2005 AO Reports Day 3 and 4 the end of qualifying

Interesting results today and it only looks like that Baghdatis is the guy that I want to watch, but there will be some more guys training which will be good.

There was this Italian guy Lorenzi who is baby Massu. He has the same hairstyle, the same kind of game, but not as much grunt as Nico and doesn't have the strength of Massu and he lost to this joker Bobby Reynolds, he could only be American with that name.

Nettle/Mazrakis match was very close and Nettle got some hometown calls in the 3rd set which helped him for sure and some of the local Greek community weren't very happy about that.
Garcia-Lopez won again and made it tough for himself, he might lift his game and win easily in the last match and I would like to see him in the main draw.

Ryderstedt forgot about his form in the 2nd set of yesterday, but the conditions changed rapidly as it was very windy and overcast a total contrast to yesterday and he couldn't handle it. Bracciali was good, but Ryderstedt definitely helped him along the way.

Prpic I was disappointed with him in this match, he was a bit too passive, he had a good start then and Van Gemerden lifted his game and was hitting with good length and Prpic was hitting too many short balls and got punished for it.

Marach and Seppi well Seppi was somewhere else today in the mind, except from where he needed to be. Marach was solid, but nothing special and he did well to beat Mackin the ghost who is the whitest guy I have seen in ages. Seppi is definitely better on the clay, but he was a fool and not good enough and Marach took advantage.

Koellerer and Parmar well that was an interesting math for the time that I saw it. After the 3rd game "Dani" was up to his tricks whining about the calls, screaming at the ballboys and after losing a break at 2-1 in the 1st set, he threw his racquet down. Parmar again showed his choking capabilities and was serving for the match at 5-4 in the 2nd, but as usual didn't have the bottle and "psychotic clown" fought hard and won the 2nd and I had no doubt he would win the 3rd. Tomorrow he is making my list if you know what I mean.

Baghdatis was a lot better than yesterday, he was able to be consistent and to swing through his shots more than yesterday and Sarstrand had his forehand broken down, as his backhand is a very good shot. He was clearly the better player and had plenty in reserve and hopefully he gets through to the main draw.

Lopez/Suzuki match was frustrating for sure. Lopez should have won this in straight sets he was up 4-2 and 15-40 on Suzuki's serve, but he played a silly shot and lost that opportunity. He had problems with his stomach again and it's a chronic problem as he couldn't hit kick serves at all. When he could get rallies Lopez had him on a string, but the game he lost in the 1st set to lose his advantage, he didn't get a first serve in at all. His serve isn't fast enough for that to happen.

Marc fought hard and won the 2nd, but Suzuki remained calm, chipped and charged and moved forward a lot. Lopez is quite good at the net, but he let nerves get the better of him and wouldn't move forward and when the chance to run around the backhand to use his stronger forehand he wouldn't do it.

There were a few more training today. I saw Monfils today and he was training with Sargsian and I realised that Gael is playing Ginepri, so allez Gael. He isn't arrogant at all and seemed fine after practice and I don't get negative vibes from him.

Zabaleta was there training with Acasuso. It was plenty of fun as always and there is a surprise involved here, but I am not saying what it is They weren't really trying hard and Zaba was having his groin stretched and some of the ladies would have loved that for sure.
Mantilla was training as well and he wasn't hitting them that well, but if he is prepared to run and run he could win a few matches, I hope he can do this for sure, as I don't see him playing for much longer at all.

Massu was there watching Garcia and then he trained, so his injury wasn't too serious and when I left Schalken was working on his serve.

Not a bad day tomorrow should be better.


Saturday

Well this report I am not quite sure how it will read, but here goes anyway. I saw a lot more players training on site and that was good as there were only a few qualie matches today, but these had good results.

Garcia-Lopez got through and it was easy for once as he made heavy weather of the other 2 matches. Ferrero was there supporting his friend and my impression of him hasn't changed, he is alright and I don't dislike him, but there are other players that I want to beat him.

Marach vs. Christophe "the Beard" Rochus wasn't a bad match. Marach is a very good fighter who makes the most of what he has and I was surprised he won, but happy for him. Melzer was there with his beautiful hair, though he is almost macho compared to Feli Lopez.

Baghdatis played well today and it was funny his cousin was so nervous when Marcos was leading with an early break in the 2nd he went for a walk, then one of the Greek guys texted him and then he came back and was very happy. He got in a good section of the draw and can do quite well as his elbow seems to be a lot better and he was moving very well against a guy who has been better than the last opponents.

Dickhead Dani got beaten 6-4 6-0 and he was around and his mother was there giving him a hug, it was almost a tender moment, but since it was Koellerer I could only laugh. I didn't see much or hear much whining from him. The best bit is Luzzi the guy who punched him qualified and he didn't.

This is in no order of whom I saw play and the like, but these are among the illuminaries. Gambill was playing with the Aussie Healey and JMG no matter what I think of him as a player, or whether he is gay. I can't fault with him with the fans and the flies were getting to him as they do and it seems to be worse than usual.

Nieminen was training with the Toad and was striking them fairly well and Söderling has decided to get a haircut and Peta from MTF was happy that she got a photo the day before he cut his hair.

Mariano was training with Lobo at the same time, though he might have trained again later, though I am not sure about it. He was in jovial mood as always and I have the Swedish speech ready for him when he goes back to Båstad. He will need our support since he is playing an Aussie.

Robredo was training with Hrbaty and the irony is I am taking a photo for two of my friends Ariel the Argentine and Peter the Chilean and I was almost tempted to cramp up but that would have been over the top. Hrbaty when they finished ran off and trained on another court with Sluiter.

A Schuettler sighting he was training with Ljubicic and Dirk was there smirking as usual, the guy doesn't have to say anything and he is still funny. He seemed to be in a fairly good mood and no Alfie warning as of yet.

Kiefer was there with Kohlschreiber who was hitting the ball very well and giving Kiefer a workout. Hogstedt Kiefer's coach is a funny guy, he definitely had a big night out last night and Kiefer says “what do you expect, all he eats is Chinese food".

I did hear the circumstances of the gunman incident and what exactly happened to Kiefer, the basic simple truth is this guy was getting chased through Melbourne and stole a cab, as the car was crashed on the footpath and Kiefer was getting his bags out of the car, then the gunman was doing the pose of pointing the shooter everywhere and Kiefer ducked behind the car, the instant reaction.

I saw Spadea twice and Vinny Ice was at his best and I was surprised a woman asked for his autograph, and even more so he gave it. I thought Vinny Ice would have come up with a rap and I think it would be close to see who is more unpopular among their peers Spadea, Roddick or Coria.

T.Johansson was with Pavel and Pavel is a funny guy and the Peta incident. When she went up to him and asked him for a photo and in a deadpan manner said " No" Then he was waiting and said do you want the photo with a smile on his face. He was hitting the backhands very well and that is good to see and I'll be watching his matches as usual.

Calleri and Nadal were hitting together as well. Calleri is a great guy he was there joking afterwards and Ariel was very happy to talk to him and El Gordo is one of my favourites and he is nothing off court, like he is when he is on court and that is very scary as there is an intense rage that grips him. He has a tough match against Max, maybe Max hasn't been able to sleep well with the new baby.

Chela and Acasuso were around as well, then there was Saulnier who was hitting with Spadea. There was Stepanek and Davydenko on the outer courts as well. Volandri was there as well.

Blake was there, but Costa was killing him in practice and Blake's racquet was snapped and only the head was there and the handle was in his hand when he left the court.

Massu and Mantilla were there together. Felix wasn't too bad and Massu as always was intense and Peter isn't a fan of Massu at all, he is happy he won the Gold medal, but doesn't care for him either way. It was fun anyway, but more crazy shit was about to happen.

In the evening Monaco and Andreev were hitting and Monaco was getting the better of it and we were joking, then this 200kg security guard with no sense of humour was trying to kick us out, but we argued then hid and came back around and decided to watch the rest of the practice. He wasn't there to be seen, maybe he needed his burger fix.

There were these Germans around, and because nobody was around, these guys had their racquets and decided to hit on the court. It was quite funny and you can see they weren't of tournament standard, then I went on there and proceded to hit from 5 metres behind the baseline with a Wilson and now I know why I don't use this one, it was crap, but fun to hit on the court anyway.

Step Back in Time : GWH 2005 Aussie Open Report Part 1 and 2

Since this is as good time as any to bring these reports back to life and then now all of them will be updated and that can only be good.

This is from the 2005 Aus Open starting at the Kooyong exho and the first day of qualies.

The organisers did the right thing, by changing the schedule and making the Federer/Gaudio match second for which I was thankful for.

Good advantage of travelling light as I don't have to wait for the luggage, though there was a foible to this and more later.

I got there at the end of the Agassi vs.. Massu match. I only saw the tiebreaker and Massu seemed to be playing alright, but Agassi is very tough on this surface and doesn't seem to miss a beat when he plays here.

Then onto the match that I wanted to see Federer vs.. Gaudio. On the whole the match wasn't great, then again being an exhibition that can happen, as they both seemed to be sluggish.

They started trading breaks and Federer was definitely attacking more and coming to the net more than usual which made sense and Gaston was missing a lot of passes, then he decided to vary his shots with a few lobs and changed the speed of shot.

At 5-5 Gaston saved his set point with a forehand winner and then on Federer's next service game, he used the lob when Roger moved forward and he hit a short shot for Gaston to hit a dtl backhand to break serve.

Then he managed to hold his serve to love and Roger was getting slightly annoyed.

Second set Federer starts hitting more touch shots and his game is getting in the groove and Gaston isn't as focused as previously, but Roger has lifted his game especially in the last 2 games.

The 3rd set then they actually started playing some good tennis as they were trying to outdo each other in the finesse stakes. Federer hits this short volley to Gaston's forehand, then all of a sudden he hits a crosscourt winner through his legs and Roger just laughs.

Both are playing well Gaston is hitting good length and Federer is using his forehand very well and knocking off the volley. They are going comfortably on serve and then Gaston at 3-3 threw in a bad game and was punished by that. He served 2 foot faults and one of them was a double, then Federer got a lucky net cord. The last chance he had was at 30-30 on Roger's serve, and then he hits a forehand that hits the line.

Roger served it out and Gaston played quite well in patches, and there was plenty of good feelings and mutual respect during the match. Gaston and Roger both signed plenty of autographs as well.

Nalbandian/Henman well this performance you could tell it was David's first match of the year and he will only get better. I am not really sure how Henman played as David made plenty of schoolboy errors, especially in the 1st set and 6-1 was justified.

The second set was better and he had so many break point opportunities, but he refused to take them and when Tim was serving for the match at 5-4, then David decides to serve 3 double faults in his service game just because he is charitable.

Nalbandian will have to improve for sure and Henman now plays Federer in the semis, while Gaston and Nalbandian play tomorrow.

Roddick was efficient in his match and he didn't seem to go that hard and Ljubicic wasn't much chop today and at least in the 2nd set he was semi-competitive, in the 1st set Duckboy didn't have to get out of neutral.

Thursday

This will have to be done in two parts as it will take too long and the first day of the qualies might have to wait.

I went and saw the first match between Gaudio and Nalbandian and for the 1st set it was quite a good match. David seemed to be more serious about it, but he needed to be after his first match against Henman.

Gaston started serving and had his footfaultitis again, but he started off well with 2 big backhand winners. The thing I noticed from the first 3 games was the clear improvement from yesterday, even though it was fucking hot already at 11am and of course I was out in the sun frying away, but managing to keep cool enough.

The first break for Nalle was for 2-3. It was funny Gaston hits a bad dropshot, Nalle hits a worse reply, but then he settles down and is moving well and being aggressive and showing he is better on this surface than Gaston. Gaston misses a sitter to make it to deuce.

The next service game had a very cool moment as Nalle gets back to deuce with some good play, he hits a top drop volley that is back spinning towards the net, Gaston makes it and but David puts it away and then they end up on the same side of the net and shake hands.

Gaston is serving/volleying more than usual and that is usually a sign in itself . He was volleying well and hitting some good winners, but I was impressed with Nalle's forehand and he was getting some very good angles and Gaston's volleying was very good in these stages, though he managed to blow easy chances at the wrong moments.

One very funny moment was a 1st serve from Gaston it was such a fault it missed the court and it went 6 rows back before bouncing, you can only laugh at such stuff like that, and then he lost serve.

Nalle is continuing on and playing very well and Gaston seemed a bit disinterested, he didn't tank at all, but a bit disinterested. He didn't hold a serve in the second set and Nalle was focused and wasn't going to let him off the hook.

It was a good and fun first set, but the 2nd one was a combination of Nalle's consistency and a bit of disinterest from Gaston, but it was good to see them play.

The right man won and the result was fair enough maybe the 1st set could have been 6-4 or 7-5 as it was fairly close, but I always felt David was in control.

Afterwards I went for a wander in the shade as it was very warm for sure and I couldn't be bothered about Roddick and Agassi, then I see Agassi walking towards me. He couldn't be bothered and it was an alleged hip problem. He has had enough practice and is probably ready to play.

I went down to the qualies afterward and I will do a combined Day 1/2 report and maybe do it later.

I saw Seppi, Baghdatis, Ryderstedt, Prpic, Marc Lopez, and Ancic training.

Since the men's doesn't start until noon at the earliest I will have it already before the start of play tomorrow.

There was plenty of activity going on with matches and I only saw a few matches in full and parts of others, due to them clashing and other annoying factors.

I saw a bit of the De Chaunac vs.Minar match it wasn't that good and De Chaunac for some reason I keep calling him "Cyrano" should have won it a lot earlier than he managed to and after the match he smashed his racquet and that was after he won.

These ones are not in order and sadly I missed the 'psychotic clown' Daniel Koellerer but fortunately for me he won and I can see him today. This guy is an absolute jerk and got suspended from the tour for a few months at the end of the season because of his arsehole behaviour and the argument he had with Luzzi at a challenger. The best bit was Koellerer's mother told these two German guys he had a back problem, but when I told them the truth, they found it very funny.

I saw the last set of the Rydsterdt vs. Sabau match and that was the set to watch. Mikael was hitting the ball well and I think he will qualify and could do quite well in the future.

Christophe Rochus has a beard and what an interesting growth it has and it helped him maybe not get burnt and there is photographic evidence of this beard.

I saw the last bit of the Seppi/Robert match once he had won the 1st set, he wasn't in much trouble. I don't mind Seppi's game and he seems to have a good attitude and I would like him to qualify for the main draw and haven't seen his section yet.

I saw the Di Pasquale match and it wasn't pretty. He really should have won this match in two as he was better than Schukin who wasn't too impressed with. He called for the trainer again and he seemed to be cramping again as he seems to do a lot sadly. I am disappointed that injuries have wrecked his career and I find it hard to see that he can make it back, but I hope to be proven wrong.

I wanted to see Sa vs. Wawrinka, but I didn't get around to it, but Stani won and that is cool as I don't mind him off the court, though on it he can be a bit of a pain, but I will watch him today.

Prpic vs. Bourgeois well Filip had this match in control the whole way through, he was moving quite well and I would like to see him go up the ranking, he has a good demeanour on court and off the court as well. It's hard to say how he played as he never seemed to be in trouble at all and it will be interesting to see his match today.

Two more matches I saw were Marc Lopez vs. Golmard. This was quite close initially and Lopez had to call the trainer for a stomach problem which restricted his serves to slice serves and ones at the body and Golmard made a lot of errors. Lopez was very consistent and hit some very good length on his hots and kept his errors down and that is what got him home. I hope he can get some treatment as the serves weren't very fast and Golmard was absolutely cut at losing this match. Mantilla was there as well for a while, so I was happy with that and the result of this match.

The last match was the Baghdatis vs. Gabashvili. I thought this would be straight forward for Marcos and it was, but there were some problems as he has difficulties with this player. Gabash is an all-forehand player with a big serve and plenty of acne and likes the ball to be hit hard.
Here is the thing that Marcos has tennis elbow and had to get treatment before the match as he wasn't able to be as aggressive as usual and was more reactive as he had some problems swinging through his shots, so he had to place them more effectively. It's a good sign that he was able to win while not playing well, he plays Sarstrand today.

Well this one was a long one and I think it will stay here as there aren't many stars around on this day.

Mr Disney De Villiers Recreating Apartheid on the ATP in the form of Round Robin

Mr Disney's most controversial plan among many is the introduction of Round Robin in some tournaments in 2007. Yes, these will be some of the smaller events, but even then it is a ridiculous notion which basically serves to protect the best interests of the Tournament Directors and the top players.

Therefore with this being the case it is another form of apartheid where the people at the top who are already advantaged, get further benefits and while the Tournament Directors have to make money, it's not about them, though since the bottom line is making profits at the expense of the players and as long as it brings more money to Mr.Disney then the rest is just damage that can be written off according to the Mr.Disney gang.

As for whether the players are for this or not, this is very debatable at best. The ATP have said that they allegedly have fan support for this particular change to the game, which is interesting as to where this mysterious fanbase is. Where did they do these surveys and which people did they ask? It's interesting cause there are certain groups of people who wouldn't piss on each other if they were on fire, yet they can agree that RR in tournaments besides the World Team Cup and The Masters Cup is fundamentally flawed at best or a disgrace to the game at worst. Then again it's not difficult to manipulate a question to get a particular response you want.

The knockout system is what makes tennis special and unique and that is how the top players made their way through the ranks of the Futures and Challenger events, and they were able as youngsters to play in these events, where if they won their match then they were guaranteed to go through the next phase.

The common phrase so far is that "Federer may lose once, but he won't lose twice", and this is on the money and as for Federer he used to believe in the system and now he doesn't support the RR. I just wish he would use his influence as the best player in the world to make some people at ATP headquarters make sense.

The fact that there are chances that set ratio will be used to go through to the knockout phase and also if all things are equal, then the player with the higher ranking goes through, that is very fair. Also there is enough suspicion of match fixing within tennis and with these events it will increase the chances and also there is the opportunity for certain results to be fixed to give a greater benefit to a particular player.

One of the main reasons the players have not made more noise about it, is basically in essence they are mercenaries. Well the lower ranked are against it for obvious reasons and their collective voice isn't as great as the elite players and since they have don't have the star power and pull. Also the ATP has increased prizemoney, but as the old saying is that "everyone has their price". Since tennis is a selfish sport, of course they are going to think about the present and not worry about the future.

The biggest problem is that the schedule is too long and this is cosmetic to distract from this problem and how does RR help when it means more matches so to protect the top players. One of the more intelligent things to do would not have Masters events back to back, but that is deemed complex.

Sure these changes will make people like the mafioso Ion Tiriac happy and as for the fans, it's not like they really matter in the scheme of things. The ATP are more interested in the profit and loss column and it does say something when Mercedes a long time sponsor of the game quits at the change of leadership. Also the relationship between the ITF and ATP which was cold at best has now gone even colder at the moment.

Now we can only wait for the results of this experiment, which really should not be taking place and there are more players speaking out against it, the problem is it won't be enough of them or loudly enough. Mr.Disney does not care about the game of tennis and is there just to bring attention to himself and hog the spotlight instead of consolidating and thinking through various strategies. He has a 1000 ideas a day and 1001 of them are bad, on that note it would be for the benefit of tennis as a whole if the Round Robin experiment fails.

Beware: Mr Disney and his vision for the Reformation of ATP Tour

The New Official Car of the ATP Tour since long time sponsor Mercedes withdrew its support for the ATP and is there a correlation between Mr Disney and this?

The Reformation of the ATP Tour

Well this entry is going to be one of the more serious ones, that has ever happened on this blog and no it’s not cause of the advancing years of the author. The subject matter concerned which are the reforms that are attempting to come into place for tennis and specifically the ATP Tour. These particular ones will be dealt individually in the piece, but we need to state the man behind this he is known as Etienne de Villiers the head of the ATP, that replaced another muppet Mark Miles and this is the only time he will be referred by that name in the article and he is known as Mr Disney cause he was a former executive with the Disney corporation and his suggestions for reform are just Mickey Mouse solutions to complex problems.

Mr Disney came in as a breath of fresh air and tennis does need to adapt and there are needs for reform and people were prepared to give the man a chance, but any goodwill that Mr Disney has gained has been lost among tennis fans, though this would not seem to be the case according to Mr Disney who has come out said. “The fans are behind these changes “. The main contention point is the Round Robin format for some of the events, which will be discussed in greater detail later on and this caused the greatest debate and with the spin Mr Disney is using. It would be worthwhile to find out who Mr Disney surveyed and it would not be a surprise if it was Tournament Directors.

Now it will be time to examine some of the reforms from Fearless Leader Disney and conclude with something deep and meaningful out of it, though with this blog that tends to happen as often as Kent Carlsson won a grasscourt match.

Starting Tournaments on Sundays:

This one is annoying yet understandable. For the weeks before Grand Slam events, it makes sense to start the tournament on a Sunday, as to give the finalists more time to get to the Slam venue than previously the case so that is beneficial.

Roland Garros this year had a Sunday start and it was a bit of a wank really just having 12 matches to choose from and that is combined with the males and the females. If they were serious about it then as a 128 draw, then they should have 21 matches on two of the days and 22 on the other day of the 1st round to complete it.

If they are going to do something like this then do it properly, there are always nice platitudes caring about the fans from the organisers when in reality they don’t give a fuck about people as long as they are gullible enough to hand over their hard earned money.

Federer had to play on Sunday and then his 2nd round match was played on a Wednesday, it was fortunate that the weather held up and didn’t create the logjam of matches that has occurred at the US Open with their 3 day 1st round. He joked he could have gone to Switzerland and back in time for his next match. The players are used to and like the continuity of play one day, then rest the next and vice versa during the Slams.

It was a gimmick just to milk more money and not really concerned about caring about the fans. If this was truly the case then there should have been more matches on offer to watch on that first Sunday, than was offered up.

Ending Best of 5 Set Finals in ATP Finals :

This is called “the James Blake rule”, named after the man who can’t win a 5 setter and says ‘that the players were behind this rule”. The elimination of 5 set finals outside of Slams well it will devalue the TMS events, even though they are in reality glorified warm up events for the Slams, some of these events have a great history and more often than not the best matches of the year have occurred in this environment, so it makes sense that Mr Disney and his cronies would want this eliminated.

As for the IS or ISG events that have 5 set finals, well it’s understandable that these finals are reduced to the best of 3 sets, that is less of a problem than doing it to the TMS events, though the above counts for some of the best matches have been in these finals. Also tennis is a game that fitness is important and these finals give players more exposure to best of 5 as well.

In other words it’s the cop out solution when in reality there should not be back to back TMS events, because Mr Disney won’t do anything about this problem, he then chooses the soft option and that is something he does frequently, as this gives the impression that something is being done, but it’s not what really should be addressed.

Marketing and renaming the tennis tour

Well tennis as a global sport is undisputed, but the way it has been marketed hasn’t been a success and this is probably down to a number of factors. Allegedly the marketing budget was under 1 million dollars and for an organisation as the ATP, that is just not good enough. This being said they have this marketing plan and that is one thing Disney is very good at, marketing their products to the general public. Whether they can use the same strategies with humans as they do with cartoon characters is debatable, though it wouldn’t surprise me if we saw stuff like Nadal dolls that scream ‘vamos” and pick their arse on demand, Roddick looking like Donald Duck as he does when he is pouting or whining about a line call and it goes on.

It seems they will focus mainly on 6 players those would be Federer, Nadal, Safin, Roddick, Blake and well since the Tursunov bandwagon is ridiculously huge they could use him as Aesop the storyteller. At the same time they need to take a punt on the younger talent coming through such as Gasquet, Berdych, Monfils, Murray, Baghdatis, Djokovic, del Potro for example. There is a fine line between marketing and overhype and no one wants something that is saturated, that it is more than likely to create a backlash. There needs to be more marketing of the sport, but they need to do it wisely.

Renaming the tour is just a silly tool and it’s not likely to bring in any more new fans just because the game will be called the “ATP Worldwide Tour”, it doesn’t scream wow I am a fan now. The question Mr Disney and his stooges have to ask is. What is their objective and end goal and where do they want to the game to be and to who they are trying to attract? Does the sport have to adapt to the casual fan or does the casual fan accept what the game of tennis is and what it isn’t? With gimmicks like this they seem to want to insult the intelligence of the existent fanbase to gain bandwagon fans who will leave just as quickly as they got on the wagon.

This is another example of taking the cheap option when the real problem is how tennis can get itself better TV coverage than it currently does. The PGA tour which owns the golf tournaments have negotiated the TV rights for their events as an organisation which is what the ATP should be doing at the very least. This means whether a consumer wants to watch the US or European tour events then they have the choice to do so and become familiar with the players and not many of these players are exactly charisma machines, but there is greater accessibility for the obvious reason, this is something tennis lacks.

There are many excellent players in tennis and have interesting stories about them, though this would not seem the case at the moment, the ATP have to take some responsibility and make some hard decisions and think about them and not just come up with cheap gimmicks. They need to take over the ownership of tournaments when it comes to negotiating TV rights, so they can charge the fees to various broadcasters and then the broadcasters choose the events that they will show for the week and have a rights deal that last 4 or 5 years for example. The lack of accessibility and the emphasis of just showing the established stars when on TV doesn’t do much for the sport, there needs to be a mixture of the financial and the future of the game to be considered.

The Round Robin section will be done alone as it’s a special stand alone subject.

Will it be the Vodka lovers or the Gauchos taking home the Davis Cup?

Finally the Davis Cup final is coming and there is great potential for a close final between Russia and Argentina. As the man known as Jimbo said “I couldn’t have had a better final even if I rigged the draw”.

There are so many possible scenarios to this tie and that alone makes it interesting, both the captains Shamil Tarpishev otherwise known as Yeltsin’s stooge and Alberto Mancini are very good leaders and shrewd and their tactics will come into play for sure, as they have to find the right balance and they have multi-dimensional options and that can make things just as difficult as only having a two man team.

First of all I will preview the Russians and they are the home team, yet the only time they have won the Davis Cup was away in France and the two finals at home they lost first of all in 1994 to Swedes on an indoor surface where Boris “boozer” Yeltsin walked in at 5-5 in the 5th set of the Edberg and Volkov match holding up play and then the next year against the inspired Yanks on slow heavy clay. That is one hurdle they have to get over and the fact that they are favourites and haven’t won the Davis Cup while being a favourite.

They have an excellent all round team with Safin, Tursunov, PMK and Youzhny. All four guys that can play on all surfaces and singles as well, so they are likely to lose the doubles tie, then again one can’t tell Davis Cup does strange things to players. The only constant here is that Safin will be playing singles and since he is the number 2 he will be playing Nalbandian on Day 1 and then the vital 5th match if it comes to that. Safin and Nalbandian will be the key players in this tie. Though Tursunov has shown his strong mentality in Davis Cup defeating Gasquet and Roddick in vital matches that have secured Russia’s place and the PMK is solid all around and has a combined 6-0 record against Calleri and Acasuso, though he is negative against Chela and Cañas. Youzhny has been named in the squad, but he will be either head cheerleader or somehow recovered from the broken bone in his foot and play doubles or a blinder in singles.

Onto the Argentines now, this is their golden generation of players and only the second time they have made the DC final. They aren’t favourites at all and that is something they can use to their advantage. Vilas and Clerc were the forerunners and it would mean a lot to Argentina to win the DC for the first time and this team have excellent harmony and that is something that should not be underestimated at all. Like the Russians, they have excellent depth and flexibility in their squad and how Luli uses his squad is vital. Mancini is aware that Shamil has been known to bullshit about his team selection, well claim that one player is playing and then he will substitute for another. Guillermo Cañas has made a wonderful comeback and is there with the team, but it would be too much to ask him to step up from clay challengers to a Davis Cup final indoors and this will mean that chubby Chela will be more than likely the 4th player, though one can never tell. It could be a case that PMK doesn’t play on Day 1 to avoid playing Chela, though if it goes to a 5th match then Chela won’t play a role.

The Order of Play will be intriguing as it would be advantageous for Argentina if Nalbandian plays first against Safin and this is the one arena where he always plays his heart out and tries his best. If Nalle can defeat Safin, then that will liven things up for sure, the other side is that if Nalle has to win the match at 0-1 down it will be a lot of pressure on him, as for Argentina to win the Davis Cup they will need to be 1-1 after Day 1 at worst.

This leads into the next question who will be the second singles player be Chucho Acasuso has been training well and responds well to Luli. His record indoors isn’t that good and while he has the best serve of the Argentines, his return game is streaky and he needs to be more of a man on the backhand and hit more of them. Calleri is another guy who lives for this format and he is the guy that I believe would be better suited to playing Safin in the last match.

Doubles well Nalbandian is the key and he plays well with Chucho or Calleri, so it wouldn’t be too radical to suggest that one of them will be playing in the doubles, but the match does rest on Nalbandian’s shoulders and he knows that. He has an excellent team with him and they are playing against a very good side as well and the tactics are going to be so important here in how they use their combinations.

If Argentina wins the Davis Cup, it will be so much more rewarding because they won 2 out of the 4 ties away from home and that is what the best sides should be able to do win the matches away from home.

The thing about this format is they win as a team and lose a team. The extreme levels of emotion involved as well is different from regular tournament play and this needs to be appreciated, it’s not about the money or individual glory solely, but then again it’s a great thing when the number 1 in the world Federer claims he cares about history, yet likes to piss on one of the most historical tennis events and he doesn’t have the excuse of a dud number 2 player.

As for who will win the final, well I think Russia will, but this is not the outcome that would be preferred. Hopefully it will be a hard fought and well contested final and whoever wins will have deserved it especially since they didn’t make the final on the back of having all ties at home.

Shanghai Showdown

Well the best 8 players of the year have gathered in Shanghai and are playing to see who will in the Masters and whatever prestige that brings with it. I mean just cause Nalbandian won it last year, it doesn't mean he was the true master of 2005 and if someone else besides Federer wins it, it won't change the fact that Federer has been the best player for the past seasons.

One thing I love about the Masters is that the surface is virtually always the same, therefore disadvantaging certain players while always favouring the same ones. Surface rotation would be good for that to spread it around, but hey that would be too sensible for those clowns to understand as a concept, then again there aren't many concepts that the ATP understand.

Better go onto the players and I will do this in groups and whatever order isn't important.

Federer : Well clearly the best player in the world and the only match he has lost in the TMC for the last 3 years was to Nalle in the final last year and he plays him again in the first round and it would be funny if he defeats him in the Round Robin play and then loses in the final. The one thing that will stop that is that Federer will win the final.

Ljubicic : The big serving Croat who has been laid low due to an allergic reaction to antibiotics taken against a virus he got in Madrid. The big man loves a roof and feels confident against any player apart from Federer indoors and would fancy his chances of making the semis and he is fortunate that he plays his "good friend" Roddick in the first round who hasn't the greatest success indoors and also has had some injury problems, so the question is who will be able to return well enough to win this match. His match up with Nalle is dependant on the mood of the happy Argentine and how well Ljubo serves, cause their matches in recent times haven't been close irrespective of who has won them. I wonder how good Ljubo's fitness is at the moment.

Roddick: Quack, quack and well apart from Federer these three are evenly matched and the fact Nalle took a set in his match with Federer means that either Ljubo or Duckboy have to beat Federer or at least take a set as it wouldn't surprise if they split their matches against each other. He can make the semis for sure, but I don't see the Duck getting out of the group.

Nalbandian: What can we expect from the happy Argentine? It seems to me that while Nalle would love to defend his title in Shanghai, his focus is upon playing in the Davis Cup final and that is something he doesn't have a problem with getting motivated for and it's hilarious in one way that he has done as well as he has considering the amount of effort he puts in. He lost to Federer in 3 sets, but would fancy his chances against the other 2 in the group.

Well that group is significantly stronger than the one below with Nadal, Davydenko, Blake and Robredo, but such is life and players have to take their chances.

Nadal : Nadal has been accused of getting some easy draws and the conspiracy theorists will love this for sure. Well Boredo isn't going to be a problem for him, in spite of the indifferent recent form of Nadal. He has to play Blake who has defeated the only two times they played, but Blake isn't always the best pressure player and Davydenko is an unknown quantity, though his record against top players isn't good.

Davydenko: The big Ukranian based in Germany playing for Russia has been rewarded with doing well in 3 of the Slams and winning enough MM events during the year and unlike the real Kafelnikov the PMK won a TMS event, but the PMK hasn't won Slams of yet. He should be able to do quite well on this surface, though he is 0-4 against Blake and hasn't done well against the top players. Well it's time for that to change, then again it might not change.

Blake: He has a hit and miss game which is spectacular when on and woeful when it's off. This is the first time that he is here at this event and he has good records against the other 3 in this group, but this is the big time and time for him to step up.

Robredo: He is there to make the numbers.

Well the only thing here is to see who will meet Federer in the final.

Andreas Seppi won 2 matches in a row and that is more important than the TMS Paris

Paris has again suffered from mass withdrawals of the big stars the arse Nadal, the bald is beautiful Ljubo and if it was likes a duck and struts around like a duck and there is a good chance that it is a duck Andy Roddick. It wouldn't surprise if Federer withdrew, but he just turn up and treat it as a training session and probably win.

Big news and more importantly big Andreas Seppi has won 2 matches in a row for the first time in some time and has qualified for the main draw and that is a big effort considering his poor form and he has a chance to win against Paul-Henri Mathieu who has been stinking more than fish left out in the sun for 4 days. In other words it's a question of who will play the least poorly will win this match.

Grosjean will take Malisse as he has done the previous 8 times and hopefully he can end Boredo's season in the next round, though I wouldn't be surprised if Boredo gets into Shanghai as an alternative.

Chucho is playing Chris Rochus and he has lost to the little gimp 3 times in a row and he should blow him away on this surface, but with him one can't tell and the winner plays the PMK and neither of them have a good record against him. PMK might be distracted as he is going to get married and I hope he has Irina sign a pre-nup agreement and he has already qualified for Shanghai, he might not care as much and this kind of thing happens at the end of the season as well.

One good thing about this week is that Ancic and Gonzalez the warrior 3 finals in a row are in the same section of the draw and there could be a straight elimination for the Shanghai spots, too bad Feña was disappointing in the Slams or he would have qualified by now and he will be very tired when he gets there if he qualifies.

Berdych is back where he made his mark and could do quite well in defending his title or he might do poorly, but it's too early for him to make a TMC and he will have plenty of chances in the future and big Safin is back at the event he loves and can't be discounted and maybe Nadal was scared that he had to play him and as for the seriousness of the last comment, most people with half a brain would know how serious I am.

Well I will get coverage this week and that is better than usual, so hope for another surprise winner in Paris.

Fondue, Vodka and Gastronomy in Lyon in the race for Shanghai

It’s another 3 tournament week and the rush for the Masters is in full force and apart from Federer and Nadal, the other 6 places are still open, but in reality those ranked 3rd, 4th and 5th on the Race should be there in Shanghai.

Basel, Lyon and St Petersburg are the venues for the shenanigans this week and they are played on carpet, which is a surface that isn’t used that much these days. Personally that is a good thing as the horror days of the serving festivals that passed off as tennis were hideous to watch.

First event to be profiled will be Basel. The hometown hero Federer is back playing his home event for the first time since 2003 due to injuries in 04 and 05. This event is special to him as he has never won it and he used to be a ballboy there and is a huge FC Basel fan. Federer has made the final twice losing to Henman and Enqvist and he is coming back from winning in Madrid and if he wins here, then he is unlikely to play in Bercy.

Enough of Federer, there are a few former champs in this field Jiri Novak who will be retiring at the end of the year and he could easily play against Federer in the quarters. Henman is another one who enjoys Basel winning it twice and making the final once, he plays the gimp Chris Rochus in the 1st round and should be an easy win, though he will play the winner of Wawrinka and Calleri which is along with del Potro and Murray are the best matches of the 1st round.

Acasuso has quarter final points to defend and he is in a pretty good section of the draw and hope he can match that result from last year. Gonzalez is back in Basel to defend his title after making his 1st TMS final in Madrid and it will be interesting to see how he backs up from this and Nalbandian another winner of this event is there and loves playing there and should be able to consolidate his place in Shanghai.

Lyon

Lyon the culinary capital of France and home to France’s most successful football team at the moment and an indoor event that has been going for a number of years, well the field isn’t as strong as it could have been with the withdrawals of Ljubo and Roddick,

Baghdatis is the only player that is capable of making Shanghai therefore leaving this event fairly open and as for Marcos he could win this event or lose in the first round. Well he is playing in his nation of residence and the tough dwarf Clement won’t be an easy opponent for him.

Mr overhyped Gasquet and Marat “my farts smell better than others” Safin is the highlight of the 1st round in name anyway. It’s good to see Marat supporting his home country tournament in St Petersburg and decided to play in Lyon, it must be hard to overcome that jet lag from St Petersburg to Paris, then again the appearance fee should just cover the difference. Got to say either this will be a huge beatdown by Safin or a close match.

The main question in Lyon this week is whether Gaudio or Seppi can win a round here.

St Petersburg

Good to see the other Russians are supporting the St Petersburg event and it wouldn’t surprise if there was another Russian victory here. The PMK has drawn Santoro and he is a heavy favourite for this and it will be interesting to see how he approaches this event. He should qualify for Shanghai, but he needs a good result in Paris, as he has done well in the optionals.

Hopefully ToJo and Pavel can get some momentum and win enough matches to make sure that they are able to qualify directly for the Aussie Open. This is getting to the end of the year and some players will be looking forward to a break and then get ready for the Australian summer.

Kunitsyn hope he can do as well here as he does in Moscow, but that has not been a strong point. The ironman Tursunov is starting to rust at the moment, but he will be ready come Davis Cup time.

Just hope young Korolev can beat Hernych, cause he could do well in this tournament and take out Boredo and maybe prevent him from qualifying for Shanghai.

Gaudio is back on tour, Tiriac is a mafioso and the 8th TMS Madrid is here

This is not going to be inspiring at all, rather just functional and there are reasons for that.

Madrid, well this is the 8th TMS event of the year and one played at a slight altitude and that isn't such a bad thing and while the population of indoor idiots love this time of year and at least the horrible servefests are virtually over and that's good.

Also good things are that the Bye is back in business and that most of the top 10 are at this event. A combination of a lack of injuries and Tiriac got some mafia hitmen to intimidate some people the players into turning up this time unlike previous years.

Tati Rascon almost qualified and somehow Youzhny didn't. Rocking Rosie with a love of Latins and shopping must be having a good time and del Potro qualified and playing the Swedish Roddick with much more personality.

Gaudio and Massu are playing and both of these guys haven't played a while and their reward is Federer in the next round, but just see what happens and it's good that they are on centre court as Safin and Acasuso will be later.

LaLo and Ginepri what a match, that will be such quality and one of the rare times I have to cheer for LaLo and that is not easy at all.

Vienna Calling, Aphex in Stockholm and Downing the vodka in Moscow

Yes, it’s that wonderful time of the year where the tennis moves indoors and the big serving indoor idiots come out to play, well it isn’t really like that since they have slowed down the courts over the years, but that is another issue I might explore later.

First tournament that will be previewed is Vienna. They have done very well with the Entry List and it’s easily the overall strongest of the events. I haven’t been to this event for quite a lot of years as I am not a huge fan of indoor tennis, but it’s a good event. It’s very easy to get to and well organised, the court surface not too quick well and some wonderful artery clogging and tasty food now onto the tennis.

There are some potentially very good 1st round results and the victorious Argentine Davis Cup team is there all four of them. I am sorry about that Choupi, but can’t have everything in life.

Ljubo vs. Calleri: Well big Ivan has a 5-0 H2H (Head to Head) record over Calleri, but Ljubo did have an arm problem in Bangkok and he is defending his title here and Calleri had the better of it in their last match in Croatia on a faster surface, but couldn’t close the deal sadly and this best of 3 format might help him. It would be good for Calleri to take this one, but the big bald Croat will get the job done here.

Acasuso vs. Roddick: The thought of making duck schnitzel out of Roddick does sound tempting to say the least. Chucho doesn’t usually play well after a break, then again he does have the knack of defeating top 10 players when he isn’t expected to do and that could easily count in his favour. The main thing in this match will be, who will return serve better, considering both of these guys aren’t exactly going to give classes on how to return serve well.

The good thing is the surface isn’t that quick and that will give Acasuso more hope than he normally would on a faster surface, just hope he can concentrate well, but his mind is on Moscow in December and any good form before that is a bonus.
As for the other things going on in Vienna, well there is Chubby Chela and Nalle in the 1st round, well that will mean that there is at least one Argentine in the 2nd round and as with Nalle, he will be a bit more with it than he normally is. One he likes playing indoors and also with a couple of solid performances he should make Shanghai and wants to be ready for the DC final.

Moya and Mucho Almagro, well at least a Spaniard is through and Almagro in theory could do quite well under a roof, but he still has a lot to learn tactically about the game, but in a few years I can see his results on other surfaces besides clay improving.

The return of Baghdatis and also Cilic and Stani isn’t a bad match and welcome back to the top 100 for Koubek, well just hope he can get rid of those horrible memories of last year losing a lead of a set and 4-0 to Lisnard, that is shameful. Speaking of Koubek he and Labadze are playing doubles and then the team with no power Gonzalez and Calleri are teaming up, watch out ballkids.


Now we move to lovely Stockholm which is a beautiful city and would be even better if they got rid of most of the Stockholmers, though there are some absolute gems to be found there.

Well it’s good to see Pim-Pim Johansson back on the main tour after all his injury problems and he wasn’t too proud to be playing Futures events in Sweden to prepare and it makes sense to give him and Vinciguerra another guy who has had bad injury problems wild cards into this event.

Vinci has drawn a qualifier and Pim Pim plays the Silver Fox who doesn’t seem to be as interested in the game these days and I wouldn’t be surprised if he retired at the end of the year and this could be a big opportunity for Pim-Pim, sure has Nadal in his section, but this court will be quicker than Madrid for sure and he is no guarantee to win this event either and these events while there are good points available, it’s more a prelude to Madrid.

Froggy Ferrer is playing Seppi again and luckily for big Seppi it’s not on clay, though with the way he is playing at the moment, it wouldn’t surprise if he only got 4 or 5 games in this match, it would be fantastic to be proven wrong on this, but this has been a difficult year.

The Swedes well the Toad is playing Chris Rochus and has a potential second round match against Björkman, but the big Toad has the game for indoors and will more than likely be the “bad guy” in a match against Jonas, they are in the Berdych section.

ToJo will be playing James Blake the highlight of the 1st round and Blakey is the defending champ and his buddy “Fisker med Mardy Fish” have done well in the past at this event. Blake can be very erratic, it depends if he decides to play with his eyes open or not.


The Kremlin Cup is the last one and I remember years ago when this had a strong field and no that was not because Rosset won it twice. As a tournament the big Kafelnikov always tried in this one and won it 5 times in a row and there have been some Russian winners of this event and the winner Andreev isn’t here defending his title.

It would far from surprising if a Russian won this event and Moscow means Vladivostok’s finest Igor Kunitsyn comes to life. He always plays well here and like a top 20 player in Russia and then bombs out badly elsewhere and I see him making the quarters again. The metamorphosis from hack to a player who beats good ones when he is in Moscow is something amazing.

Safin, Youzhny, Tursunov, PMK and Korolev give the host nation plenty of representation in this tournament and it’s the weakest of three in overall quality, but still open enough. Safin has had some difficulties when playing in Russia and I remember that he got booed by his own fans and he didn’t take it well. The whole booing issue, well people should be allowed to express their frustrations. I mean these pampered ponies want to take the credit when they play well, but they act all tender when they are criticised, sometimes it’s fair and other times not. As much as I like Safin, he will always find something to complain about, hates Hawkeye and loves Round Robin, it wouldn’t be because he’d be gaining something, nah that would be cynical to suggest that.

No mess in Metz with fan reports from Choupi. It's about the culture and not the appearance money in Tokyo

Goodbye to the clay for the year, well there are still some clay challengers and I will get around to those later. Now the European indoor kicks off in lovely Metz and the field has been weakened sadly with many withdrawals and almost looks like the French Closed Championships, though even then it’s a lot better than the addition in 2004 and we will be getting some reports from there with one of our special reporters.

Back to Metz later, the final in Mumbai has been held over to today and got to love the organisational genius that puts an event outdoors while that’s a good thing, it isn’t the smartest thing to do it in the Indian monsoon season and it would not be surprising if the final was not played at all.

Onto Metz, well for our reporter Choupi, she had some bad luck in that most of her favourites decided to pull out of Metz, this would be Acasuso, Calleri and Chela who are spending some more time at home, before they have to trudge the European indoor circuit and they deserve some time away and it’s too bad that Metz misses out. I am lucky I am not at this event in addition to Chucho and Calleri, Horna, Seppi and Pavel withdrew as well and Luczak lost in qualifying. At the same time it’s live tennis got to see some of it and make the best of it and Santoro is still playing and his uniqueness will be lost very soon.

As for the event itself it’s very open since big Ljubo isn’t there defending his title and the fact that Ferrer and Ferrero are the top 2 seeds mean it’s an open event for sure. Robin “The Toad” Söderling is seeded 8th and has come back from Brazil and he loves playing indoors and suits his game and can see him doing well in this event.

The highlight matches of the 1st round are Santoro vs. Mathieu a battle of guile and versatility against inconsistency and erratic play. Then another battle between countrymen between Safin and Youzhny, well Youzhny is the higher seed, but Safin is an indoor monster who seems to be coming into some form and this is his favourite part of the year. Then there is Richard “The show pony” Gasquet well he is seeded 5th and my feelings for him are pretty clear, he doesn’t support the Round Robin format, has a good backhand and the Pink Panther as coach and those are the best qualities, just wait if he wins here, then all the hoopla about him starts again.

The last outdoor event for the season is the Japan Open and Mr Roger Federer has turned up this time. He likes to play in Asia and he doesn’t mind the appearance money as well, plus the Bye is there and that has to be a good thing as well.

This event looks like a prime candidate for the Round Robin format with its 48 draw and it’s funny to see Benji Becker, Björn Phau and Paul Goldstein seeded for this event, but there are some interesting characters here as well. Koubek who had a SF appearance in Mumbai plays Galvani and if he wins then Moodie and he is in the same section as Federer, well at least he should have enough time to go back home to Vienna for the indoor event. Then señor Fernando Vicente continuing his Asian adventure, he could do quite well with the women being a blonde Spaniard and those Asian girls love the exotic Western look.

Tursunov is stuck in Mumbai and has to get to Tokyo, but he loves the travelling and he will be able to handle it and he has done very well this year and he is a bit like Andreev and Davydenko in the amount of tournaments he plays. Davydenko has taken some time off and 2 weeks free from tennis is like long service leave and maybe Irina is spending too much on his credit card and he is in shock.

Youngster del Potro is up against Stop and Go Soeda the Japanese buzzsaw and hopefully he can win that and take out Captain Charisma Robby Ginepri, that guy is ranked higher than he should be, but he will go down to the LaLo level, though at least LaLo has a good serve.

The match of the first round is over and it was a bit of a fizzer sadly Edgardo “Yayo” Massa who is a bit soft around the midsection played against the big Greek Kostas Economidis. This match should have been standing room only, but Yayo was too classy for the Big Greek and won 6-1 6-3 and imagining shrieking Japanese girls chanting “Yayo” would be enough to get the wax out of my ears.

On a sidenote, bad luck to Michael Russell he couldn’t win his Challenger final against Bobby Reynolds and that is not good, though he should be back in the top 150 soon.

Look forward to the reports Choupi.

Ciao Palermo Clay, Exotic Spices in Mumbai and One Night in Bangkok

The last main level ATP event of the year lovely Palermo is upon us and this means in the meantime I will have to follow clay challengers and then wait for Viña del Mar, while the indoor idiots rule the way. Sicily at this time of year is pleasant as it's not as hot as it is in the summer, but still warm and pleasant enough and there have been some good winners of this event.

The last 2 defending champions Andreev and Berdych aren't here this time around. Igor is still injured and in the loving arms of Tursunov after the successful Russian win on the weekend and the Berdman has gone to Mumbai this time around. Volandri the guy who was beaten in the last 2 finals is the number 2 seed here and has been playing well recently a final in Bucharest and played very well in a losing effort against Spain in DC.

That is the problem with these events after the Davis Cup, it's very hard to predict as to who will do well, either cause they might be still drunk from the celebrations or only having just arrived at the venue after a long flight, but with this tournament it doesn't seem to be the case with long flights. It's an open event and nearly anyone can win this.

Jan Hajek the man who has been on a tear at Challenger level is playing against Ulihrach who has come back from nowhere and winning matches. Seppi a man who is in poor form at the moment is playing Simon and he was a semi finalist last year, hopefully the Sicilians get behind him as he needs a big performance soon to salvage his year which has not been good.

Zabaleta is playing Olivier "Have a Little" Patience and Mariano is struggling badly at the moment losing to Zib is an indication of that, but as long as he can remain fit and fight hard, then the results will come for him. Nico Lapentti the winner of the big challenger in Poland plays Mathieu, who had some ankle problems in Bucharest, but has had about 10 days off and should be ready to go now.

Blogger fave Oli Marach fresh from winning his first 2 DC matches is up against the Spanish 'Superstar' Almagro who has had some injury problems and hasn't played too much. Almagro should win this easily, but with him one can never tell. Then Lucho plays Montañes and vamos Lucho save your season with a good performance in this event.

The tournament from Ho Chi Minh has been moved to Mumbai this year and neither finalist is there this year. Björkman is still in Brazil with Davis Cup and Stepanek is still out with back problems. It seems Martina has been working Thunder Lips too hard in the bedroom and his back has suffered cause of it. It's good that they have bought some big players to India and Moya is back there and he loves it there, it must be the food.

Tursunov will have fun adjusting from clay to outdoor hardcourt, but he should win his first match at least and apart from that anything is a bonus. This event has to be good Berdych, Koubek and Monaco are there and besides this the big Greek Economidis is there and he is literally a big guy. At the start of the year he had to play qualies of the Burnie Challenger 25K event and won it and now he is making it directly into this field. Too bad del Potro didn't get the easiest first round match available.

One night in Bangkok with the huge appearance money kicks off the indoor season and this event has some of the big names Ljubo, Safin, Baghdatis, Blake are there. There has been a coup in Thailand, but it doesn't seem to have to have had too much impact. I mean they played the South African Open when it was the apartheid regime, so they will do what they can.

Got to say it's funny seeing Vicente and Massa in an indoor event as direct entries and they are there for the holiday in reality as they play Ljubo and Nieminen respectively and Marcos has to play Chicken Man for the thrid time this year and he is 0-2 and will want to get a win over him as soon as possible.

Davis Cup Dance

Well it's the Davis Cup semis and promotion ties for the World Group as well this weekend. I will try and cover as much as I can, though there are lot of other things going on at the moment.

The Hewitt sideshow is almost at an end, and the whole "will he or won't he" saga about playing in Argentina, seems to have been answered. Sure Hewitt is disliked in some sections of Argentina, but is the same in Australia and the fact that he is playing this time is a good thing and it creates some interest in a tie that in reality should not be close. Argentina with their strength in depth could easily use Guzman and Roitman and probably still win this tie.

From reports it seems Chucho will be playing the first day against Hewitt and this is a good test for him and though Hewitt might be the higher ranked player and he will use all the negative energy to fire him up. Hopefully Chucho doesn't shit himself, though he is lucky he has Mancini on the sideline. Basic facts that this match will decide whether it goes to the 3rd day, if Chucho wins the singles, then it's match over. I wonder how the crowd will react to little Lleyton. Chucho said allegedly "they must insult Hewitt, but moderately" hehehe.

Russia and the US, it seems the Yanks have been talking up their chances in this one. It would be to Argentina's advantage if they won the tie, but for some reason this is not likely to happen.
Safin plays Roddick first and Marat must be licking his chops to be able to play Roddick on his worst surface and should be able to get the right result. The Russian captain has also decided on using Youzhny against Blake and that is a commonsense decision under the circumstances that the PMK doesn't play well against these guys and they can rotate their players.

The playoffs well the Czechs have a new captain Tomas Berdych's coach Jaro Navratil who has a mullet and while they are away, they are playing on carpet and that will suit Berdych and they should make it back to the main group.

Austria and Mexico: Koubek asked to be left out of this tie to improve on his ranking at the moment and it will be good that Oli Marach, a blogger favourite to make his debut and Melzer who comes off his first ever title win on Bucharest will have a chance to improve on his very poor Davis Cup record, it's something he has struggled with for some reason.

Spain and Italy : Brazil were the last team to beat Spain at home and they had Guga playing for them and as much as I like Seppi, he is definitely no Guga and he got the job of playing Nadal, though it pains me to say this that it would be good if Volandri beat Boredo on Day 1, just to make it go to the 3rd day, but Spain will be back in the World Group.

Brazil and Sweden : I love Brazil, the parties, the beaches, the women and the like, but I will cheer for the Swedes in this one. It's great to see Vinciguerra back after all the injuries and he is the clearly the best Swedish player on clay when fit and it seems Brazil are having internal problems. Marcos Daniel hasn't been named and got the shits, Guga has come out of nowhere to play doubles and Saretta is in poor form.

Switzerland and Serbia : Federer decides to make a comeback that and Wawrinka is good enough to win a singles match, will mean that the Swiss will be back in the World Group again and it would be good to see Federer play in the 1st round for next years competition, though I wonder if he would go to Argentina say for example.

Go the Russians and the Argentines.

Guillermo Cañas back on the tennis circus

The Return of Guillermo Cañas

The tough Argentine Cañas is making his return to the ATP tour on Monday after getting his suspension for taking a masking agent reduced by the Court of Arbritration by 9 months. For those who have not read the verdict, there is a full PDF file on the case, but this is the short version on the ITF site about the case. At the same time the people who still think he is guilty, this proves below why the CAS chose to uphold his appeal. It's not in their interests to favour athletes for the sake of it. There were faults within some part of the process and if there wasn't, then the case would have been dismissed.

http://www.itftennis.com/antidoping...le.asp?id=16515


Cañas has been training very hard and obviously with the time out and having to deal with some negativity and it will obviously take him time to come back into the swing of things and he will have to be more vigilant when it comes to supplements and if he is feeling crap at any point, then declare on the forms that he is taking something and then he can cover his own arse. At the same time as much I am happy to see him back, he can't be stupid again when it comes to this sort of thing and there will be definitely an air of suspicion around the locker room, while he has received the support of many players especially fellow Argentines and others, but there will be dissenting voices as well.


Willy has a new coach the former doubles specialist Gaston Etlis, it is not surprising that he and Hernan Gumy split afterwards, it wouldn't surprise if it had something to do with the case, at the same time the coaching world is like a transit lounge, so many changes in a short time, though there are some exceptions to this. I wonder if Cañas has improved his backhand drive, cause that was something I noticed he wasn't hitting that as well, he has an outstanding backhand passing shot, but with the wrist problem it seems he doesn't hit it with enough penetration or spin and it ends up landing short and he can be punished on that side.


This experience will make Cañas even more determined than he was previously and I have many good memories of watching this matches and he has been in so many battles, some he has lost and others he has won. He and Hewitt had a couple of bruising matches at Roland Garros in 2001 and 2002 and they split them. In the first one Willy was leading 2 sets to 0 and had the match suspended at 2 sets all and then Hewitt came through and this was around the time he was ranked in the 80sand started making some big progress.


The 2002 match was very hard fought match these matches Hewitt was #1 in the world and the first 2 sets of this match were brutal, both were hitting the ball well and scrambling everything back and leaving nothing there on court. Hewitt won the first set TB easily 7-1 and then the big turning point was the 2nd set TB and whoever won that, was going to win the match and both players knew that and they were fighting like 2 rabid dogs with only one bone left and both were hitting to the corners of the court and jerking the other side to side. Cañas had the superior movement on the surface and Hewitt was at his strongest mentally then and neither was going to give in and saving set point after set point and then Willy took it 15-13 and then won the last 2 sets and that sums his up.

He can play on all surfaces and if he returns to form he will be a valuable asset for the Argentine Davis Cup team, as in my view he is the 2nd best all surface player in Argentina behind David Nalbandian, though if Coria returns to form that could be debated. Cañas loves the Davis Cup and would love to play again, but before that can happen, he has to battle through the Challenger events and it is fortunate that the Latin American section of the Challenger tour is active and that he can get some wildcards and be able to establish himself not far from home and away from the major epicentres of the tennis world.

If he is good enough to come through that and determined enough then he will able to make some noise on the main tour eventually, the question is now how well will he bounce back from this setback and he has been successful after having the wrist problems establishing himself, in theory the older he is, the harder it will be form to restablish himself in a sport that continues to evolve.

Bizarre Bucharest and no Nadal to defend the Chinese Clay championships

Bizarre Bucharest and no Nadal to defend the Chinese Clay championships

No, I have not gone mad with the subject title, well no worse than usual. Nadal won Beijing last year and some of the masses still can’t handle the fact that he has won events off clay and last year since Miami was meant to be the “new-clay” as in it’s almost as slow as clay and that is stupid in itself. So when he took the big appearance money and won a hardcourt event, it could not have been possible, it must have been a new surface called Chinese clay. As for charismatic when it comes to Nadal. I am not a huge fan of him and I don’t hate him, but somebody running up and down with the attack of the crabs in his pants doesn’t make someone to be charismatic.

Bizarre Bucharest, well this event is a bit of a Mickey Mouse event, and there are plenty of strange results that happen in here, it maybe the spectre of Vlad Tepes although he is in Transylvania that looms over this event. The example of some of the previous winners like Florent “Que sera” Serra last year coming out of nowhere and winning the title and beating players like Volandri, Mathieu, Pavel and then Igor Andreev in the final with no form to speak of and he doesn’t have much of a game either.

Among some of the fine winners of this event the great Tasmanian Richard Fromberg who was surprise surprise unseeded, but with the afro, he was always cool, even with a visor. The Catalan doubles man Joan Balcells who looks like the character “Monkey Magic” was another bolter to have won. In 2002 a certain young “Froggy” Ferrer won the event as well and yes, he was unseeded as well, then in 2004 the stoner smoking Jose Acasuso won this title thumping Andreev and there is a twist to this tale, in that he was unseeded. This is why the title of bizarre Bucharest, strange results, slightly mysterious place, Ion “Mafioso” Tiriac even though from Brasov, has his fingers involved in the pie and the ladies can be a big distraction as well.

As for the tournament there are some good names or ones that I like anyway. Big Chucho has more important duties ahead that he couldn’t afford a trip to Bucharest, but Yayo Massa is back and maybe he could be the winner of this tournament and I’d love that. He has been playing well in the Bundesliga and just hope he can get a good run. He is in a very good section of the draw, especially since Mathieu is sucking badly at the moment and Tursunov as a #1 seed for a clay event, then you know it’s open.

Zabaleta who has been struggling for form this time around plays against the wildly inconsistent Koubek and as for who I want to win. I can’t lose because at least one is in the 2nd round though with Mariano he is deep in the 300s and he needs the points more, though his fitness is more important. That section is interesting as well with Lucho and Moya playing and that is clearly the best 1st rounder of this event and a tough match for both. In this section the hometown boy Pavel is playing big Boris and should be too good for him and it would be great if he could win his hometown title.

The bottom half of the draw has Florent “Que sera” Serra and the Argentines Martin Vassallo “Che Guevara” Arguello and Roitman could easily make the quarters here, it’s a very open section with the “geeky German” Mayer, Potato Starace in there as well and no huge stand out and with Bucharest as has been shown from previous winners expect the unexpected. Too bad that Luczak decided to lose in the 1st round of qualies, then again the bizarre nature of the event can lead to these sorts of things happening.

Sidenote to finish, the Düsseldorf Challenger final between Korolev and Vinciguerra is something that I am more interested in than the US Open final, it would be great if Vinciguerra could win another challenger, but it will be tough against Korolev who is going places very quickly.

No More Slams for the Year and Federer sending the field into Tears, maybe, maybe not

It’s that time of the year, the last GS event called the US Open. Personally it is not a favourite of mine and there are a multitude of reasons, which I should get out of my system, since this is my blog, it’s the perfect opportunity to do so.

- Shitty organisation playing 1st rounders over 3 days and at a Slam that is very poor form.

- Super Saturday that idiotic marketing gimmick, do they seem to forget that the guys are playing the best of 5 set matches and it’s the epitome of fairness to make them play one of them the day before the final and surprise that gives the advantage to guys who finish first. I love TV marketing gimmicks.

- 5th set tiebreakers, which is not a way to decide a match in a GS, especially in the 5th set, but as they say the Yanks are different.


Enough of what I dislike and onto the subject at hand, the US Open and first of all I am going to start with the qualies and for some reason I can see this being more interesting than the Main Draw itself, the qualies are fun to go to for so many reasons. There are usually legit tennis fans there, it’s a lot cheaper and there are less people around which gives the fan more time to get used to the venue, so when it gets busy, then it’s easier to find things, this in addition that a lot of players are on site training and if you are lucky or some would say smart, then it’s the best time to get photos and the like.

As usual with a qualifying 128 draw, you’d think there was a possibility of fairly even spread of players you like around the draw, but as common as 3 buses go in the opposite direction than the one you want to go and you stand around like a fool, of course they concentrated the ones I like within the same section.

The main match I am talking about is between Michael Russell and Peter Luczak, they both deserve to be in the main draw, but only one of them can do that. The positive is that at least 1 of them will be in the main draw, though it’s a no-win situation and I have seen some of the buffoons that have a chance of qualifying e.g. Minar v Vanek. Alves vs. Lorenzi and Kindlman vs. Witten. This is what is meant to be luck of the draw and as much as I’d like to see this match, it should be hard fought either way.

Also in other qualies the young rising Russian Korolev is in the last round of qualies as well and I hope he gets in as well and Kendrick could be tricky, if he is not firing. Korolev says that hardcourt is his best surface and hope he can make it here next year as a direct entry and I have been impressed the little I have seen.

Speaking of youngsters del Potro is in the last round of qualies as well. His match should be quite funny, not cause Juan Martin is a stand up comedian, it’s because of his opponent Herr Dani Koellerer, who has been known to use some very over the top antics and he got suspended from the ATP for 6 months. They played last year and del Potro is a bit soft and started to cramp and Dani saw that and started taking the piss out of him and he won the mental battle and then took the match and I am sure del Potro hasn’t forgotten. Part of me wants Koellerer to qualify, cause he is such a clown that it needs to be seen to be believed.

As for other Austrians, well the hair Alex Peya is in the last round as well and if you can find a pic of his hair, then it makes it all worthwhile. He plays that fool Jeff Morrison and I’d love him to win, but for some reason Morrison probably will, and it’s not good as he is a true gimp.

Then there is the man “El Fashionista” Stefan Koubek who has been impressive this week and he plays a “Challenger man” Zib who lost 17 matches in a row on the main tour and would have to like his chances of progressing, though with Stef anything can happen, witness his great loss against Lisnard in Vienna last year and getting thumped by Tuksar at the RG qualies. It will be good to see the Koubek in the main draw and he should be able to reach the top 100 by the end of the season.

The Main Draw

Federer and Nadal, only thing I will say about these two, is that there is a chance that they could win or not win this tournament.

Gaudio vs. Seppi: At least someone I like will make the 2nd round that is a given. Seppi hasn’t been in great form lately, but at the same time his level is a bit higher than Gaston’s at the moment. Gaudio doesn’t like the US Open much and doesn’t seem to be really into tennis at the moment and I hope he takes the rest of the year off after this tournament. As for Seppi he started the year very well, but hasn’t been able to string 2 wins together for some time and he is in a good section.

Calleri vs. Moya: This match should be worth watching, though I know many ladies wouldn’t be focused on the tennis in this match. Calleri has been in excellent form since coming back at Wimbledon and if he can keep it up, he is a chance of finishing the year in the top 20, something which would be great considering his problems. One thing that Calleri needs to improve apart from his poor 5 set record is his performances in the Slams and I think these two factors are inter related. He has a 1-4 record against Moya, but he beat him the last time on hardcourt and I hope he can do that again. James “I hit the crap out of everything” Blake is the high seed in that quarter.

Stani vs Chela: Chela has been in solid hardcourt form and Stani needs to do well in a GS event and is capable of a good result there this one could be a long one and it will feature plenty of excellent lateral movement.

Nieminen vs. Malisse : This match is one I’d like to see and I don’t see a straight set walkover for anyone in this one and it depends on how the moody Malisse wakes up and hopefully Jakke can serve well as his 2nd serve is so attackable, and he has QF points to defend from last year. Go Nieminen.

Acasuso vs. Srichaphan: Tennis played like chess won’t be a factor in this match and the Srich has a 2-0 record over Chucho. At the same time Chucho has improved his game, though he can get the right result if he doesn’t try to belt everything, though not be so passive as to stand 10m behind the baseline. The Srich loves pace, so give him what he doesn’t like. It will be a tough one for Acasuso for sure.

Berdych vs Tursunov: I read that esteemed tennis writer Jon Worthless called this a clash of styles and I hope he was just being humorous because that is so funny and I’d love this third round match to happen, then again there could be some great finesse in this match. Just hope it can happen

Almagro vs Ferrer: Nico has the potential to play well on the hardcourts, but he hasn’t had the wins yet and he had 6 match points the last time they played him, but managed to blow the match. With Almagro anything can happen, I just wish Koellerer was the qualify and he had to play Almagro, the fun to be had there.

Ginepri vs Benneteau: Please Julien, just think you are playing Baghdatis instead of Gineprick.

Pavel vs Agassi: Please Pavel finish Agassihole off and get him off the tour, though if he doesn’t, just hope Baghdatis will do it.

Novak Djokovic gets to lay the smackdown on Donald Young this time around, it must be good to have an easy 1st round match. He might even try his serve and volley skills out.

It will be interesting to see how these clowns will handle any rain delays with their first 2 rounds played over a week normal scheduling. Last Slam of the year time to get it over with.

Nutty New Haven Mayhem

First of all before the preview is written about New Haven. I'd like to congratulate the American Michael Russell for winning the Bronx Challenger and I hope he can get through the rest of the year without injury, he has definitely had a bad run with injuries and then he can hopefully qualify for the US Open.

The last event before a Slam usually throws some interesting results before the main event itself, most of the top players don't bother with playing the week before unless they get a good guarantee, though with the Aus Open cause of its lack of lead up play, the fields of Auckland and Sydney tend to be good. At the same time the qualifying rounds of these events are of interest, cause many who would be there are either waiting for the Slam qualies or have WC's into the event.

This is the only time where starting on Sunday is a good thing. As for the results themselves so far, it wasn't a bad day at all. Blogger favourite Andreas Seppi gave Björn Phau a total bitchslapping 6-1 6-1, though it makes me wonder how he can perform like this, yet he can't get past Vinnay Ice and Seppi does need some good performances soon, but he has been lacking consistency and now he plays Chubby Chela in the next round and that could be quite funny. Two tall lanky guys who don't serve that hard playing each other, at least hair colour can tell them apart.

Big Stani Wawrinka had a good week last week in Cincy and he defeated "Superstar" Almagro for the 3rd time in a close match and now plays the Srich who seems to excel at this event for some reason. As for the other matches well Chucho plays Mahut and there are a lot of players I like at this event Nieminen, Calleri, Baghdatis and Lucho who is playing the big Benneteau at the moment and it has gone to the 3rd set and hope Lucho can do it.

Jan Hajek is playing Gicquel and Janne has been the big star of the Challenger circuit, started the year ranked at 354 and is now ranked 84 and that is impressive in anyone's language. He was trying to qualify for Challengers and then he started winning them, hence he is where he is. It's good that he will playing some more main events now and he should be able to do OK, well better than Boris Pashanski or Charly Berlocq.

The results of the events the week before Slams are not usually very indicative of what happens in that event and sure the players don't complain about winning a tournament, but there is always one eye on the larger prize of a Grand Slam and maximising their points there. James Blake is the hometown boy and might win it or he could be out with his friends having a good time and his cooler brother Thomas Blake is playing doubles, he is the one with the cool hair, but since true tennis fans read this or I'd like to think so anyway.

I will get around to profiling one of my all-time favourite players Felix Mantilla soon enough, that was a cheap plug I know.

Mad Michelle in Cincy and that means Fan Reports for Us All

Onto the second of the TMS events in Cincinnati and of course the ATP have dropped the ball and have back to back TMS events, but since when have these clowns had a clue as an organisation.

The common complaint people always seem to have is that the Draw is so hard and all this and all I can say to that is boo fucking hoo. It's a TMS event and there are going to be tough matches and of course there are going to be matches we don't like, and I have already found a few already that aren't the best for me, but this is life and usually they will always pair players who you either like or ones that bitchslap your player in that particular section.

As for what will happen in this event, well who knows but maybe something like Federer or Nadal winning the event could be deemed to be something as a major boilover in the tennis world.

All is good in the tennis world now as the girl known as Jess to me or as savestheday91 on MTF has finally caught up with her dream object Gospodin Novak Djokovic and while Jess has a chest to remember, in all seriousness it's good that she finally had a chance to speak with him.

I have seen Djokovic around quite a lot and he is usually quite friendly with people and that's a good thing, though he doesn't mind the strategic break when it's needed. He plays the Finn Nieminen in the 1st round and I'd like to see that match, however knowing the organisers they won't be on a TV court unless Jess gets them out, but hopefully they will be.

Chucho and big Stani Wawrinka, that is another 1st rounder that is of interest, whether Chucho can perform well 2 weeks in a row on hardcourt will be a challenge and the winner will play Nalle or qualifier and I don't see Nalle playing like he did last week again. Nalle and Stani is a good match up for Nalle as he knows how to work him around the court and highlight Stani's weakness. As for Chucho and Nalle, the DC doubles team of Nalbasuso, they have played only once and Nalle won that. I guarantee that Chucho and Stani will be not on TV.

Massu and Gonzo: At least a Chilean will get through to the next round and that is something and which the way the Chilean fans will swing in this match is of passing interest. Gonzo is a man of the people and has a smile on his face a lot of the time, whereas Massu is not happy unless he is scowling and taking 30 mins in between points.

There are some other good 1st round matches.

Boredo and Gasquet : Well I hope the umpire is not Norm Chryst, cause if it is then I will go for the linespeople. The whole Gasquet bandwagon thing is ridiculous, sure he is a shotmaker and a good one at that and has a cool coach Eric "The Pink Panther" Deblicker. What makes the "Pink Panther" so cool, he doesn't have to try hard and he comes across in a good way and knows his stuff and he is a backgammon genius. The Gasquet hooplah is over the top. How many players go from superstar, chump, forgotten about, potential, has been and the greatest thing ever to hit tennis in a short period of time?

Monfils and Safin: A guy who hasn't played against one whose form is so up and down and there are rumours of a coaching split with him, but with Safin, it's never his own fault for bad and inconsistent results.

Then there is Mr Consistency Paulo Mathieu, who the more he loses, the more I get to appreciate him and as for appreciation he would be doing the tennis world a big favour by knocking out that piece of rubbish and gimp Gineprick in the 1st round, then again with Paulo, he would find a way to make Tulasne lose hair.

As for the qualies big Seppi has a good chance to make it and needs a good tournament and it would be funny if Dropshot Dlouhy got through over Gimelclown, reversing the defeat he had against Justin on clay, by beating him on a hardcourt.

Well the WD's as for Agassi, just retire and be done with it.

Hope The Crazy Canadian Open Tradition Continues

Since I can't be bothered with a long entry here, well I am going to say why I love the Canadian Open.

It's Canada and Canada is cool and not just literally. This event has had so many surprise winners and I love it, though nothing will beat Andrei Chesnokov, Andrei Pavel, Micke Pernfors and Guillermo Cañas. It's the first of the big hardcourt events and maybe that is a reason, but we need more surprise winners, yes that includes Wayne Ferreira in there. There needs to be more diversity among the big titles, then again we are in a clown era, then again we always are, just the amount varies.

Speaking of clowns. Nalle played like a clown who took too many drugs losing to the Silver Fox Sanguinetti 2 and 1, but he was ill. Perhaps Seppi had the same illness losing serve three times to Wayne Arthurs in a set in qualies.

Gaudio was at his best 9 winners and 42 errors and it was not like he was going for too much or even tanking. Moya didn't have to play well, but he kept the ball in and that was enough, sure it was windy, but it's the same for both players.

Hope there can be some upsets that I like and not the Chicken Man beating Baghdatis. I'd love to Kool Kevin Kim take out Gineprick, the humour value would be immense and tennis needs some more humour.

Andreas Vinciguerra : The Long Road Back

Ever since the retirement of Magnus Norman and to a lesser extent Magnus Gustafsson, who did well in the lower level clay events, but couldn’t convert that to success in the big clay events retired, there has been a distinct lack of ability to play on clay by the Swedish players.

From the days of the golden generation of the 80s where even Stefan Edberg who was not at his best on the clay, yet won TMS events and made an RG final to prove that he was very effective on the surface, that many of the Swedes were proficient on the surface, but changed with the retirement of Norman.

The current crop of Swedish players range from indoor idiots thanks Aphex for that term which include mostly Joachim Johansson with his huge canon of serve and to a lesser extent Robin “the Toad” Söderling who has been able to secure some good wins on clay, he lacks consistency to the other guys like Björkman and Thomas Johansson who have never been good on the surface doesn’t help things.

“Vinci” for those who don’t know is a Swedish-Italian, his Italian dad runs a pizzeria in Malmö in the deep south of Sweden where they speak a special dialect which is like eating mouth full of food with a throat problem speaking Swedish and sounding like a Dane and “Vinci” does have the special accent and his mother is Swedish. “Vinci” is good friends with the Ian Thorpe lookalike Zlatan Ibrahimovic, both are from the same city and share an immigrant background, as well having their particular issues with the police at different time.

Vinci was a top 10 junior and he started the year of 1999 ranked at 633 and he finished it ranked 98 and that was a massive leap showing his potential and made his first tour final in Båstad as a WC losing to Cheech Marin and then winning a challenger over the same guy later in the year.

This was a good start for Vinci and I remember when saw him in Båstad that year when he defeated my countryman Christian Ruud in the semis and he played a game quite similar to Muster in the way that he would try and dominate with his heavy left hand forehand with heavy topspin and his fighting hard and running down a lot of shots and he quickly became a favourite with the fans and myself, but even then his backhand was a liability, but it was hard to get to that side.

So I made the annual trip to Melbourne to watch him play and there were plenty of Swedish fans there to support him and saw his first match with Hernan Gumy who didn’t win any prizes for aesthetics when it came to his tennis, but Vinci blew him and Leander Paes away, before losing to Escude.

The funniest thing about that year was that he won his only title the Copenhagen indoor which is the closest he will get to a hometown event and even funnier it was in the middle of a 4-0 head to head victories over Marat Safin who is an indoor monster and Vinci beat him Marseille in straight sets 2 weeks earlier and then beat him at the Copenhagen semis before winning over Magnus Larsson who is now his coach. Then he defeated Safin again in the US before losing to Sampras. After that he struggled on clay and got a bath from Guga at RG where he lost the first 15 games in a row, but then held out to only lose 6-3 in the 3rd.

One of the best Vinci memories was the singing and chanting during his great AO run where he made the 4th round. He defeated Medvedev easily and the Swedish fans were just singing all the way through, well at the change of ends and before the warm up and Vinci really appreciates that and after the matches he has won he speaks with the Swedish fans and jumps in the crowd and he feeds off their support a total contrast to say Thomas Enqvist.

On Show Court 3 it was a late match against big Wayne Ferreira and once the women finished the Swedes started with the songs, one of them is a silly Midsummer song which is fun to sing, but can’t translate among others and it started and while there was plenty of beer to be had, it was a carnival atmosphere, so much so, that during the warm up you couldn’t hear the names being mentioned by the umpire, so it was on for 10 minutes and then Vinci came out smoked Ferreira. When they wanted him to give a wave, he would give them a wave and when the Swedes asked him to dance then he’d dance. After that he’d lost to Kafelnikov as he had done later in the year at Bercy where he defeated Safin and also made the semis in Rome, where the Italian press wanted to adopt him cause of his Italian parentage.

2002 is where all the injury problems began and the motivational ones came in as well, as he has not played a full season since 2001, he injured a bone in his finger and had lower back problems as well. He made the 3rd round at the AO which is his favourite Slam and helped Sweden win against Brazil in Davis Cup and he loves this environment and plays for the team and not just himself, then he later he injured his knee in 2003 and had 2 months off and has been chasing time ever since.

Vinci was out from Feb 04 to July 05 where he made his comeback in Båstad. He got into some trouble and involved in a brawl with some Danes in one of the Malmö pubs, but at least he doesn’t mind going out at night which is something. He had a lot of injury problems with his ankle, feet and knee and including problems with motivation and wasn’t sure whether he wanted to come back even though he is not old as tennis players go. There were minimal steps last year and he had another operation on his foot.

Now the question is can Vinci come back and make the top 100 again. Potentially yes he is capable of doing that and how much he wants to do it as well is the key, well Boris Pashanski is an example the guy won all these challengers last year and made it in the top 70 and he is not a better player than the Vinci. Having watched him recently I am disappointed that he still hasn’t improved his backhand or maybe he has, but it is not significant. He had the time off to do and didn’t manage to do it.

He has only played 2 main draws this year in Båstad and wasn’t impressive against Dlouhy and lost to Massu in Amersfoort. Mainly this year, one thing Aphex ( the great Swede) pointed out that Vinci seems a bit slower these days on his feet and if that is so, then that will hinder him, especially since his speed around the court was one of his main assets, he might have bulked too much, then again this is not likely with Magnus Larsson as one of his coaches and big Magne wasn’t known for his strict physical regiment.

Vinci has had some good wins on the Challenger circuit and is moving up the rankings as he started at 407 for the year and is now in the 230s and he is in the quarter finals this week of another Challenger, just hope he can a few of these performances into finals or victories. He should stick to the challengers for the year and try and stay healthy as that is the key. If he keeps up with some solid performances he can finish the year within the top 200 and considering where he was a year ago where he didn’t have a ranking, he isn’t doing too badly at the moment.

2007 will be a key year to see whether he can make it back to a respectable level or not and one of the ironical things is that he was the prototype playing the Rafa Nadal game before Nadal was around, except Vinci doesn’t use all the antics in between points and or is that particular, plus Rafa just plays it better than him.

It would be great to see Vinci back in the top 100 with that huge forehand, fighting spirit and a Swede that can play on consistently, the thing he has on his side is that he is not old and even if he doesn’t come back to somewhere near his former level, then I can appreciate watching him on the small courts in a football like atmosphere which was always quiet once play started, but very loud when he broke a serve or was doing well. It’s not everyday some player gets 10 mins of cheering before the match and during the warm up, but Mr Charisma Sampras never got that.

Feel free to comment.