Not A Week For The Defending Champions

We had two defending champions in action in finals this week - Steve Darcis in Amersfoort and Dmitry Tursunov in Indy. Neither of them won. I doubt this is indicative of any major change in tennis, but I thought it was kind of interesting.

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I remember when Darcis won Amersfoort last year, actually. He was ranked something stupid like #297, came up through qualies and won the tournament. Obviously that sent him rocketing up the rankings, and he's been hanging about ever since. He won a tournament earlier in the year, I think, so he wasn't a one tournament wonder. Good for him. I don't actually know much about him except that he's Belgian and kind of weird looking (though not as weird as Radek Stepanek... no one is that weird looking). So I know more about him than Potito Starace (for example) but not that much, really... although now I know that he lost in the final of Amersfoort this year to Albert Montanes. There's not much you can learn about someone when you're not actually watching their matches. Maybe if Mr. Darcis (or Mr. Starace, for that matter) played Hopman Cup, I would be able to make proper judgments about them. Because that's what every tennis player needs, obviously... a Judgement from Judge Jodi.

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I apologise for that awful pun.

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Our other dethroned champion was my old friend Dmitry Tursunov. I can make no comment about the match... but judging by the stats, a story was told in Tursunov's points won on second serve percentage (34%) and the fact that he converted none of his break points. Alas, Dmitry. Even after his bad behaviour in Nottingham, he's still one of my favourites... even if he has been eclipsed a little by Marat Safin for me. But I like Dmitry's attitude. Well, mostly I like his blog. I don't know indicative of his actual attitude that is. But he is one of those people I would like to have a drink with one time, just because he sounds like he'd be fun.

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But alas, Dmitry lost. The winner was Gilles Simon - actually, did you know that Simon is only the third Frenchman this year to win a title? Given the amount of Frenchmen in the top hundred, that absolutely mystifies me. Llodra has won two titles, and Santoro won Newport last week. But what about Gasquet? Tsonga? Monfils? Clement? Grosjean? Mathieu? There are so many - an insane amount, more than the Spaniards - and this is only their third player to take a title this year? That is vaguely unbelievable.

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Apart from the staple Clement/Llodra, there is an interesting French doubles team in the Toronto draw next week - Gasquet is playing with Mahut. Why oh why didn't they play together on grass? Actually, maybe they did... I don't pay much attention to doubles normally - which is bad, because I should. Doubles rules and all. But Gasquet and Mahut would be an awesome grass court team. Just a theory.

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The reason I am paying attention to the Toronto doubles is because some of the big guys are playing. I am really, really excited about the Federer/Wawrinka doubles team - I suppose they're playing together now to practice for the Olympics, but practice or not, I think this is going to be really good fun. Their first match is against Julien Benneteau and Frederic Niemeyer, which I'm pretty confident they can win... which would bring up against bye-beneficiaries Lukas Dlouhy and Leander Paes. Just below them in the draw are the also interesting pairings of Roddick/Fish and Clement/Llodra - just why aren't Clement and Llodra seeded? I am mystified.

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That first round match promises to be a corker, but even more interesting is a little higher in the draw - Nadal and Robredo against Davydenko and Andreev. That one should be a big battle. (Andreev lost his final yesterday, by the way... in a third set tiebreak! Poor Igor.) With the Olympics coming up, a lot of people are pulling double duty, and it's led to one of the most interesting doubles draws I've seen in a long time. It'll be really interesting to see who wins... I will be cheering for Roger and Stan all the way! Hopp Suisse! And that goes for the Olympics as well - I'll be gunning for the Aussies in just about every other sport, but when it comes to tennis, I think that I might well be Swiss.

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Just before I go - big kudos to Juan Martin del Potro, who won his second straight title in Kitzbuhel. This kid might just be here to stay!

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Today's Results

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Austrian Open (Kitzbuhel)

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Juan Martin del Potro def. Jurgen Melzer, 6-2 6-1

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Dutch Open Tennis (Amersfoort)

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Albert Montanes def. Steve Darcis, 1-6 7-5 6-3

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Studena Croatia Open (Umag)

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Fernando Verdasco def. Igor Andreev, 3-6 6-4 7-6 (7-4)

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Indianapolis Tennis Championships (Indianapolis)

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Gilles Simon def. Dmitry Tursunov, 6-4 6-4

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Bank of the West Classic (Stanford)

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Aleksandra Wozniak def. Marion Bartoli, 7-5 6-3

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Gastein Ladies (Bad Gastein)

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Pauline Parmentier def. Lucie Hradecka, 6-4 6-4

Roger Federer World

Somewhere out in the sky in that vast belt of rocks between Mars and Jupiter, is the newly christened Rafael Nadal asteroid. Until a few days ago, it was known as the 128036 asteroid. Its new name is a little cooler, methinks.

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Apparently it was named as a tribute to 'one of the greatest tennis players of all time.' I assume that means they're waiting till they find a suitably lovely planet before giving it the name of THE greatest tennis player of all time. I'll be one of the first in the line when the rocket flies with the first human emigrants to Roger Federer World, let me tell you. Now wouldn't that be a fine place to live?!

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Actually, that would be a great place to live. Imagine a world where everyone lived like a Federer. It would have a charter based on fairness and niceness and politeness. It would be a planet based on fair play and good sportsmanship - and, of course, genius and beauty. Though of course, if everyone was like Roger, maybe he wouldn't be so special. But Roger Federer World would be a wonderful place. No Djokovics there.

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Four tournaments for men going on this week - and again, three of them (Kitzbuhel, Amersfoort and Umag) are on clay. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. Why, ye players, why do you play on the clay? I would be heading straight to Indianapolis, where they are sensible and play on hard courts - and also are located in North America, where the tour pretty much lives for the next little while (Olympics aside.) But the top seeds in Indy are James Blake, Gilles Simon, Dmitry Tursunov and Sam Querrey. The cutoff for direct admission is 169. Hardly the most distinguished field ever.

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Let's check out the stats on the three clay tournaments. In Kitzbuhel (which got rained out today), the top four seeds are Andreas Seppi, Rainer Schuettler, Agustin Calleri and Potito Starace. Last direct acceptance at 156. In Amersfoort, we have Marc Gicquel, Jose Acasuso, Steve Darcis and Marcel Granollers (all of whom receive first round byes... badness) with a last direct acceptance at 157. And in Umag, the top four dudes are Fernando Verdasco, Ivo Karlovic, Carlos Moya and Igor Andreev, and the last direct acceptance is 137.

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Now, none of the top TOP guys are playing this week (though interestingly, Ivan Ljubicic is the #5 seed in Umag, and he did used to be a top TOP guy not so long ago) but still, the fact remains that Indy has the lowest direct acceptance of all the tournaments. Why would you not make a run for it? Is the schism between claycourters and the others really so pronounced? Are claycourters so good on clay and so rubbish on everything else that they'll endanger the rest of their season just to rack up points on the red stuff?

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I just do not understand. Surely, if you are a claycourter, you want to practice on hardcourts so you can do well at the US Open, yesno? But I suppose you would also want to stick to what you're good at so as to maintain your points... but it just seems so bizarre to me. I know there is a big difference between clay and hard courts, but is it really that pronounced? Why, WHY is there such a demand for clay tournaments?

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And why clay? Why not grass? Is it just a matter of what people have grown up on? But look at Federer. He grew up on clay, and while he is obviously the second best player on it in the world, it's still his least favourite surface. And there are SO MANY claycourters. I can only think of one specific grasscourt player off the top of my head, and even then, he rarely makes that much of an impact - it's Nicolas Mahut, by the way. And Roland Garros is great and all, but it's Wimbledon that is really the holy grail of tennis - always has been, always will be.

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Back in the day, when Rod Laver won his Slam, three of the four Slams were on grass, with Roland Garros the exception. What happened between then and now? When did people go off grass?

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The only post-Wimbledon grass court tournament (to my knowledge, anyway) is Newport, which Fabrice Santoro won last week. But there's clay tournaments pretty much the whole year round - you have the South American swing right after the Australian Open, where you have Vina del Mar and a whole host of other tournaments. This is in the leadup to Indian Wells and Miami - so why play clay? Then you have Estoril and the European clay swing, which is the swing that makes sense, as it leads up to Roland Garros. But then there's Warsaw - which Davydenko played and won this year, and then went on to promptly lose in the first round of Wimbledon. And still now, clay everywhere! You can hardly get away from the stuff!

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If it was one clay tournament and three hard court ones, then maybe it would make more sense. But you cannot tell me that three quarters of the players on the tour are specialist claycourters. I refuse to believe that.

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I know I have flogged this dead horse about nine hundred times, but it just does not make any sense to me at all. Quite apart from anything, the Olympics are coming up, and they are not on clay. Oh no, they are not.

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Any answers welcomed. Because surely, if three quarters of the players on the tour are clay courters, three quarters of the tour would be played on clay. The important tournaments, anyway. But no. We have one claycourt Grand Slam and three Masters Series events, all crammed into one quarter of the season. That would be one quarter, not three. Whereas the hard courts get two separate seasons and two Slams. I know the Australian and the US are different surfaces, but they're both hard, when it comes down to it.

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So what the hell is going on, Kitzbuhel, Umag, Amersfoort? Jodi demands to know. Why the clay? WHY?

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Today's Results

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Dutch Open Tennis (Amersfoort)

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Martin Vassallo Arguello def. Alberto Brizzi, 6-4 6-3

Alberto Martin def. Yuri Schukin, 7-6 (10-8) 6-4

Teimuraz Gabashvili def. Thierry Ascione 6-2 7-6 (7-1)

Christophe Rochus def. David Marrero, 7-5 6-2

Thiemo de Bakker def. Adrian Cruciat, 7-5 6-4

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ATP Studena Croatia Open (Umag)

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Fabio Fognini def. Ricardas Berankis, 6-3 6-2

Boris Pashanski def. Gianluca Naso, 6-3 2-6 7-6 (11-9)

Roko Karanusic def. Francesco Piccari, 6-2 6-2

Mathieu Montcourt def. Antonio Veic, 6-4 6-2

Filippo Volandri def. Flavio Cipolla, 6-1 6-4

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Indianapolis Tennis Championships (Indianapolis)

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Gilles Simon def. Nicolas Mahut, 6-2 3-6 6-3

Dmitry Tursunov def. Igor Kunitsyn, 6-3 7-5

Benjamin Becker def. Kristian Pless, 6-3 6-4

Joseph Sirianni def. Mikhail Ledovskikh, 6-3 1-2 retired

Yen-hsun Lu def. Justin O'Neal, 7-6 (7-2) 7-6 (14-12)

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Bank of the West Classic (Stanford)

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Sybille Bammer def. Olga Govortsova, 7-5 6-2

Alisa Kleybanova def. Elena Vesnina, 4-6 6-2 6-3

Ai Sugiyama def. Alexa Glatch, 6-2 3-6 7-5

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Gastein Ladies (Bad Gastein)

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Zhang Shuai def. Joanna Sakowicz, 7-5 6-2

Tereza Hladikova def. Yevgenia Savranska, 6-4 2-6 7-6 (7-4)

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And today in Stars of the Past, Stars of the Future: Marin Cilic.

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Marin Cilic must seem like the boogeyman for Paul-Henri Mathieu. They have met in four consecutive tournaments now, and while the first match went the way of the Frenchman, since then, it has been all Cilic. This nineteen year old Croat took out Mathieu in the third round of Wimbledon, and now, on clay, has taken him out in Bastad. Mathieu was the defending champion, and this loss to Cilic will probably see him fall out of the top twenty. Cilic is that kind of player.

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Cilic has been rising quietly through the rankings. He made no spectacular leap like Jeremy Chardy, no one big Slam finish that sent him soaring up. Just solid consistency - which, one would think, is a pretty good asset for a player of his age. Like Chardy, he was in the fourth round of Slam this year - beating his bunny Mathieu ensured that - but it wasn't really a surprise. Cilic is rising so steadily and solidly that no one has really seen him coming.

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How long will this continue? Are we going to look up in two years time and find a twenty one year old Marin Cilic in the top ten, challenging at all the Slams? Where did he come from? we will wonder. But he will have been there all along - a steam train heading up the rankings, a tortoise to Chardy's hare. But one expects that it is Cilic, rather than Chardy, that will have the longer career.