ILE rolling non-slam Tennis thread

Hingis on the Woz. Bitch still has it: http://www.tennischannel.com/news/NewsDetails.aspx?newsid=9530

“I think I had more game than her,” Hingis told me at the Mercury Insurance Open in San Diego: "I don’t want to be cocky about this, but I think I had more [weapons]. She’s a great fighter but I out played [opponents] and I took the ball earlier and didn't give them as much time. If she wants to win a Grand Slam, she’s going to have to take charge more. She doesn't have one great weapon. You need that one little extra thing to overcome.”

When I mentioned to Hingis what an extraordinary amount of confidence she had when she came on tour, she immediately shot back that, "you need to win to have confidence.” While Wozniacki was a terrific junior, she was not Hingis, who was already beating solid pros when she wasjust 14.

“She does the best with what she’s got,” Hingis said of the Dane. “Everyone is saying she hasn’t won a Slam but maybe it’s a question of time. Lately she's struggled more because there are probably more players at the Grand Slams who are better than her.”

<3

Can't wait for this lame San Diego tournament to finish. Toronto!!

Okay Young beat Baghdatis, apparently in straight sets

Did he suddenly remember how to play tennis

Martina Hingis is the most perfect woman who ever lived. (Sorry Dan).

How many matches has Hantuchova lost after winning the first set to 0 or 1? 0-6 6-4 6-4 is such a Hantuchova scoreline, always welcome and hilarious to see.

Whose damn fool idea was it to schedule the women's and men's Canadian Opens AGAINST EACH OTHER in the same week? I just...that makes no sense. Why is this happening. Tennis must be one of the most poorly organised professional sports. It's completely fucking stupid and the kind of thing that shouldn't even be contemplated and yet here we are, it's actually happening next week.

Women's draw is stacked, anyway. Venus/Ivanovic 1R, lol. Winner gets injured Cibulkova...so a Wozniacki/Venus 3R is very likely. Serena gets either JaJa or Gorgeous in the 2R (wow, one of those will have to win a match) and then St Kim in the 3R. Kvitova really lucked out with her quarter, given the draw's strength, therefore an opening round loss to Unforced Errani is probably imminent.

How many matches has Hantuchova lost after winning the first set to 0 or 1?

Boredom demanded it:

Q2 Klagenfurt, 2000, l. Anca Barna 61 46 36
1R Miami 2001, l. Jana Nejedly 61 67 46
2R Gold Coast 2002, l. Justine Henin 61 06 36
QF Berlin 2002, l. Anna Smashnova 61 26 36
2R Wimbledon 2003, l. Shinobu Asagoe 60 46 1012
2R Montreal 2004, l. Ai Sugiyama 61 46 46
3R Los Angeles 2005, l. Serena Williams 61 36 36
SF Australian Open 2008, l. Ana Ivanovic 60 36 46
2R Paris 2009, l. Alize Cornet 61 46 26
QF 's-Hertogenbosch 2009, l. Dinara Safina 61 46 36
F Monterrey 2010, l. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 61 16 06
4R Miami 2010, l. Venus Williams 61 57 46
2R Wimbledon 2010, l. Barbora Zahlavova-Strycova 61 26 46
QF Carlsbad 2011, l. Agnieszka Radwanska 61 46 46

Lol Hantuchokeva. The gift that keeps on giving.

All 4 of my faves are in different quarters of the Toronto draw (Venus/Kvitova/Sharapova/Serena) so that's good. I'm glad Serena has a challenging draw. It's all good practice for her right now. I'd prefer her to meet St Kim once before the US Open. And we all know JJ will turn into God Mode against her BFF.

Such awesome eurosport coverage for Toronto. I could cry.

What. the. actual. fuck. Ivanovic is ranked #18? Like, how? I literally thought she was in the bottom half of the top 100.

bloody Bali points innit. she'll still be top 20 even with last year's Cincy SF points coming off, and now with Venus pulling out even has a chance to add a few this week.

at least Oudin is well out of the top 100 at last.

was v happy with A-Rad titling last week, wish I'd seen a bit of her run but she was way overdue a trophy. by all accounts Bepa is still playing horrendously, I have no expectations any more (not that my expectations were anything other than severely limited in any case).

I think Serena is the obvious choice to come through her bit, and fairly easily. weird that she's the match-tough one, but JaJa's looked like she has a foot out of the game for a while and St Kim hasn't played in an age.

OMG Kuznetsova losing a 3 setter to a nobody

I for one am shellshocked.

You mean a nO_Obody, surely.

Bartoli lost which is more of a shock.

Jelena Jankovic. To Julia Goerges. On hardcourts. Winning 4 games.

*Jelena Jankovic lost.

People don't seem to harsh on Jankovic the way they did Safina, but really, it's she that is the worst player to ever be #1, surely.

(I mean objectively she was more consistent for longer than Ivanovic, but Safina had more finals, Ivanovic won a slam and Wozniacki is mentally tougher and has loads of weeks at #1)

Jankovic doesn't seem to care any more. Her game has been a shadow of what it used to be since 2009 now, but almost every time I've seen her play this year she's so listless and just doesn't give a shit. Don't think she's winning matches against anyone any time soon.

I think Sweta's decline might be terminal too, usually in her vast stretches of moronic losses to nobodies there'd be a random huge result around the corner, I have no faith in that any more though.

CAKE was visibly injured in the Stanford final, maybe she isn't fully recovered yet? Also, Voskoboeva has made a really strong comeback this year, her results have been better than before her injury. Already beaten Kirilenko and A-Pav, gone from 528 to 135 in the rankings since the start of the year.

ugh this story:

Elise Tamaela is a 27 year-old Dutch player on the ITF circuit. She was playing a challenger in Versmold when she was verbally and physically attacked by another player's (Karen Barbat (DEN)) father. She's now in the hospital and the dude has fled with his daughter, presumably trying to avoid the authorities.

Here's the account from Elise's brother:

As the brother of Elise I can confirm the story... Elise has been attacked by the father of Karen Barbat whule watching her game. He was calling her names from the start of the game (all kind of racist things I'm not willing to repeat). After a while Elise said something about it, he then knocked her out with a punch and elbows to here temple. She immediately lost consciousness for about five minutes... After a while she was taken to the police station to press charges, the father and daughter flee, police still looking for them. At the police station Elise started the vomit continiously, an ambulance was called to take here to the nearest hospital. She's still on a intravenous drip with painkillers and needs to stay in the hospital till at least tomorrow morning (having a concussion and a bruised face)...

My father and I drove to Halle (where Elise is in the hospital) and are now in a hotel, we hope we can take Elise back to The Netherlands tomorrow...

The father/trainer of Karen Barbat will probably never see a (professional) tennis court again, that man is a true risk to all people around him!

ugh, wtf?

looking at the draw, Barbat was playing another Dutch player in qualies, not Tamaela, who's in the main draw, so I'm guessing Tamaela was attacked as she was supporting her compatriot?

yep seems like it - Barbat was playing Tamaela's doubles partner I think. Utterly horrible.

I wish there was some way to get psycho parents off the tour or at least limit their participation - there seems to be too many of these kinds of stories lately. But it's simply impossible given how many parents double as the players' coaches/managers/agents etc.

Why wasn't he ejected for yelling racial shit?

I'm guessing because it was just the qualifying event of a tiny tournament w/very few staff - I've been to the equivalent level of event in cardiff and they're just hosted in tiny tennis clubs, no ball boys and certainly no security.

There aren't really any spectators either, just the players and their coaches.

I think we need a lol after that story:

http://espn.go.com/tennis/story/_/id/6847895/two-time-defending-champion-andy-murray-ousted-rogers-cup

Ugh Clijsters retired! I was so looking forward to the Serena rematch.

Q. What happened tonight?
JELENA JANKOVIC: Um,you know, it was my first match after, you know, the break, you know, since Wimbledon. So obviously, you know, I had a hard time, you know, playing my first match.You know, I need some time to get, you know, my rhythm and feel comfortable, you know, on the court playing matches again. So I made some, you know, bad errors and I made actually a lot of errors.I wasn't really feeling my game out there, and, you know, it was tough. I felt really rusty out there. So,you know, I tried, you know, the best that I could, but obviously I need, you know, some more time and hopefully more matches and I'll be better.

Clijsters out of Cincy. So if she plays the US it will be without any preparation, just like at the French and we know how well that worked out for her.

that's good news

Meh I really wanted a Serena/Clijsters rematch on US hardcourts.

Twitter says that Stosur just shanked a shot that hit Pennetta, playing on the next court over. I can't even.

hahaha

Twitter also says Woz is on her way out after a reportedly horrible match against Vinci.

Woz was up 5-1 in the second set

Words can't describe how happy that match made me. So ludicrously hilariously bad from the Woz. 3 DF's in a row at one point

amazing win for dodig over nadal! I left at 3-0 in the third, figuring he'd run out of gas. Glad I recorded it.

WTF at that loss! Especially with the leads Rafa had. Paves the way for a GROSS bottom half. Fish in the final again just as I was looking forward to his Cincy points dropping off. Why can I not be rid of Fish and Ivanovic from their unwarranted high rankings? Go awaaaaaaay.

LOL @ Wozniacki. Vinci never beats top players, ever! I do hope this is the start of everyone starting to beat Wozniacki.

Damn I am loving this tournament. Dodig!!! :D

Why can I not be rid of Fish and Ivanovic from their unwarranted high rankings?

oh come on, Fish at least won a title this year

Kvitova Kvitova Kvitova... US hardcourts arent good for her it seems.

Voskoboeva 6-3 5-4 40-0

followed by 2 doublefaults and an error.

6-3 5-5 :)

Maria was nice enough to gift her the next 2 games after that monumental choke though. Champions should really not lose to some qualifier who just threw away 3 match points. UGHHHHHHHHH. I just don't know what Maria can do any more. Awful awful awful all the time.

Well look, Kvitova, if you're going to lose, it's nice that you chose to do it to Petkovic, whom I also <3.

Also, yay for A-Rad! Not working with that dickhead father of hers is working out for her.

FUCK YEAH GALINA VOSKOBOEVA

god it gives me so much LIFE when Sharapova and Clijsters and Ivanovic all lose within 48 hours of each other

go go go Zheng

pity about Kvitova and Li though - this is why Wozniacki will be No 1 forever :(

FUCK YEAH ZHENG JIE

she just won an epic point there - she was at net, couldn't put it away, Serena smashed an easy BH straight at her, you know how that normally ends

except Jie hit a reflex volley past Serena for a winner and Serena looked SO PISSED OFF

<3 <3 <3

Lol @ these girls playing amazing against Serena and losing to Craybas 2 weeks earlier.

Shot of the tournament easily there. Forehand DTL pass from Serena. Ridic.

Oh are you one of those who buys into Serena's whinging that everyone plays better against her out of spite?

I thought Zheng's volley a couple of games before was better tbh, Zheng should have been more prepared for that to come back