise for sponsors.

Naturally, it will take him a few tournaments to play himself into his kind of form.
I expect a kind draw for him in AO (no Nole, Stan & Nishi in his quarter/half).

Does anyone here who either just reads or posts know any more details about financial percentage of sponsor distribution spread across slams?
Nadal's sponsors rule in AO (Nike&Kia), RG (Babolat) and USO (Nike)which explains a few things.

2 slightly surprising demolishions today esp. the Murray-Nadal match (6:2 6:0):
(In the post-match conference Murray complained about pote tial shoulder injury: "Shoulder is sore and I've never had an that issue. I'll see how I wake up."


Looks like he's been trying to fix his serve...






And the Nole-Stan:

After seeing the clips....

Murray has Nadalised his FH even playing 4m behind the base-line, whereas Nadal is now on the baseline but still doing his ridiculous lasso FH and slowing the game down.
Terrible viewing for spectators.
Nole-Stan much easier on the eye, Nole looking quite sharp, some good volleys from him and groundies nicely honed a level up from the end of last year.
Doha next week will be interesting.
If Nadal has a poor showing there, could we expect his withdrawal from AO?

Happy New Year everyone!

Tennis is back! Draws are out in Brisbane and Chennai. Fed and Dimi in the top half, Nishi and Rao in the bottom one.

Stan the only top player in Chennai. Goffin seeded #4 and scheduled to play Stan in SF.

Only two weeks to the AO and late-night tennis watching for me.

Hi SB, long time no see!

Didn't get time to see the draws yet, only that Nole withdrew from today's exo final with Murray due to fever...

He,he, after Fed in the WTF, that is the second final in a row now with one of the finalists not turning up, imagine if it became a trend!

Anyway, I've had enough of "holiday", Christmas/New Year week tempo is just too slow for me, and I didn't even cook any turkey!!! (I cook salmon in all shapes and forms instead )

Everyone in my tennis club keeps complaining about having to eat turkey 5 days in a row and when I ask them why they don't cook something they actually like they just shrug their shoulders...and I have seen some absolute monster size turkeys in supermarkets, they must breed them with ostriches these days....

Tenez wrote:...and happy New year all!

back on OTF soon!

Where have you are/been, home?

Happy New Year everyone !

noleisthebest wrote:
If Nadal has a poor showing there, could we expect his withdrawal from AO?

He may as well withdraw, not much point showing up at the AO anyway.

Kim Jong-Un wrote:

noleisthebest wrote:
If Nadal has a poor showing there, could we expect his withdrawal from AO?

He may as well withdraw, not much point showing up at the AO anyway.

So internet is back in N. Korea...just in time for new tennis season!

I think it's a valid question. Nadal looked like fish out of water against Murray in that exo clip from yesterday.
It was interesting to see him play on the baseline and try to attack more than usual, clearly not that comfortable.

So, does he just play AO (gets an easy draw as a pre-condition) and then hopes he plays into form or just skips it claiming some virus and starts his season on clay like in 2013?
He needs a solid 6 weeks of easy competition to get into his kind of form.

One thing he can't seem to handle well is losing and diminishing his aura, so from that point of view Doha will be quite interesting next week.

What do your "sources" say?

noleisthebest wrote:After seeing the clips....

Murray has Nadalised his FH even playing 4m behind the base-line, whereas Nadal is now on the baseline but still doing his ridiculous lasso FH and slowing the game down.
Terrible viewing for spectators.
Nole-Stan much easier on the eye, Nole looking quite sharp, some good volleys from him and groundies nicely honed a level up from the end of last year.
Doha next week will be interesting.
If Nadal has a poor showing there, could we expect his withdrawal from AO?

I was going to say exactly the same thing while I watching the clip....until I read you.
I have never seen such slow conds. Maybe AO09?

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:...and happy New year all!

back on OTF soon!

Where have you are/been, home?

Deauville, Paris and Chevriere (a tiny village near Compiegne). Compiegne being Napoleon's quarters. I am preparing a second UK invasion!

noleisthebest wrote:

So internet is back in N. Korea...just in time for new tennis season!

Yes, but I must say BT infinity really is bloody unreliable.

noleisthebest wrote:I think it's a valid question. Nadal looked like fish out of water against Murray in that exo clip from yesterday.
It was interesting to see him play on the baseline and try to attack more than usual, clearly not that comfortable.

He played lot better today against Wawrinka. Still not at his best though.

noleisthebest wrote:
So, does he just play AO (gets an easy draw as a pre-condition) and then hopes he plays into form or just skips it claiming some virus and starts his season on clay like in 2013?
He needs a solid 6 weeks of easy competition to get into his kind of form.

One thing he can't seem to handle well is losing and diminishing his aura, so from that point of view Doha will be quite interesting next week.

What do your "sources" say?

It's been 100% confirmed to me that he will get Djokovic in his half of the draw in the Australian Open.

Doha draw also out.

Nole gets Ferrer.  Also in his half Kohli, Youzhny, Rosol, Karlovic, Verdasco.

Rafa gets Berdych, and also has Seppi, Dodig, Istomin, Mayer and Gasquet in his half.

Let the season begin!

Happy new year everyone..

Djokovic gave a w/o in yesterday's exho final against Murray. Commentators were talking about his possible withdrawal from Doha too. Any news nitb?

Murray too complained about his left shoulder. Not sure its very serious.

a w.o. in an exho.....that's a bad sign!

He just had a fever, it wasn't anything too serious as far as I could tell.

Tenez wrote:I have never seen such slow conds. Maybe AO09?

Yes, it looked truly depressing.
Playing conditions suitable for 70+ age group club night tennis, not these professional, young, super-fit athletes who have been training/hitting the ball 3 hours a day for 20 years...

Kim Jong-Un wrote:
Yes, but I must say BT infinity really is bloody unreliable.

I've switched to Virgin and it's been a good decision. [/quote]

Kim Jong-Un wrote:He played lot better today against Wawrinka. Still not at his best though.

Ths is the third time Nadal's coming back after a long break, and pattern appears the same. It looks like he worked his socks off during the break.
He'll be 100% ready for clay.

IW will be dead slow as usual, but that is now working against him.

raiders_of_the_lost_ark wrote:Happy new year everyone..

Djokovic gave a w/o in yesterday's exho final against Murray. Commentators were talking about his possible withdrawal from Doha too. Any news nitb?

Murray too complained about his left shoulder. Not sure its very serious.

Nole did look a bit flushed against Stan, I thought that was because of heat, but it seems he was ill.
He traditionally never plays any ATP tournaments before AO, last time I can remember was in 2009 (Sydney?) when he failed to get number two spot from Fed after losing to Nieminen!!!
It's always been exos and/or Hopman Cup.

Doha is probably quite different from Australia in terms of climate as well as time-zone, so I would not be surprised if Nole just turns up for his doubles match tomorrow and then withdraws from the tournament, esp as he is scheduled to play his Davis Cup team,ate Nobody-bagls-Dusan-Lajovic in the first round.

Another reason Nole probably agreed to play Doha and Abu Dhabi back to back is out if duty since the Arabs have started investing heavily into Serbia in the last two years (they even bought National Airline and named the first plane after Djokovic) and Nole has been the key "diplomat" in bringing them over to Serbia who has been struggling to get anywhere with EU blackmailing it for the last 10 years with zero investment and empty promises.

Tenez wrote:
Deauville, Paris and Chevriere (a tiny village near Compiegne). Compiegne being Napoleon's quarters. I am preparing a second UK invasion!

Funny you say that, I was in London ice-skating the other night and I heard so many speak French everywhere!
I am assuming Christmas in France (like the rest of Continent) is nowhere near as commercial as the UK.

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:
Deauville, Paris and Chevriere (a tiny village near Compiegne). Compiegne being Napoleon's quarters. I am preparing a second UK invasion!

Funny you say that, I was in London ice-skating the other night and I heard so many speak French everywhere!
I am assuming Christmas in France (like the rest of Continent) is nowhere near as commercial as the UK.

Were you skating in fulham/south kensington? this is really a French neighbourhood.

Tenez wrote:

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:
Deauville, Paris and Chevriere (a tiny village near Compiegne). Compiegne being Napoleon's quarters. I am preparing a second UK invasion!

Funny you say that, I was in London ice-skating the other night and I heard so many speak French everywhere!
I am assuming Christmas in France (like the rest of Continent) is nowhere near as commercial as the UK.

Were you skating in fulham/south kensington? this is really a French neighbourhood.

I live there (uni), it's not too French is it ?

Tenez wrote:

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:
Deauville, Paris and Chevriere (a tiny village near Compiegne). Compiegne being Napoleon's quarters. I am preparing a second UK invasion!

Funny you say that, I was in London ice-skating the other night and I heard so many speak French everywhere!
I am assuming Christmas in France (like the rest of Continent) is nowhere near as commercial as the UK.

Were you skating in fulham/south kensington? this is really a French neighbourhood.

Somerset House. I noticed that even the ice has been slowed down these days...must be artificial.
Still, quite nice.
http://www.somersethouse.org.uk/images/si/a2f64a60-0648-4218-9c16-261b401a92ef.png

2015 tennis season is underway - Simon and Duckworth with the honor of opening it have just started their match.

Roger
2015 tennis year

Simon and Bennetau, both out in the 1st round in Brisbane.

Unfortunately, Brisbane does not seem to play fast like last year:



Camera angle does not help, either.
I was curious to see the other young Aussie hope Kokkinakis as he is considered more talented than Kyrgios.

Benne did not seem to play badly, apart from some exo style shots that show it's the beginning of the season.

Duckworth, who beat Simon, played som nice aggressive old-fashioned tennis:



Federer close to his 1000 match win, and should he win in Brisbane, he'll meet the mark!


"I would love to win this event. I was close last year, after I had had a good week. I always like lifting trophies in a place that I have never been able to. I am unbelievably pumped up for this week. It’s a really good field, with a lot of promising players."

I haven't checked the scores but had these bookmarked for

Match of the Day:

Gasquet-Anduhar
Chardy-Golubev
Dolgopolov/Nishikori-Bophana/Nestor

Fed's back is still a very big concern for me. What happened in London in November is not a good sign and clearly shows that the problem is always there. I am pretty sure it is also the reason he lost teh USO this year.

Regarding the youngsters, I expect a few of them to do well this year. I think only Djoko will be able to contain most but it will get tough for him too as the youngsters hit harder than the previous generation.

Tenez wrote:Fed's back is still a very big concern for me. What happened in London in November is not a good sign and clearly shows that the problem is always there. I am pretty sure it is also the reason he lost teh USO this year.

Once the back starts giving you trouble, it never goes away completely, it's all down to how you manage it.

With current level of physicality, it's got very hard to remain fresh for the end of tournaments, esp slams.

So, in that respect, the fragility of Federer's chronic injury does give a sense he is playing on borrowed time.

Unless conditions ger faster it's going to be very tough for him no matter what.

I think WTF final withdrawal last year was more to do with Davis Cup, but probably also had the element of panic knowing what he went through in 2013 as he certainly did not want a repeat of it.

Interesting to read what Jelena Jankovic went through with her back injury last year:

"I thought this maybe could be the end of my career. It was really bad. Not sick. Just when you are injured and you have a bad back injury, you're thinking maybe you're never going to be able to play again at a high level. Just kept doing therapies. I was just trying to recover. And I did. But there is still something in the back of my mind. Sometimes when I play I'm a little bit tense where I just don't want to get there again.

I lost my muscles and I look like jelly. There was nothing there. Then when I saw myself in the mirror a month ago I was like, ‘Oh, my God. I got to do some work,’ so I think it improved a lot.

With that all said, I still need to do a lot of work to get where I want to be. Because of that injury, I needed more time to recover and heal, because it was a bad injury.

It can be tough on you just overall on the mental aspect where you cannot even brush your teeth properly. You have to find a technique to bend down. You kind of get down. You don't feel happy where you cannot do normal daily activities, such as brushing your teeth; putting my shoes on was a tough task for me. So it took a while to get better and to kind of heal."

A nice article in Leander Paes and his 25 hears in professional tennis.
Some interesting quotes and insights.

http://www.atpworldtour.com/News/Tennis/2015/01/1/Feature-Paes-25-Years.aspx

Tenez wrote:Regarding the youngsters, I expect a few of them to do well this year. I think only Djoko will be able to contain most but it will get tough for him too as the youngsters hit harder than the previous generation.

Nishikori if stays injury free and fit, will be taking out Nadal and Djokovic in a lot of their meetings. Dimitrov too, if he has changed some of his game.

I wish you were right. Nishi is too fragile. He keeps having physical issues.

Hopefully, Cilic can consolidate his ranking.

Cilic seems to have picked up a bad shoulder injury, which does not surprise me.
He is not a natural server like Goran, yet Ivanisevic did improve Cilic's serve which eventually won him last USO.
He probably got the extra pace not from better timing but throwing/jerking his shoulder harder into the shot, hence current troubles, he even looks questionable for AO.

The other young Croatian, Coric (18), although weaponless will probably be more successful.
He beat Haase easily yesterday and is scheduled to play Stan next. That could be very interesting.
He has cockiness that reminds me of young Nole:

"Playing tennis to break into the Top 20 has never been a goal. It is meaningless to play a sport, if it's not for becoming the No. 1 world player.  "When I'm at my best I am more like Djokovic game wise, when I'm not, I'm more like Murray. (nitb:   )
I think my game is quite similar to Djokovic's. I move well, I don't miss many balls, I'm a fighter and my backhand is my best shot. Currently, I'm the best of my generation. Making the Top 50 within the next few months seems a realistic goal for me now."

that was funny. But hopefully he will be stopped by the better more aggressive players.

I only saw a little bit of him and Zverev (who is much taller than Coric), and was impressed with the maturity & patience with which they play.
I don't know who the other promising players of that generation are, maybe Thiem or Goffin, though they are a bit older.

It will be interesting to see how Nishi/Dimi&Raonic do this year.
In a strange way, their time is running out....

He, he...tennis 2015 couldn't've started any better!

Disgusting! classless and crass from NADAL (who else?) making Berrer wait on every single point of that last game when Berrer was serving for the match.

So glad Berrer stuffed him....despite losing his temper and saving 3 break back points.

Well done Berrer. PLayed so much more gutsy than Nadal (well that's not difficult actually).

Yes, Berrer was excellent, right down to when he tied his shoe laces and made Nadal wait the last deuce.
I wish more players had the same attitude.

Nadal may as well retire, can't even beat Berrer these days.

yes Nadal hasn't reached his peak yet. He is only 28! Berrer is 34!!!!!.

Wow, pretty surprised with this result, but it is still early days; he may turn it around soon enough - even for the AO possibly.

Match of the Day:

Goffin-Berankis
Wawrinka-Coric
Djokovic-Strakhovski



and currently playing for Auusie pride (3:3 1st set)

Kokkinakis-Tomic

Interesting comment from Nadal's coach (Roig) about yesterday's loss:

"Honestly, Rafa was playing very well. Some of the best tennis in his life. And I'm not kidding. He was hitting from both sides, very complete. And something changed. He had a bad game in the second set and he never really recovered. It was easy and then, in the space of 10 minutes, everything got difficult. He wasn't agonising, his attitude was good, but because he lacks match play everything gets magnified. Me, as a coach, I didn't expect that. But Rafa, yes. You know how he sometimes over-analyses."

So, for all his much hailed fighting spirit, all it takes just one game for Nadal to collapse, such is the fear he plays with.
Not to mention that his game is reduced to being described as "hitting from both sides."

Tsonga withdraws from AO, his DC injury still bothering him...

Goffin bagels Berankis innthe first set, now Berankis trying to bagel him in the 2nd (3:0) ....

Turning into quite a battle, now 3:3 in the 3rd set.

Berankis is a tough competitor,  quite some punch on his  serve and groundstrokes, esp FH, even serve, playing better as the match goes on.
Goffin, quicker hands, more flair, quicker to attack.

Both playing with lots of heart, nice to see.

Great news, Delpo is playing in Sydney and AO!


"I missed the tour, I missed to compete, I missed interacting with you on court and those feelings outweigh the pain in the wrist, which comes and goes and prevented me from having the ideal pre-season training.

I don't expect great results, I just want to feel the competition, I want to feel an active player once again, nearly a year after my last match.

At this point I don't care about the rankings. The situation is different. I take it as a reward for the effort that I put to come back."




Welcome back!