On the mens side, there are two events this week in Barcelona (ATP 500) and Bucharest (ATP 250). The clay court event in Barcelona has drawn a reasonable line-up which as always, is spearheaded by Rafael Nadal and David Ferrer. The top 16 players have byes into the second round. Let’s take a (slightly different)…
Maria Sharapova An exciting week of tennis on both the ATP and WTA tours has concluded with Maria Sharapova defeating Li Na in the Stuttgart final and Rafael Nadal beating Nicolas Almagro in the Barcelona final. Sharapova was on fire today, raising her game by several levels compared to her performance against Angelique Kerber yesterday,…
An all-Spaniard final graces Barcelona tomorrow as Rafael Nadal and Nicolas Almagro will do battle on the clay. Nadal was terrific today, winning a second set bagel against the serving juggernaut of Milos Raonic in a 6-4 6-0 win. He was standing so far behind the baseline to receive Raonic’s serves, but he had an…
1.Rafael Nadal v Milos Raonic Philipp Kohlschreiber The one thing I have managed to predict correctly this week was Milos Raonic repeating his 2012 semi-final run in Barcelona. Raonic had an excellent day as he took out the in-form Ernests Gulbis, saving a set point in the second set breaker to win, 6-2 7-6(6). He…
Rain decimated the Barcelona schedule so we have just one quarter-final match to preview for Friday. The remainder of the third round matches will kick off the schedule with the yet-to-be-decided quarter-finalists having to play two matches in one day. 1. Nicolas Almagro v Juan Monaco Juan Monaco Straight set wins for Nicolas Almagro and…
1. Milos Raonic v Ernests Gulbis Milos Raonic From the eight third round matches in Barcelona, I am most intrigued by the match-up between Ernests Gulbis and Milos Raonic, which has not even made the Pista Central schedule. Gulbis has continued his excellent form of late with two straight set wins over Radek Stepanek and…
Today in Barcelona, Ernests Gulbis continued his excellent form of late with a comfortable 6-3 6-4 victory over Fernando Verdasco, who is rapidly speeding the wrong way down the rankings. Tomas Berdych avoided another early upset as he saved a match point in a 3-6 7-5 6-4 victory over Nikolay Davydenko. In Stuttgart, Ana Ivanovic…
Time is limited so I am going to get straight down to dissecting next week’s Barcelona draw. Note that the top 16 players all have byes into round two. David Ferrer David Ferrer returns to action having missed Monte-Carlo and along with Rafael Nadal, headlines Barcelona. Ferrer will open up against Dmitry Tursunov or Denis…
Rafael Nadal finally turned the tables on Novak Djokovic as he continued his marvellous winning streak in Monte-Carlo and inflicted a defeat on the Serb, his first since the 2010 World Tour Finals in London. Although it was a crucial win for Nadal, Djokovic was emotionally exhausted having suffered the loss of his grandfather earlier…
This week sees the beginning of the European clay court season in Barcelona and the hard court tournament in Denmark, which continues to somersault around the calendar each year… WTA Copenhagen Caroline Wozniacki Copenhagen boasts a much stronger line-up than previous years although Caroline Wozniacki looks a dead cert to reach the final with much…
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