ILE rolling non-slam Tennis thread

so osaka has arrived

It's getting to the point now where Paire can beat Novak in straights and no one even notices. Kokkinakis though! So Rafa gets to be #1 through the spring until such time as he loses a match or pulls out of an event. Only 4680pts to defend, no pressure. Fed not bothering with clay again. Meh.

wow @ danielle collins

I realise that Rafa on Spanish clay in Davis Cup has always been utterly invulnerable, but, still, the crushing of Zverev suggests he's Back-Back-Back. (He's now 24-1 in DC singles; sole defeat being his first ever rubber: vs Jiri Novak on indoor carpet in Brno in 2004).

Suddenly those 4680pts look sort of defendable.

isner v stevie johnson on wet clay is actually a p compelling watch, no i swear

lmao rain stoppage at break pt on isners serve

nadal/thiem tmorrow in monte carlo qtrs

welp so nadals not losing again til say wimbledon qtrs ish, he is a legend

The gulf on clay between RN and everyone else who has ever lived is extraordinary. Thiem had just beaten (a semi-rejuvenated) Novak, ffs. I was watching the point-by-point on my phone app yesterday and practically every game was going to multiple deuces, but Rafa was winning them all anyway. I'd give Dimi a 15% chance today, which is more than I'd give Kei or Sascha on Sunday.

The idea that Roger can just sit out the CC season and have #1 drift back to him seems silly now. But... you never know. Rafa's knees and so on. It's still six weeks of slog, even if he's killing people one and three. There may be a Soderling moment yet.

50 consecutive sets won on clay

this is a great 1st set rafa/thiem

rafa w two really uncharacteristic errors, 2nd chance for dom to serve it out ~

props dom! 7-5 1st set.. he played really well

two set losing streak on clay now !@!

A 3-6 record vs Nadal on clay (and they've only ever played on clay) is really pretty good - better than Djokovic!

nice rome final 4 -- rafa v novak; cilic v zverev

sascha got great bounce height on smashing his racquet

cilic is tough, couple gutsy as hell shots down set pt, is currently 10-10 1st set tiebreak

zverev takes it 15-13

Well, that was inevitable. As soon as the rain came I had a feeling Rafa would just roll through on the resumption.

Quite impressed with Sascha this week, coming through some tight matches (I’d pegged him as a bit fragile after losing a lead) but to fold after winning 9 of 11 games before the rain delay was really disappointing.

queens club semis tmorrow are interesting

krygios v cilic
&
djoko v chardy

chardy has been on fire but notably is 0-10 all time vs novak, has never won a set and only once has even gotten to a tiebreak o_o

check out these qtrs in newport (ill be in attendance for the later two matches):

jung/smyczek
ramanathan/pospisil

mannerino/granollers
stevie johson/dudi sela

theres also an xhibition match btwn sloane/keys iirc so that may be decently fun actually

mannarino crumbled & sela couldnt handle steve johnsons serve after beating ivo last rd ~

interesting night of matches in dc, impacted by lotsa rainouts already this wk

currently zverev v zverev
noah rubin took out isner & has to play again like 2hrs later v rublev
tiafoe/goffin
chung/deminaur
kei/shapo
murray is also still alive

well jeez - https://www.bbc.com/sport/tennis/45055266

I've been watching highlights of AM's matches this week - he fights and chases as much as ever did but, damn, 75mph second serves half way up the box. No wonder he's going three hours vs Copil and McDonald, he's not getting any free points.

It's a tough MATCH-UP for Andy, with the CONDITION he's in at the moment.

andy out of dc & out of toronto

did drop a tiebreak but otherwise titsy gets thru djoker w/ not a tonne of resistance, never broken o_o

And now takes out Zverev from MPs down. He’s a bit good.

real grind of a opening night match in cincy, djoker v steve johnson

novak wins it on his 9th match point ~

Real shame Titsy couldn’t take that set-point vs Rafa in Toronto and turn it around. No one has ever beaten five top-10 opponents in a single event* and he had a chance there.

(* men’s tour, since computer rankings in ‘73)

Kinda grimly curious to see just how many points Murray can scramble together before the protected ranking expires. Not that it matters, I guess - even ranked 250 Melbourne, Miami and the rest are likely to wildcard him next year. Can’t last forever for Stan W though.

Ah, but that’s a great win for Stan overnight! He’ll be fine.

hes looking p decent suddenly

chung looked as bad as ive seen a pro look vs delpo, who also looked not super interested

new haven quallies gets going tmorrow - 24 matches w some good names! for $7, i really should have planned better to be going to this :\

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Connecticut_Open_%E2%80%93_Singles

Held over from last night? Which means, with more rain today, Delpo is playing Kyrgios in a few hours. Off to bed, hopefully not to wake to a collapse from Dimi, who is suddenly all late-'17 vs Djoko.

xp

yea i could be wrong but im not bullish on djoko for the us open

fed/stan good so far

damn delpo/goffin set2 is nice also

fed giving it away whoa

stan!

goffin beating anderson then delpo in the same day is impressive as hell

stans bhand is looking great

some sloppiness but this is def a compelling match, fed rarely has recently been a match where he cant dictate as far as i can recall

that pt 2nd set fed 5-4 up in the tiebreak was thrilling

it better not fucking start raining lmao

killer semis, tho all are prob tired

novak/cilic
fed/goffin

fed looked really sluggish to me today