Wednesday’s first match of the day produced one of the most shocking scorelines of the entire year as Simona Halep defeated Serena Williams, 6-0 6-2. This was an upset, but it was the one-sided nature of the scoreline that really shocked me. I’m going to go and watch the highlights now! The stats really show off what a great job that Simona did in maintaining her second set lead and preventing a Serena comeback. Halep saved six break points in the second set and is still yet to be broken in this tournament. The errors were flowing for Serena and have been generally for hard hitters throughout this tournament. Could it be the court surface that has seen the likes of Caroline, Aga and Simona beat players in the top three… or is that downgrading their success somewhat? All three played superb matches to win, but also, did have some help from their opponents.
As Serena suffered one of her worst ever losses, Genie wasn’t having much fun either as she lost her second match in straight sets to Ana Ivanovic, 6-1 6-3 which all but confirmed her exit from the tournament. It’s not mathematically impossible that she can’t qualify, but it’s very, very, very unlikely. Genie has not played well this week, but this should take nothing away from what she has achieved this year, particularly as she has dealt with injuries in the last couple of weeks. I saw a few comments from an interesting changeover chat with her coach, Nick Saviano.
In the not before 7.30pm match in Singapore on Thursday, Serena and Genie will play their final round robin match. After Serena’s loss to Halep, it will be fascinating how she responds. I’m going for Serena, but who knows? Pre-tournament, I thought Bouchard could get a set, but she has done nothing in her first two matches to suggest that will be the case on Thursday. This tournament has already thrown up some surprises so i’m prepared to expect the unexpected…
Prediction: S.Williams d. Bouchard in 2 sets
ATP Basel 2nd Round Predictions
Borna Coric d. Andrey Golubev in 3 sets
Milos Raonic d. Donald Young in 2 tight sets
Roger Federer d. Denis Istomin in 2 sets
Vasek Pospisil d. Grigor Dimitrov in 2 sets
Mikhail Kukushkin d. Benjamin Becker in 3 sets
Ivo Karlovic d. Kenny De Schepper in 3 tight sets
ATP Valencia 2nd Round Predictions
Pablo Andujar d. Dusan Lajovic in 3 sets
Andy Murray d. Fabio Fognini in 2 sets
David Ferrer d. Fernando Verdasco in 2 sets
Roberto Bautista Agut d. Thomaz Bellucci in 3 sets
Jeremy Chardy d. Alexander Dolgopolov in 3 sets
Moo's Tennis Blog 
Whats unexpected? maybe Serena loses to Bouchard too? that shouldn’t be unexpected either. She might as well just tank it. This is a tough spot for her though in the excuses department cuz Bouchard is already out in the prairie. Serena Williams has a way of taking away the credit from her opponents every single time she loses. And whats worse most everyone swallows the bait too. Kudos to Halep for her professionalism among all the rest of her assets. The rest of the WTA can learn much more from her example instead of Wiliiam’s other rivals in Sharapova and Azarenka. In my mind she is the ideal sportsman and role model and tennis players both male and female would do well to learn from her example!
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“Serena Williams has a way of taking away the credit from her opponents every single time she loses.”
No she doesn’t. She always makes a point of commentating on how the other player played, singling out what they did well. Serena said that Simona played a perfect match and said that she was going to train extra hard in the off season especially for her- can’t get a much bigger compliment than that, can you?! To top it off, if you did watch the match, there was a fantastic winner that Halep hit early in the second hit that even Williams applauded. Despite just being served a bagel.
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Yeah, there are really many surprises in thoses ATP tournaments and WTA masters.
Hope Bouchard will do the job against Serena. And thank you Moo for sending predictions for Basel and Valencia
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