ILE rolling non-slam Tennis thread

Dimitrov-Murray sounds messy. Dimi's response to a 1-7 tb loss was to win 16 of 18 pts for a double-break lead in set two. Murray almost got them both back, but Dimi just served out, saving a bp. My money is on a 6-1 Murray blow-out in the third.

not quite gregor just broke to go up 4-3

Ha! Murray led 3-1 and fell apart.

Losing from a break up in the third in two straight tournaments! At least we won't have to hear any nonsense about how fatherhood has transformed his game. Well, maybe in the bad way.

wow @ thiem seemingly breaking djoko @ 3-5, coverage going to commercial, only to comeback and say it was challenged and the shot was out

thiem currently 0/7 on break chances

they'd both sat down after that BP, neither thought it'd be in!

sveta looked so done in during that 2nd set, amazed she won it. some p cool points all in all.

same could be said for monfils, in this 3rd, tho showed sum guts & now onserve w the crowd behind him

this is a real battle, kei saved 4 mp's

each guy has separately looked cooked at pts, now tiebreak

nishi still pounding groundstrokes so deep was impressve

novak is only playing like a B- game and still ttly demoralized kei

Siegemund is SUCH a fun player to watch. This match vs Keys is v entertaining

sock has kind sulked his way into this L

super odd match

sock is exhibiting like intermittent chronic fatigue syndrome

Townsend just lost to a 69-year old in a 25k lol

lol nevermind, they haven't played yet

they just played, Townsend obv won 60 60 but Falkenberg won 12 points (had a game point in the second set!) and lasted 36 minutes (eight more than Tomic did against Nieminen that time in Miami)

there were videos! https://www.facebook.com/rgcoopersmith/posts/10154771146349535?pnref=story

this one from Falkenberg's Q1 win was pretty special https://www.facebook.com/rgcoopersmith/videos/vb.545924534/10154767608159535/?type=2&theater

I went back through Gail F's ITF history and she did actually win a round in the AO qualies - but that was 28 years ago, when she was Kimiko Date vintage rather than Bille Jean King vintage.

serving for the match over Djokovic and at 0-15 after a basic UE, Vesely hit maybe one of the best dropshots I've ever seen for a clean winner. Closed it out from there!

Vesely beats Novak! Nole started badly but played pretty good in the end. Vesely redlined everything and hit some of the best drop shots I've ever seen

lol xp

thought Djokovic was fine off the ground (if a bit passive in the last game) but his return wasn't there - he had a half-chance to break back at 3-4 but missed a couple of key returns

wow huh

first opening round loss for Djokovic since Madrid 2013 (Dimitrov)
first loss to a player out of the top 50 for Djokovic since Queen's 2010 (Malisse)
first completed loss to a player out of the top 50 on clay for Djokovic since Umag 2007 (Troicki)
first time Djokovic has failed to reach a Masters final since Shanghai 2014

damn so rafa looks better than he has in like 2 yrs

this match has been phenomenal so far

beset by terrible streams all afternoon :(

gross result to go w my gross stream

halep just got first set breadsticked by someone i have never seen play before

I can't watch but Siegemund is super-talented and full of variety. Until a couple of years ago she was a student who only played tennis part-time, but that was enough to get her into Slam qualies, and now here she is...

yah. the first set and a half (which is all i watched) i was amazed at the variety she showed. v attacking, came to the net a ton, hit a bunch of v good drop shots and also often faked the drop shot and instead played beautifully deep sliced forehands nicolescu style.

milestones! in front of her home crowd, Cagla Buyukakcay becomes the first Turkish woman to make a WTA final, and with it the first Turkish woman to make the top 100, and she'll be the first Turkish woman to play a Slam MD this summer - this will get her direct entry to Wimbledon if she doesn't qualify for RG

Siegemund just out-Aga'd Aga. Never looked in doubt

also, the fourth non-top 70 player in a WTA Premier final this year so far

#94 Puig @ Sydney
#88 Ostapenko @ Doha
#85 Vesnina @ Charleston
#71 Siegemund @ Stüttgart

and this also makes the first single-nationality final of the year, strangely

Cagla Buyukakcay, first Turkish WTA titlist!

djokvic is really good at the running x-court forehand

obv also really good @ other shots

crazy game, novak serving to end it & murray tryna break

Bartoli designed a dress for Jankovic and this is what happened

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CiFrdOWWEAAvB3G.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CiFrdQ2WEAAbwz-.jpg

see that looks better to me than the weird color block things that ivanovic & pavlyuchenkova were both wearing yesterday in their match

damn thiem took out rog

err haven't watched any tennis in a while but still checking following scores, Berdych got double bagelled by Goffin?!!

I left the house yesterday evening and every one of the remaining matches wound up with a hilarious bagel scoreline -_-

Thiem played really well to beat Fed, who I didn't think was as off-form as the press or he himself suggested (he was excellent vs Zverev the day before)

Muguruza/Bacsinszky is super high quality right now

that set point for Djokovic over Nadal was incredible