Doing It For The Dwarves

Gilles Simon, here is the exit. Hand in your pass at the door. You're out. I never want to see your face in here again.

The Club of Lost Souls is no longer open to you.

That's right, after pretty much a year of whaling on the guy, I'm going to say something nice about ol' Gilles. I'm going to cut him a break and expel him from the Club of Lost Souls - the one club you definitely don't want to be a member of.

He played some great tennis to win the title of Thailand. Sure, maybe Viktor Troicki wasn't the strongest finals opponent in the world and maybe it wasn't the bestest field EVAH, but he played some good stuff to win it, and that's a hell of a lot more than we've been seeing from him in recent times. He's played le pathetique for most of this year, and I'm glad to see some decent balls flying from his racquet.

I like Gilles because he's little. There's not a whole lot of little guys in tennis, and the ones that are small aren't usually in the upper echelons. Gilles is the top ten flagflier for the little guys, and he was getting absolutely pummelled for a while there. I'm still not a massive fan of his game, but good on you, Gilles - doing it for the dwarves.


Today's Results

PTT Pattaya Open (Bangkok)

Gilles Simon def. Viktor Troicki, 7-5 6-3


Proton Malaysian Open (Kuala Lumpur)

Nikolay Davydenko def. Fernando Verdasco, 6-4 7-5


China Open (Beijing)

Dinara Safina def. Roberta Vinci, 6-4 6-2
Serena Williams def. Kaia Kanepi, 7-5 6-4
Elena Dementieva def. Anna-Lena Groenefeld, 6-4 6-0
Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez def. Caroline Wozniacki, 6-7 (5-7) 7-6 (7-2) 6-0
Svetlana Kuznetsova def. Zheng Jie, 7-6 (7-3) 7-5
Vera Zvonareva def. Sorana Cirstea, 6-2 6-2
Victoria Azarenka def. Olga Govortsova, 6-1 6-3
Marion Bartoli def. Magdalena Rybarikova, 6-2 4-6 6-3
Anabel Medina Garrigues def. Lu Jingjing, 3-6 7-5 7-5
Sara Errani def. Alexa Glatch, 6-1 6-1
Lucie Safarova def. Ji Chun-Mei, 6-2 6-4
Patty Schnyder def. Urszula Radwanska, 6-4 7-5
Peng Shuai def. Yaroslava Shvedova, 6-2 6-3
Ekaterina Makarova def. Shahar Peer, 6-4 6-2
Kateryna Bondarenko def. Maria Kirilenko, 6-2 2-6 7-6 (7-2)
Melinda Czink def. Elena Vesnina, 7-6 (7-2) 5-7 6-4
Zhang Shuai def. Iveta Benesova, 6-4 6-2