A Highly Educated Look At Things I Know A Lot About

There is not so much to report today. We're in that brief no man's land between the Davis Cup weekend and Indian Wells where fat nothing happens. So what I thought we might do is have a quick snappy look at the dudes who won Challengers over the weekend. Are you cool with that? You better be, because that's what I'm doing.

In Cherbourg, much to my chagrin, it was not defending champion Nicolas Mahut to took away the trophy, but young Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov. As a result, Dimitrov leaps up the rankings ten spots while Mahut goes down ten (but he's still in the top hundred, fear not!) Dimitrov is the latest player, as we all know, to be touted as the second coming of Roger Federer... but while we have the first one I don't really see the necessity of a second. Dimitrov's strokes are so closely modelled on Roger's that it's uncanny. And if there's a model you want to take, Federer is not a bad one...

...but I heard Jim Courier say once that unless you develop your own style, there's not much out there for you. I'd like to see Dimitrov move in his own direction a little. Sure, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and his Federerness is clearly working for him, because hello, he just won Cherbourg, but I'd like to see something in the mix that is pure Grigor. And I think it'll come too - what's the attraction in being a carbon copy of another dude when you can be yourself? The Federer strokes will provide a great base for Dimitrov to build on, provided he's prepared to get his hands dirty and build a beautiful house. The house is a tennis player. This metaphor is bad.

In Dallas, the tournament where all the Australians thought it would be a good idea to go for some reason, we saw Alex Bogomolov Jr take away the title. Here is all the things I know about Alex Bogomolov Jr:

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As you can see, I am supremely well informed about this young man and all his prospects. I'm going to stick with 'well done' - particularly as he beat Rainer Schuettler in the final, and Schuettler, while he might be past it now, has been to a Grand Slam final in his day - and give a big shout out to Matt Ebden, who made the semis, and lost to this Alex Bogomolov Jr character in three tight sets. It's only a matter of time before Ebden starts winning these tournaments, I think - he gets better and better every time I see him play.

And then in Salinas, Andres Moltini was the winner. You know how much I knew about Alex Bogomolov Jr (ie. his name and nothing else)? I know even less about Moltini. I'd never even heard of him before this week. But he's clearly doing something right, because he just won in Salinas. And he upset top seed Brian Dabul to do it, so well done Andres. May you continue Moltini-ing on for the rest of your days.

Yes, He Killed Kenny

I do believe that I promised to (and I quote) 'blow your mind' with my Cherbourg coverage. So I better do that. And I think that involves me... talking about Cherbourg. So what can I make up - I mean, say - today!

Important things first - Nicolas Mahut is through to the next round. Yes, he may have scraped through by the skin of his teeth, but a win is a win and I'd rather he took a tight win than a tight loss. Or any kind of loss. A third set breaker is there to determine the winner and the loser and this time he was the winner.

And yes, he killed Kenny (de Schepper).

One thing that always astonishes me about Mahut is how consistent he can be on first serve. His percentage is, in general, really, really freaking high. There's a ton of players who would amputate a limb if it meant they could regularly serve at 71%... which doesn't seem that high, but it, you know, is. I suppose it shouldn't be surprising after the whole 'why yes, John Isner, I think I will hold serve 68 times in a row' incident that happened last year, but I'm still impressed. He won 79% of first serve points as well today, which is pretty bloody good.

...although he did get taken to a third set breaker, so maybe I shouldn't be extolling his wonderment in a match where he probably didn't play his best. Though I can't be sure, on account of how I didn't see it and I'm talking about something I know zero about. But still!

Nico's doubles partner Edouard Roger-Vasselin (how many vaseline jokes do you think he gets? per day, on average?) was not so lucky, going down to Karol Beck in straights. But Stephane Robert flew that French flag high, coming up with a W against 'my name is also' Stefan Seifert.

...yeah, you can see how much I know about those dudes. HEAPS.

And the French dude who won his way to my heart through stupid trickshots is also out. Benoit Paire just went down. Pout. I want good things to happen to him.

We're on track for a Dimitrov/Mahut final, which could be anyone's game... depending who turns up. Both these dudes are capable of going Ferd and pulling out performances so terrible they make you want to cry. But then they can both (definitely) go the other way as well, so we'll see.

And at some point, I hope to actually watch a match at Cherbourg. Imagine how mindblowing my coverage will be then!

Be Prepared (Trust Me, You Are Not)

Cherbourg! It's going to be a thing this week. Be prepared to have your world rocked by my Cherbourg coverage. Be prepared to have your mind blown and everything you thought you knew turned on its head.

...I should probably make sure I've watched some of the tournament before I start making large, grandiose, sweeping promises, but hey, I bet you kept reading till the second paragraph!

Cherbourg is a Challenger event, and it is a defending champion that we all know and love in Nicolas Mahut, he who should have been given a wildcard to the Australian Open but who qualified anyway and made it to the second round. (Yes, I'm still harping on that hobby horse.) And he played last night, this Mahut of whom I sing, and he won.

And yes, this makes me happy.

I didn't see the match, but I'm going to talk about like I know what I'm talking about, so be prepared. (I've seen the stats sheet. Surely this is enough!) Mahut played a nasty first set of badness and despair wherein his opponent - qualifier Matwe Middlekoop, if you are a) interested and b) know who that is - pretty much walked all over him. The stats show that Mahut wasn't playing that badly - they're not great stats but they're not awful either - but the real telling one is the return. Middlekoop clearly had that serve cranking and Mahut wasn't reading it, because his return percentage on both first and second serves was not a happy fun joyful return percentage of sunshine and rainbows, if you know what I mean.

So, yeah. Down went Mahut in that first set. Into her mouth went Jodi's heart (or it would have, had I been watching. I was busy doing this thing called 'being asleep'. People are determined to have their tennis tournaments at very inconvenient times of those of us here in the land of Oz). But then what light at yonder window breaks (broke)? Suddenly, Mahut returned much better! Middlekoop returned much worse! And this trend continued until Mahut was winning 89% of points on his first serve in the third set. And, oh yeah, he was serving at 82%, so Middlekoop didn't get much of a look in there.

It highlights a) what a big freaking deal serving and returning is; b) the way that players - even ones you might not usually think of as 'great' - can change gears in the middle of matches; and c) that Jodi is capable of rabbiting on like a crazy person about a match she hasn't seen. (If you are new to this blog, I do this a lot. Be prepared.)

Anyway, it wasn't Mahut's most gloriously stylish win ever, but he got the job done, and a win is a win - no matter what that craptacular study I was talking about yesterday would have you believe.

I'm pretty sure that Mahut faces 'OMG, you killed' Kenny de Schepper in his next match, who came through a tough three setter. I know nothing about de Schepper, so I might just stop here before I start predicting matches I probably won't end up seeing. I'll just say ALLEZ NICO and leave it at that.

Oh, and also - whatever happened to Josselin Ouanna? Remember when he was all Safin-beating third-round-making at Roland Garros? Now he's getting smacked down by Ivo Minar in the first round of Cherbourg. What happened there?

Playing To Survive

So I was idly checking the qualifying scores in Marseille - a tournament very much in my good books at the mo on account of how they have given a wildcard to Nicolas Mahut, which obviously fills me with #wildcardformahut joy - and I was a bit struck by something. Some of the names looked very, very familiar.

'Hmmm,' quoth I, 'where have I seen these people before? Verily, I have seen their names recently!'

And then I remembered. I'd seen them in Challenger draws. Not just any Challenger draws. Draws of Challengers which are still happening.

Let's take Laurent Rochette, for example. He had a win in the first round of qualies for Marseille, a three setter. But just a couple of days ago he was in Quimper, where he made it to the third round, beating Amir Weintraub on the way. Essentially, by playing Marseille qualies, he is playing two tournaments in the same week.

Obviously, if he had gone further in Quimper, he wouldn't be playing Marseille qualies. So many decisions on the satellite tour seem to be so split second. It reminds me of that bit in Amir Weintraub's blog where he goes to Brisbane to play qualies, but then realises he has no hope of getting in, so heads straight back to the airport to head to Noumea. 'Entry lists' just don't even seem to be a thing on the satellite circuit. You just rock up somewhere and hope you have the ranking to get it. Even if that place is on the other side of the world.

And there are always more points to be made. Laurent Rochette, if he had won Quimper, would have got 80 points. He made the quarters, which garners him 15 points. But before the week is even done, he's in the hunt for more points in the Marseille qualies. It's brutal and opportunistic and crazy, but ranking points are everything.

Seriously, when do these guys sleep?

In the most recent installment of his blog (which is here, if you haven't read it), AW talks about how he's been so hungry for ranking points that he's played nine weeks on the trot and is picking up injuries like crazy. And yet, as far as I am aware, he has somehow avoided essentially playing two tournaments in a week like Laurent Rochette. People often mock Caroline Wozniacki for how much tennis she plays. The satellite tour makes her look like she spends her weeks lying about in a hammock. Seriously, they must play so much tennis.

And it can't be good for them, physically. It's nuts. But to quote AW: "All I see in front of my eyes are ranking points, points, points. I realise I no longer play to improve, but instead run and check each time which place in the world ranking some more points will take me to."

It's an uncertain life. You never know where you're going to be, week to week. The only stability - for Weintraub, anyway - is Davis Cup. Everything else is up in the air, up for grabs. Weintraub is right. The crazy points chase that dudes like Laurent Rochette is on isn't playing to improve. It's playing to survive.

Missing Ivan Dodig

Here is a list of facts I know about Ivan Dodig:

1) He is from Croatia.
2) His first name is Ivan.
3) His surname is... wait for it, drumroll please... Dodig.
4) He is humanoid. (Probably. I assume.)
5) He plays tennis.
6) He is pretty good at playing tennis. (I think.)

Seriously, had anyone heard of Ivan Dodig before this year? I have totally never heard of him. The first time he popped into my frame of vision was at the Australian Open this year when he played that epic late night match against Karlovic. I could have stopped by and seen a little bit - I was in Rod Laver Arena that night - the night that Djokovic beat Granollers - and that session finished before this outside court epic.

But I didn't stop by. Me and Ivan Dodig missed each other again.

Dodig lost in the second round of the Australian Open (there is another fact I can add to my list!) which seems pretty unremarkable, until you consider who he lost to. You might have heard of him. His name is Novak Djokovic and he's been doing pretty okay recently.

So okay, in fact, that he only dropped one set in the whole tournament. He played a bunch of awesome guys - Federer, Murray, Berdych. But that one set he lost to was to some guy named Ivan Dodig. Of whom I had never heard.

I didn't see the match. I missed Ivan Dodig. Of course.

But clearly his set-winning was a sign, because Ivan Dodig, of whom I have never heard, just went and won himself a title at Zagreb. He's also got a pretty good 2011 record - he's won seven matches and lost twice, or so the ATP website tells me. And those two losses came to Djokovic at the Australian Open and Berdych in Chennai, so he's not exactly losing to Mickey Mouse opponents here. Ivan Dodig - whoever he is - has very suddenly made the big time.

Zagreb had a couple of local hopes in there who were real chances at the title. Marin Cilic was one. Ivan Ljubicic was another. If either of these dudes had taken out the title, then it wouldn't have been surprising. But this Dodig guy? He's the homegrown hero that no one expected. Because as far as I can tell, he just popped into existence this year.

I wish I could say something more meaningful about him, but you've seen all I know about him in my awesome List of Ivan Dodig Facts. (To which I can add this, courtesy of the ATP website - he is coached by a dude called Martin Stepanek. Any relation, do you think?) What it really proves - once again - is the depth of the field. I think I'm pretty knowledgeable when it comes to, you know, knowing tennis players exist and stuff. Put me in front of a Challenger draw and I'll recognise a bunch of the names. But before this year, Ivan Dodig wouldn't have been one of them. And now he's gone and won not a Challenger title, but a full tour title.

That is a major-ass achievement. There is a whole ton of tennis players out there - very successful ones - who have never won a title. Never come close. Look at Janko Tipsarevic, for example. We all know who he is, but he's never won a title. Same with Potito Starace. Rendy Lu. But this Dodig dude has. He's smashed through the wall that these dudes never have.

And all I can tell you about him is that he is humanoid (probably). Tennis can always surprise you.

100% Top 100

ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ!

If you look at that string of crazy ALLEZs and assume that I am a little bit happy about something, then you would be right. My new best friend Nicolas Mahut has gone and won himself a Challenger title in Courmayeur in stunning style, and I am a little bit pleased about that. Just a little. Not a lot.

ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ!

Okay, so quite pleased.

This win will put him squarely back inside the top hundred - if my calculations are correct, he will jump nearly 30 places and land at about #90. How about that?! He said at the Hopman Cup earlier this year that his goal for this year was to get back inside the top hundred. In the past month, he's jumped about 50 spots to achieve this goal. That is 100% pure awesome.

The real battle, of course, will be staying in the top hundred. Breaking in is one thing, staying in is another. Amir Weintraub could probably write a lot more eloquently about the vagaries of ranking. However, just getting in at all is hard enough - Mahut's been out of it for about two years, what with injury and whatnot. And the fact that he's jumped back in at around #90 (as opposed to #99 or something) gives him a little cushion.

There is no rest for those hungry for ranking points, of course. Mahut's been given a wildcard (it feels oddly satisfying to say those words) to this week's Challenger in Quimper, where he will be the top seed. If he can pull a good result here, he can go even higher in the rankings. And according to a French article I read (or tried to read, given as I don't speak French) it seems likely that he'll be given a wildcard to the ATP tournament in Marseille.

Honestly, all these people jumping late onto the #wildcardformahut bandwagon... I thought of that WEEKS ago. It's raining wildcards!

Also playing in Quimper this week is Amir 'Awesome Writer' Weintraub, and I'm going to try and catch one of his matches if I can. I want to see if his game is mightier than his pen. (Also, Nicolas Mahut should seriously consider giving a column a try. I think he'd have lots of amusing things to say. He seems like that kind of guy.)

The fact that I'm already talking about Quimper shows (yet again) how the satellite tour never sleeps. You win one tournament and already you have to think about the next one. There is no sleep, no rest... just an all consuming quest for rankings points. It's brutal. It is 100% hard to the core.

But for now, let's just say ALLEZ! Nicolas Mahut has gone and won himself a Challenger. And I, for one, think that is pretty awesome indeed.

Worth Watching

This week, I watched my first ever Challenger tennis. I've always known it was out there, sort of in the abstract... you know, out there, existing, but I never thought of watching it. Or even checking the results.

You have Nicolas Mahut to thank for my transformation. With a soupcon of Amir Weintraub, because his column has got me absolutely fascinated with the hardcore life these players live.

The match I watched was an absolute cracker - a Hopman Cup reunion match in Courmayeur between Ruben Bemelmans and my beloved Nico. Mahut ended up winning in a third set tie break. It was engaging and entertaining and generally, the level was pretty damn high. I mean, neither dude is Federer or Nadal, but only two dudes get to be them. It was a good match. I don't think it would have been out of place in a tour level tournament.

Amir Weintraub writes in his column about how playing Australian Open qualies really made him feel like he was on the same level as the guys ranked #100-#200 and how he could really send himself skyrocketing up the rankings, how it was real and tangible and could really happen. But then the next week in Eylat he lost to a guy ranked in the #600s and he got all depressed, because he felt like maybe he wasn't doing as well as he thought.

What this really highlights for me is how good so many guys are, how close. It's a fight for every ranking point on the Challenger and Futures tour because one ranking point can be a big difference. At the top of the game, it wouldn't matter whether Nadal gained a point or lost a point, because he'd still be 3,000 points ahead. On the satellite level... if you gain a point, you could jump quite a lot on the computer.

If Nicolas Mahut wins in Courmayeur, I'm pretty sure he'll go back into the top hundred. I felt pretty gypped on his behalf when I found out he got 45 ranking points for making second round at the Australian Open - I felt like that was barely anything. And then I read Weintraub's column about how happy he was to get eight ranking points just for playing first round qualies - how he played the tournament in Eylat in the hunt for 17 points. 17. It seems like nothing. But it's everything.

And yet the level of these guys, if the Mahut/Bemelmans match is used as an indicator, is not so far off the tour level. It's a very fine line between good enough and not quite there. And it seems to me that there must be a lot of luck involved - as well as talent and skill and tenacity and whatnot - in getting there. Getting into the top hundred, playing on tour level instead of being stuck in the satellite dogfight... everyone works for it, but only a few get lucky.

There's part of me that wants every single guy on this satellite circuit to make it - for their hard work to pay off. The reality is that not every guy is going to make it. Not every guy gets the fairy tale. Some guys are going to be stuck here slogging it out forever, in this world where one ranking point can make you or break you.

But that doesn't mean that they're not awesome tennis players.

Challenger tennis. It's worth watching. For reals.

Going Solo

The Amir Weintraub column has really made me think. (See yesterday's post, if you are all like 'who is this Amir Weintraub of whom you speak?') The difference between life for a player ranked #25 and one ranked #250 is something I found very, very striking. Hence devoting that whole post to it yesterday and stuff.

One thing which I found particularly remarkable and that I thought deserved a little more space was the fact that players on the Challengers and Futures tours generally can't afford to bring their coaches with them. Weintraub notes in his column that some people do travel with huge entourages - sometimes they're top echelon players on their way back, other times guys who are somehow scraping the money together because they are so desperate to succeed - but for most dudes like Weintraub, it's a solo act. He brings his coach with him to a tournament in Israel - where he's from - and even that is a massive financial stretch.

I talked a bit yesterday about the striking link between tennis and money - the top guys earn heaps and never have to think about it, the little guys earn pretty much nothing and are constantly pre-occupied with it as a result - but that's not so much what I want to talk about here. I often say that one of the reasons I love tennis so much is that it's a true gladiatorial battle. Two people walk onto a court, with only their wits and their abilities to recommend them. Two men enter. One man leaves. Welcome to Thunderdome.

In the upper echelons of the game, people travel with massive entourages. Not only do they have coaches, but they have fitness trainers and physiotherapists and all kinds of crazy things - quite apart from their families. But when you get down to the satellite tour, all there are are the players. They might have coaches, but they're not there. They truly are alone.

I don't know if this somehow makes satellite tennis a purer form of the game or whatever, but the court must be a very lonely place for people down there. If you're a top seed playing on Rod Laver Arena or Court Philippe Chatrier or wherever, you might be by yourself on the court, but you've got a whole support team who've carried you there. They're there looking down on you, and even though they can't help you on the court - much as they might try to help you, coaching warnings be damned - you know they're there and that they're there for you. And there's a whole crowd to carry you too.

Let's cross over to the satellite tour. No coach. No player's box. Probably not even a crowd. Just you. You are all you have to depend on.

And in a way, that's kind of awesome. Not that players shouldn't have coaches or coaches should be banned from matches or whatever - nothing crazy like that. I'm not suggesting a revolution. But there's something very appealing to me about the idea that you - your mind, your body, your skills - are literally all you have to depend on.

Which is why on court coaching is such a freaking stupid idea. (Sorry. Had to get that dig in there.)

It must be horribly, horribly hard to be so alone. But in a way, it must be character building too. If you can survive all by yourself on the satellite tour with nothing but yourself to depend on... if and when you make it to the top echelon of the game, you'll be tougher for it. And a player who can throw down when the chips are down, who knows that if they're in a hole, they'll have to dig themselves out of it... that's the makings of a good tennis player, right there.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Wow. Just wow. If you have not Amir Weintraub's column what life is like when you're ranked #270-odd, READ IT NOW. Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four.

When we write about tennis, when we talk about it, when we think about it, we think of it as a rich sport. We think of Federer and Nadal and their massive entourages, of Sharapova and Ivanovic and Wozniacki with their huge endorsement deals... of rich people who got rich by being great at sport and who basically attract money like giant magnets. We see them on red carpets, on billboards, at fashion shows, at soccer matches... modelling Armani, driving in Mercedes Benz cars, wearing Tiffany earrings. And we see them holding aloft massive trophies with massive cheques shoved in their back pockets, and this is normal.

What we don't think about is the guy for whom playing the first round of qualies and picking up eight ranking points and $3000 is a massive, massive achievement.

"In the next few weeks I'm going to tell you about my life, about the life of a pro tennis player, and how it is nothing like you would imagine." This is the first sentence of Amir Weintraub's first column and he is dead on the money. I don't know about you, but this is not how I imagined the life of a professional tennis player.

He writes about getting to Brisbane for his first ever 'big' tournament and then learning he has no hope of getting into the qualies... so turning around, going back to the airport and flying to Noumea for a $75,000 event. So that he can get free accommodation, he has to play singles and doubles (after a night or two crashing on the floor in another player's room). "You need to understand that a big part of the considerations players in our level make have to do with how to save costs," he writes. "Sometimes those considerations exceed the professional considerations."

I'd heard that life was hard on the satellite tour. I didn't know how hard.

He gets injured in his victory in the second round of qualies for this tournament and the doctor and physio tell him not to play today. He replies, "I didn't make all this way from Israel to this hole so someone could tell me whether I'm healthy or not." He plays - injured. He loses second round in both singles and doubles. He doesn't even break even on the whole trip, but, as he says, "what's money in comparison to the chance to earn a few more ranking points?"

To do this - to live the life that Amir Weintraub does - takes guts, chutzpah, dedication and heart. Huge amounts of each. But most of all, it takes a great love for tennis. How much do you have to love a sport to keep living flight to flight, no certainty, no surety, never knowing what will happen next?

And alone, too. "Me, like other players in my status, are a one man industry," he writes. "No family, no coaches, no nothing. I don't want to make it sound like an excuse, but I have too many thoughts about things other than tennis, about the future and about procedures, like flights. In general, flights and flight arrangements occupy about a third of a player's time." I cannot even begin to imagine how intense living in that kind of uncertainty must be.

And why do you do it? For the chance, that one, small, tiny chance, of playing in Slam. Weintraub doesn't even know if he'll make the cut for qualies - he's two spots out - but he's so excited about being an alternate and getting two cans of new balls for practice (instead of three old balls) that it all seems worth it. But damn it, he wants that badge that says 'player' on it - the alternate badge brands him as an outsider.

And he gets it! He's the last player to make the cut for qualies. He gets his player badge and access to all the facilities that go along with it - including a locker next to Andy Roddick's.

He loses in the first round of qualies, but he's pleased with his performance. He's exhilarated by the whole Slam experience. And he's determined to get back next year. "Leaving Australia. Swearing I will do everything, but everything everything, to be back here sometime. This can't be my first and only time." I hope it isn't. Because if you're back in Australia next year, Amir, I am going to come to at least one of your matches - and I'm going to cheer my freaking head off.

Because this dude clearly loves tennis so, so much. Listen to this:

"For the very first time I able to understand what fellow tennis players and friends are talking about when they tell me, 'Come on, Amir. You haven't seen a thing. The day you reach a Slam you'd understand'. Understand why people won't give up their careers, why they are willing to hold on to this dream by their fingernails, why they won't retire even when they know it's over."

Hot damn, Amir Weintraub. You can write. Someone get him a book deal, stat.

He goes on to write about playing a Futures event in Eylat, Israel - which he describes as like leaving a Champion's league game to play a C league one. I won't spoil it for you, because you need to read it yourself. Seriously. AMIR WEINTRAUB. His column. Read it. I cannot emphasis this enough.

It's so easy to forget that under all the glitter of the upper echelons of Slams is this world, where players play week in, week out, where getting one ranking point is huge, where players live or die by tournament cutoffs - to quote Weintraub, "'The Cut' is the term players in my level die by". To get to the top, you usually need to go through this world - but not everyone makes it. Some people stay here, in the dogfight, for their whole careers - Weintraub talks about a guy he once played whom people were saying was destined for the Top 20, but he forgot how to hit a forehand literally overnight and gradually lost all his ranking points. It's a hard life - a demanding, stressful, full-of-pressure life. I think Weintraub says it best when he says this:

"I'm back to the reality where victory is worth one ranking point (how can you move ahead like that? It's like trying to conquer Everest when you're only allowed to take one step every day) and to a financial reality where I spend more money than I make."

And why do this? Why live this life? Why live like this, with all this pressure: "The pressure to get ranking points. The pressure not to mess up in small tournaments, the pressure not to mess up in Davis Cup. The pressure to start and make some money. Pressure." Why do it?

For the love of the game. For the chance to go to a Grand Slam once again. The chance to play the qualies. It's a mountain, one that Amir Weintraub and hundreds other like this are trying to conquer. "Point by point. Game by game," he writes.

And that love - the simple love of tennis - is enough. Enough to keep fighting. And that is something else indeed.

The Foot Of The Mountain

One of the strangest things about the time immediately after a Grand Slam is the fact that there is still tennis going on. There is no quiet time, no downtime... the players who gathered in Melbourne have scattered to all corners of the earth, unable to put their racquets down. Tennis players must feel like they're wearing the fairy tale red shoes sometimes - they just can't stop playing.

Of course, if you're Roger or Rafa or one of the top dudes, you can take a break. But for the little guys, there is none of that. You need the points to claw up the rankings. Every week is another battle. And just because a Slam is over and the whole tennis world is trying to catch its breath doesn't mean that you get the luxury of a break.

No, no, no. You are in Santiago or Zagreb or Johannesburg, trying to win a few rounds and gain some much needed points if you're a little little guy or notch up a tournament win if you're slightly bigger. Or some little guys might be in Courmayeur or Burnie or Kazan playing on the Challenger circuit, trying to grab the win and the valuable points there. And this is what you do, week in, week out.

When you're at the top, you can care about sensible scheduling. When you're not, then every week is another dogfight.

My newfound great love for Nicolas Mahut, he of the awesome hair, means that there'll probably be a lot more of the little guys on this blog - which is a good thing, I think. The little guys need some love. It's easy to be a Fedal fan (which, as you know, I am LIKE WHOA) but when you're not so famous, when you get shunted to the furthest court there is when you manage to qualify for a Slam... you deserve some screentime.

Mahut is the fourth seed in the Challenger in Courmayeur this week, and he had a first round win against Dieter Kindlmann last night in two breakers. Yay! He also jumped fourteen spots in the rankings up to #118 after his second round showing at the Australian Open! Also yay!

I tried to stay up to watch the match - Courmayeur has a livestream - but it didn't, you know, happen. However, I am definitely going to make an effort to watch at least a little of this tournament this week. Challenger tennis is something I don't know much about, and that's something I endeavour to change. Grand Slam tennis may be the pinnacle of the mountain, but Challengers and Futures are all about the climb.

Dropping Eduardo

I'm making it official. I'm dropping someone from my Stars of the Future club. Bye bye, Eduardo Schwank.

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Schwank shot to fame (well, "fame") last year when he won three Challengers on clay in a row and then nearly burned down a hotel and lost all his prize money. He put in the best performance of all the Argentines at Roland Garros, making it to the third round. He had a good couple of months there.

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But he hasn't delivered since then, and the time has come (the walrus said). The other kids in the Stars club have been steadily performing better and better (current concerns re Ernests Gulbis aside). So, bye, Eduardo. Been nice having you.

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Speaking of Challengers, it's always interesting to see who's been winning them, so let's have a look... am glad to see a couple of Aussie boys on the list, with Brydan Klein and Bernard Tomic winning a couple early one (but I did discuss those at the time... ad nauseam, I do believe.) No one is standing out as someone that is winning a whole pile, but Benjamin Becker is one that's popped up a few times (aka Becker-no-relation.) Andreas Beck is on the list as well. And the French wizard, Fabrice Santoro won one last week. Which is nice for him.

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Other overnight winners include the elusive Mikhail Youzhny, who seems to pop up whenever it suits him, and Gaston Gaudio, whom I have not seen around for some time. (What's up with that? I thought he was gone for good.) But we had some bad losses as well... Marat Safin, Guillermo Canas and, yes, Eduardo Schwank, I'm looking at you.

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Today's Results

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Barcelona Open Banco Sabadell (Barcelona)

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David Ferrer def. Mikahil Kukushkin, 6-3 3-6 6-1

Igor Andreev def. Alberto Martin, 6-2 6-2

Radek Stepanek def. Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, 6-4 2-6 6-4

Robin Soderling def. Teimuraz Gabashvili, 6-1 6-4

Feliciano Lopez def. Jarkko Nieminen, 6-2 6-1

Daniel Gimeno-Traver def. Fabio Fognini, 6-1 6-3

Oscar Hernandez def. Eduardo Schwank, 6-2 6-4

Arnaud Clement def. Guillermo Canas, 7-6 (7-0) 6-3

Gaston Gaudio def. Diego Junqueira, 6-4 3-6 6-4

Juan Monaco def. Marat Safin, 6-4 6-1

Richard Gasquet def. Jan Hernych, 4-6 6-3 6-2

Nicolas Lapentti def. Paul-Henri Mathieu, 6-4 2-6 6-2

Mikhail Youzhny def. Viktor Troicki, 6-7 (5-7) 7-6 (8-6) 6-4

Boys Light Up

There's tennis going on all over the world right now - in Dubai, in Acapulco, in Delray Beach - but there's another tournament going on that no one's really going to write about, and it's in my own country, so I think that makes it my duty.

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That, of course, would be the Maccabi Men's Challenger in East Bentleigh. It may only be a Challenger, but I think it offers some signs of hope for the future - how often do you see four Aussie blokes in the semis of a tournament, even one of the satellites? Sure, it is on home soil, but I'm not sure how much I believe in the home court advantage in tennis... it's not like cricket or football or anything like that, where you can legitimately know the way a stadium plays better than your opposition. So, good on you, Aussie boys - it's going to be an Aussie holding up the trophy for sure!

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The four we have to choose from are Colin Ebelthite (winner of the December Showdown), Marinko Matosevic (who shares a birthday with Roger Federer), Brydan Klein (newest member of the Davis Cup team) and Bernard Tomic (boy wonder). Ebelthite and Matosevic are one semi, then the blockbuster, one would imagine, would be Klein and Tomic in the other, Australian Open junior champs from '07 and '08 going head to head. That should be an absolute corker.

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Who do I want to win? Well, to tell the truth, I don't much mind. It'd be good to see Klein go well so he has a big lead-in to Davis Cup next week... Ebelthite's been round for a while and could use some love... I don't know a whole lot about Matosevic but he's definitely on the up and up... and I always pull for Tomic, as you all know. But it's just so great to see Aussie boys doing so well, even if it is 'just' a Challenger. Tennis drought my foot. We've got some good boys - and even if they aren't #1, they doesn't mean we can't still be very proud of them.

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Today's Results

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Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships (Dubai)

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Novak Djokovic def. Gilles Simon, 3-6 7-5 7-5

David Ferrer def. Richard Gasquet, 6-2 6-2

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Abierto Mexicano Telcel (Acapulco)

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Men's Draw

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Gael Monfils def. Leonardo Mayer, 6-3 6-7 (4-7) 4-1 retired

Jose Acasuso def. Tommy Robredo, 7-5 6-2

Nicolas Almagro def. Daniel Gimeno-Traver, 6-2 7-6 (7-2)

Martin Vassallo Arguello def. Daniel Koellerer, 6-3 7-6 (8-6)

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Women's Draw

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Flavia Pennetta def. Iveta Benesova, 6-3 6-3

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Delray Beach International Tennis Championships (Delray Beach)

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Jeremy Chardy def. Marcos Baghdatis, 7-6 (9-7) 7-6 (7-3)

Christophe Rochus def. Stefan Koubek, 6-3 7-6 (8-6)

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PS. Another gratuitous spruik for my other blog, The Black Valentine's Day Manifesto - http://blackvalentinemanifesto.wordpress.com. It has nothing to do with tennis - it's more about ... well, being 23 and living in Canberra, I suppose. So if you've ever wondered what I do when I'm not writing Tennis From The Backseat or crying over Roger Federer matches (a question which I'm sure has kept you awake at night) please check it out!

The World Below The Surface

It's rather hard to write about tennis when there's no tennis to write about. I'm going to have to think about how to manage Tennis From The Backseat while we're in the off-season - it seems a little extravagant to write about tennis every day when there's no tennis to write about! But the blog will keep going strong into the New Year, bringing us back to where we started - the Australian tennis summer, my favourite swing of the tour (for obvious reasons.)

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Tennis Australia has also realised the dearth of stuff to write about now everyone's on holiday - but instead of writing about the Davis Cup final like normal people, they've done a list of how the Australians have been doing this week. No one's been playing on any of the major tours, but in Challengers and stuff there've been quite a few active. Let's have a look at the men's singles highlights (this list had no women on it anywhere. Are there just no women's events this week? We don't suck that badly.)

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*Chris Guccione reached the semifinal at the ATP Challenger event in Jersey, Great Britain.

*Carsten Ball was a quarterfinalist at the ATP Challenger event in Champaign, USA.

*Steven Goh qualified and reached the quarterfinal at the ITF Futures event in Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia.

*Zachary Van Min qualified at the ITF Futures event in Queretaro, Mexico.

*Matt Reid reached the quarterfinal at the ITF Futures event in Honolulu, USA.

*Isaac Frost qualified at the ITF Futures event in Honolulu, USA.

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Reading lists like these, it makes you realise just how hard tennis is, particularly for the kids starting out. There's this whole tennis pantheon of celebrities - your Federers and Nadals and Safins and so forth - but underneath it all is this seething mass of people dying for a chance. Chris Guccione is ranked in the top hundred and he's still losing in Challenger events. That top echelon is really pretty damn small, when you think about it. Imagine if you play all your life and you get to about #200. Out of three billion or so people, #200 is pretty damn good - but in tennis terms, that's nothing of anything. Some minor Challenger or Futures victories, maybe... a lifetime on the pro circuit. You're good, but not quite good enough.

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Tennis isn't like music - it's not like lurking down in the #300s is some brilliant player who simply has to be discovered and will shoot straight to #1, winning umpteen Aria awards or whatever along the way. The guys in the top echelon are genuinely the best - because they beat everyone else. If there's one thing you can say about tennis, it's that the people at the top genuinely deserve to be there. (Except maybe Djokovic. Because I don't like him. The last two years have been a massive fluke, mark my words.) It must be so incredibly tough to be one of the little guys, schlepping away in Challengers and Futures, knowing that there is no quick fix. There's only hard work, a lot of it - and even then, you might not still be good enough. The guys ahead of you are just that little bit more talented, have those few extra shots... and though you can get a long way by hard work, sometimes it's just not enough.

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Taking that into consideration, it's amazing that the guys at the top aren't total tosspots with egos the size of Mt Isa (apparently the biggest city in the world in terms of space. Just so my imagery makes sense.) They are the best of the best of the best - because there are a whole lotta tennis players, and they've beaten them all. So congratulations, Roger and Rafa, for being genuinely nice guys.

The Hidden Circuit

One of the lead stories on the Tennis Australia website today is that Monique Adamczak and Nick Lindahl (both young Australian players, for those of you who don't know the names) have won events on the '2008-09 Pro Circuit.' Now, I'm mystified. What on earth is this so-called Pro Circuit?

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Adamczak and Lindahl are not very highly ranked players - Adamczak is somewhere in the late #100s and Lindahl in the #200s, so presumably this Pro Circuit is not especially prestigious. The tournament that they won the men's and women's singles in was in Rockhampton, so it's hardly a travel-around-the-world international affair. Oh, wait - I've found a page on Tennis Australia about it. It says:

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'The tennis Pro Circuit is a series of international entry level events onto the professional tour. These events provide an opportunity for players to earn their first world ranking points, which is a players' livelihood as a professional player. The tennis Pro Circuit is a vital step for all tennis players as they embark on professional careers. Positioned as a bridge between junior events and the elite WTA and ATP tournaments the circuit, it is the breeding ground for future champions.'

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That makes sense, I suppose - but surely Monique Adamczak is a bit past that stage? She's played in Slams - surely she should be playing ITF events... her ranking is high enough to get into most of those, yeah? She's professional, not jumping the gap between the two - though looking at her profile, she hasn't been playing much tennis, either at WTA or ITF level. She's made it to some semi-finals, but that's about it. She was born in 1983 and turned pro in 1998, by the looks of it... she's had some career success on the ITF circuit with four title but not that much recently - and now she's back playing on the Pro Circuit. She was the top seed in Rockhampton.

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That's really a bit demoralising, but well done Monique Adamczak, nonetheless.

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Nick Lindahl is a bit of a different story... I remember him playing in juniors a couple of years back, and he was no Tomic, but he was pretty good. I haven't really seen him since - the ATP has no record of him turning pro, though presumably he did, because he played quarter finals in a Challenger event... do you have to be a professional to play Challengers? Maybe you don't. He was the second seed in the event at Rockhampton.

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It's funny, isn't it, to actually see the evidence of the work that players do to get to the top? You sort of assume they have to work their way up, but I've never really thought about how they did that. It'd be the rare junior that jumped straight onto the ATP or WTA circuit - I suppose, in recent memory, Alize Cornet has done it, and maybe Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, but let's have a look at recent junior Slam winners for boys, and see where they are now. In 2007, Donald Young won the US Open for boys, and in 2006 Thiemo de Bakker won junior Wimbledon, but we have to go back to 2005 before we start getting any really familiar names - the champions that year were Young, Marin Cilic, Jeremy Chardy and Ryan Sweeting. That was 2005, and now we're in 2008, and if we take Cilic as our example case, it has taken him about three years to be a regular on the ATP circuit. He didn't even qualify for the US Open last year.

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So where was Marin in these few years? Playing Challengers and Futures, no doubt, but maybe he was hanging about on the Pro Circuit too. So maybe I should pay more attention to this hitherto unheard-of circuit... perhaps I can claim I saw the next Roger Federer play before he was famous!

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Today's Results

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TOE Life Ceramics Guangzhou International Women's Open (Guangzhou)

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Olga Govortsova def. Yan Zi, 6-3 6-2

Mariya Koryttseva def. Akgul Amanmuradova, 6-4 6-4

Karin Knapp def. Zhang Shuai, 7-6 (8-6) 1-6 6-1

Alla Kudryavtseva def. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 6-4 4-6 6-3

Ioana Raluca Olaru def. Aniko Kapros, 6-7 (5-7) 6-4 6-1

Lu Jingjing def. Ekaterina Dzehalevich, 7-6 (7-4) 6-2

Waiting In The Wings

Have you heard of Jeremy Chardy? Because I haven't. And you know why? He's ranked #145 in the world. Even people like me who follow tennis closely don't normally follow it that closely.

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And yet today Jeremy Chardy, of whom no one has heard, took out David Nalbandian. Heard of him? I have. #6 seed. Argentine #1. Rival of Federer throughout their junior days - a rivalry that continues today, to an extent. Winner of the Tennis Masters Cup in 2005 and two consecutive Masters Series events at the end of last year.

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Surprised? I was.

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If there's one thing I've learned from this year's Roland Garros - and, indeed, the claycourt season - is that I should be paying attention to the Challenger circuit (and probably the Futures circuit as well.) I've already written a bit about Eduardo Schwank (who is Argentina's best hope in the draw now!) Thomaz Bellucci was pretty impressive against Nadal in the first round, even though he got beaten. Ernests Gulbis, the young Latvian kid, beat James Blake today. And now Chardy... there is some interesting stuff going on in those lower rankings. I wouldn't say that Roland Garros has been a fiesta of upsets or anything - though Schwank, Gulbis and Chardy certainly pulled them! - but there have been a few guys that I think are going to be good in a year or two. REALLY good.

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A disappointing result for Nalbandian, though I can't bring myself to be too sad. I'm hardly his biggest fan. I think a lot of his wins and defeats are in his head. He has this Jekyll and Hyde thing going on. It's like there are two Nalbandians - GoodDave and LameDave. I only caught a bit of the Chardy match, but it looked like LameDave showed up big time in the third set. I wouldn't call Nalbandian inconsistent exactly - LameDave wins sometimes, though he's got nothing on GoodDave, who beats Federer twice in three weeks - but the continual presence of LameDave has to be a worry for him.

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What is going to be really interesting is to see who makes it through that quarter. Everyone was talking about the potential Nadal/Nalbandian quarterfinal, because even though Roland Garros is Rafa's playground, he's never beaten Nalbandian (GoodDave or LameDave.) But it is not going to come to pass. Our options now are Murray, Chardy, Tursunov or Almagro. Now, I suppose I can't count Chardy out... but I'm going to. I think we're looking at a Tursunov/Almagro fourth round - Murray's good, but I don't think he's going to be able to touch Almagro on clay. Sentimentally, I'd like Tursunov to come out on top, as he is my second favourite after Federer and all, but I think Almagro might be our quarterfinalist there. Rafa will take him out - there's pretty much no doubt in my mind, unless something dire happens - but I think Almagro will push him a bit. He's a real claycourt player - I think he's won Valencia twice? Correct me if I'm wrong.

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Speaking of Nadal, he put a beating on Nicolas Devilder today... who never even came close to pulling a Chardy. He did well in the first set, but after that, Nadal destroyed him. Federer did a similar thing, though he actually lost a rain-interrupted first set against Albert Montanes in a breaker... but when it was time for the second set, the Fed amped it up and went all destructo.

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I know there'll probably be some 'mon dieu! Federer has lost his touch!' media attention because of the whole first set loss and all, but, like Sharapova yesterday, I don't think it'll hurt him too much. Considering it's been a rainy Roland Garros, it's probably a good thing for him to get in some extra practice on the super-soft wet clay. And playing ten games odd in the rain can't have been much fun! After the first set - which was tight - Federer played very well. I'm happy with his progress! He plays Ancic in the next round, which is being billed (justifiably) as 'potentially tricky' but I think he's going to do just fine... especially if he can keep his first serve percentage up there!

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On the women's side (only a little bit on them today. I talked much too much about them yesterday!) Casey Dellacqua won again, in what must have been a much easier match against Nathalie Dechy. She comes up against Carla Suarez Navarro in the next round, and it'd be great to see her make a run to the round of sixteen again, to prove the Australian Open wasn't a fluke! I don't think Australia has a prayer of winning the French this year in anything, but if someone's going to go deep, it's going to be her. I was surprised to see Hewitt take out Fish, but David Ferrer is going to cane him in the next round. In my humble opinion, anyway... and judging by the beatdown Ferru laid on Santoro yesterday, my opinion might be grounded in fact...

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I was glad to see Alize Cornet win as well - I have my eye on her as a bit of a star of the future, and I REALLY like the way she plays. Same with Dinara Safina, though it was a shame her big brother Marat went out to Davydenko. I think the upset of the day was probably Anna Chakvetadze - the #6 seed, much like Nalbandian - going down to Kaia Kanepi. Mauresmo went down too... I don't think Amelie's really ever going to have much impact in Paris, to tell the truth, which is sad for her. Kirilenko also got knocked out... but so did Andreev, so they can console each other and stuff, I guess!

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And, finally, congratulations to my man Stan Wawrinka, who won his match in straights. With Richou out of the draw, I think we might be looking at an all Swiss quarter... when I would obviously have to abandon cheering for Stan because of extreme Federer adoration. But I would love to see him get that far! And speaking of Swiss players, Timea Bacsinszky is going to be one worth keeping an eye on. She went out to Patty Schnyder (from Switzerland, surprise surpise) yesterday, but I think she's going to be great. She and Cornet, my other up-and-comer on the women's side, are playing doubles together and I'd love to see them go deep. They won their first round match against Navratilova (Gabriela, not Martina!) and Paszek... so here's hoping my pick of the teens comes up trumps! Although they might be facing the Bondarenko sisters in the next round... but if Chardy can take out Nalbandian, who knows what might happen in the women's doubles?

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Roland Garros Results - Day #5

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Men's Draw

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Roger Federer def. Albert Montanes, 6-7 (5-7) 6-1 6-0 6-4

Rafael Nadal def. Nicolas Devilder, 6-4 6-0 6-1

David Ferrer def. Fabrice Santoro, 6-0 6-1 6-0

Gael Monfils def. Luis Horna, 7-6 (7-5) 6-4 7-5

Nikolay Davydenko def. Marat Safin, 7-6 (7-4) 6-2 6-2

Ernests Gulbis def. James Blake, 7-6 (7-2) 3-6 7-5 6-3

Lleyton Hewitt def. Mardy Fish, 6-4 6-3 6-2

Jeremy Chardy def. David Nalbandian, 3-6 4-6 6-2 6-1 6-2

Tommy Robredo def. Marc Gicquel, 6-7 (7-9) 6-4 6-4 6-4

Mikhail Youzhny def. Maximo Gonzalez, 6-3 6-2 6-2

Fernando Gonzalez def. Pablo Andujar, 7-5 6-0 6-7 (4-7) 7-6 (7-3)

Radek Stepanek def. Jiri Vanek, 6-1 6-0 6-7 (7-9) 6-3

Jarkko Nieminen def. Martin Vassallo Arguello, 7-5 6-1 3-6 7-6 (7-2)

Robby Ginepri def. Igor Andreev, 4-6 6-2 7-6 (7-5) 6-2

Dmitry Tursunov def. Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, 7-6 (7-4) 6-0 6-0

Nicolas Lapentti def. Bobby Reynolds, 7-5 6-4 5-7 7-5

Mario Ancic def. David Marrero, 4-6 6-0 6-3 6-2

Jurgen Melzer def. Marcos Daniel, 4-6 6-3 2-6 6-3 6-4

Ivan Ljubicic def. Diego Jungueira, 6-3 6-4 6-2

Robin Soderling def. Paul Capdeville, 6-3 6-2 6-4

Stanislas Wawrinka def. Marin Cilic, 7-6 (7-3) 7-6 (7-4) 6-1

Fernando Verdasco def. Juan Ignacio Chela, 7-5 4-6 6-3 7-5

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Women's Draw

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Venus Williams def. Selima Sfar, 6-2 6-4

Carla Suarez Navarro def. Amelie Mauresmo, 6-3 6-4

Alize Cornet def. Gisela Dulko, 6-0 4-6 6-4

Jelena Jankovic def. Marina Erakovic, 6-2 7-6 (7-5)

Svetlana Kuznetsova def. Vania King, 6-4 6-2

Casey Dellacqua def. Nathalie Dechy, 6-4 6-2

Elena Dementieva def. Marta Domachowska, 6-1 6-4

Karin Knapp def. Olivia Sanchez, 6-2 7-6 (7-4)

Flavia Pennetta def. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 3-6 6-1 6-1

Aleksandra Wozniak def. Akgul Amanmuradova, 1-6 6-1 6-3

Victoria Azarenka def. Sorana-Mihaela Cirstea, 6-0 6-0

Iveta Benesova def. Shuai Peng, 6-4 6-3

Dominika Cibulkova def. Milagros Seguera, 6-3 6-0

Olga Govortsova def. Ai Sugiyama, 6-0 7-5

Petra Kvitiva def. Samantha Stosur, 6-2 6-1

Agnes Szavay def. Sabine Lisicki, 7-6 (7-3) 6-3

Kaia Kanepi def. Anna Chakvetadze, 6-4 7-6 (7-2)

Francesca Schiavone def. Sanda Mamic, 6-3 6-0

Jie Zheng def. Maria Kirilenko, 4-6 6-3 6-2

Anabel Medina Garrigues def. Tsvetana Pironkova, 4-6 6-3 6-1

Petra Cetkovska def. Galina Voskoboeva, 7-5 6-3

Dinara Safina def. Magdalena Rybarikova, 6-0 6-1

Katarina Srebotnik def. Ekaterina Makarova, 6-0 7-5

The Kuerten Falls for Guga, or; the Tennis Pun So Bad It Cannot Be Denied

So much for my weekly roundup of tennis, huh? I guess that was being a little ambitious. After the Australian tennis summer, I'm always subconsciously convinced that the world will realise just how exciting tennis is and everyone will still be into it. But it never happens. Everyone forgets.

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Actually, on a sort of tangent, I realised how little people know about tennis at the Australian Open this year when I was watching Rafael Nadal practice with Carlos Moya. 'Who's that practicing with Nadal?' I heard someone ask. 'It must be his dad,' someone else replied. I cringed. What is the point, I asked myself, of coming to an event like the Open when you recognise two, maybe three of the players? I mean, if it was Jarkko Nieminen or Sam Querrey or Philipp Kohlschreiber or someone practicing and they didn't know who they were, I'd get that - none of them are that famous - but Carlos Moya? Come on. He won a Slam (albeit in 1998, but still), was ranked #1 in the world and is, as one of my friends might say, a stone cold fox.

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Speaking of Carlos, he lost at Roland Garros yesterday. I like him quite a lot, and I was very sad. This brings me back to the reason I've revived the ol' backseat tennis blog - we are, once again, in Grand Slam territory. Roland Garros, the French Open - which is, in many respects, the most interesting Slam of the year - has once again begun.

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And, as I was saying, unfortunately, Carlos Moya, who won this tournament ten years ago, lost in the first round to Eduardo Schwank... who is really an interesting character in and of himself. I'd never heard of him until there was that hotel fire in Paris (that he started, apparently) and his prize winnings from one of the Challengers he'd just won went up in smoke. I must admit, my first thought was that that was a bit dodgy, because who pays in cash? but I suppose Challenger tournaments might have different standards. So yeah, he's never won anything before - this is his first ever Grand Slam match, if you don't include the qualies he played - and suddenly he wins three Challengers in a row. (Cremona, Rome and Bordeaux apparently.) And now he's beating Carlos Moya, who is a great player and seeded at the tournament... maybe he's going to pull a Marcos/Jo-Wilfried. Actually, if Marcel Granollers-Pujol wins his first round match against Michael Berrer, they'll face each other, and that could be interesting - Granollers ain't no slouch on clay, as he showed at the Houston tournament. Schwank is in the Djokovic quarter of the second half of the draw, along with Canas, Blake and Baghdatis... it'll be interesting to see how far he can go.

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Actually, speaking of Challenger events, the whole Schwank story led me to looking at who has been winning the Challengers this year... I'd always assumed it was, like, this lower echelon of players that no one ever hears of, but a lot of them are top hundred - sometimes even top fifty. Ivan Ljubicic won a Challenger this year. Ivan Ljubicic, who used to be #3 in the world not that long ago, and who is seeded at Roland Garros. Seeded #27 or #28 or something, sure, but seeded. Who knew Challengers drew such good players? It makes me wonder what the Futures circuit is like. Are there people there that I've heard of as well? I had this image in my head of Challengers being people ranked down to about #500, and then Futures being #500-#1000ish (not that I ever thought it through). However, the standard is obviously a lot higher. I wonder how many of those top thirty, fifty players ever play a Challenger?

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The real story of the first Sunday of Roland Garros, however, was obviously the emotional retirement of Gustavo Kuerten. (There is a really nice article in this month's DEUCE magazine, which does him much more justice than I can do here.) It was hardly surprising - and really, logistically speaking, everyone knew he wasn't going to get better after his hip surgery, and he really did draw this out A LOT - but it was still very sad. I wasn't really into tennis during the Guga years, but I still remember his three Roland Garros victories... him drawing the heart on the court in 2001 (or was it 2000?) and that great takedown of Sergi Bruguera in 1997. His run to the final that year was very Baghdatis-esque, with one change - Federer took Baghdatis out, much as Djokovic took Tsonga out this year, but Guga took out Bruguera, and he did it EASY. He was one of those instant superstar players that we haven't seen for a while... not since Nadal, really, when he won Roland Garros in 2005. And even then, Rafa was still seeded #6 or something, and I think he'd just won 5 clay court titles in a row, so it wasn't like it was totally unexpected. Guga came pretty much from nowhere. Don't quote me on this, but I think he was the lowest ranked player to win a Slam since Edmondson in Australia in '76. So that's some achievement right there.

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And Guga was a good fun player as well. He was deceptively harmless looking... all thin and lanky, with that mop of funny hair, but if you gave him an inch, he'd wipe you off the court. And he was always so smiley. I like a good smiley tennis player. The more I think about it, Guga really is a prototype for Marcos Baghdatis - except that Guga made it to #1 and stayed there for a while, whereas Marcos made it to the final of the AO '06 and has been drifting round the top 20 ever since, but has hardly made huge waves. Not that anyone would ever expect the Baghdatises of the world to dethrone the Federers, but Guga's success is still proportionately much greater, I think.

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So, farewell, Guga. It is sad to see you go... even if it has been coming for a long time.

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Roland Garros Results - Day One

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Men's Draw

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Paul-Henri Mathieu def. Gustavo Kuerten, 6-3 6-4 6-2

Novak Djokovic def. Denis Gremelmayr, 4-6 6-3 7-5 6-2

David Nalbandian def. Carlos Berlocq, 6-2 6-4 6-1

Andy Murray def. Jonathan Eyserric, 6-2 1-6 4-6 6-0 6-2

James Blake def. Rainer Schuettler, 6-4 6-1 7-6 (7-3)

Nicolas Lapentti def. Janko Tipsarevic, 6-4 4-6 6-1 7-6 (9-7)

Juan Martin Del Potro def. Josselin Ouanna, 6-3 6-2 6-3

Eduardo Schwank def. Carlos Moya, 7-6 (7-4) 6-2 6-7 (1-7) 4-6 6-3

Sebastian Decoud def. Olivier Rochus, 3-6 6-4 6-3 6-7 (8-10) 6-1

Jose Acasuso def. Dominik Hrbaty, 6-4 6-2 6-4

Maximo Gonzalez def. Roko Karanusic, 6-3 7-5 4-6 3-6 6-2

Jeremy Chardy def. Frederico Gil, 6-3 6-2 7-6 (7-1)

Nicolas Almagro def. Boris Pashanski, 6-4 7-5 6-1

Ernests Gulbis def. Simon Greul, 6-4 6-0 6-4

Miguel Angel Lopez Jaen def. Frank Dancevic, 7-6 (8-6) 3-6 7-5 7-6 (7-2)

*

*

Women's Draw

*

Alize Cornet def. Julia Vakulenko, 7-5 6-4

Ana Ivanovic def. Sofia Arvidsson, 6-2 7-5

Serena Williams def. Ashley Harkleroad, 6-2 6-1

Klara Zakapalova def. Virginie Razzano, 4-6 6-3 6-2

Mathilde Johansson def. Camille Pin, 6-4 4-6 6-2

Iveta Benesova def. Nicole Vaidisova, 7-6 (7-2) 6-1

Nathalie Dechy def. Julie Ditty, 7-5 7-6 (7-3)

Caroline Wozniacki def. Yvonne Meusburger, 6-0 6-2

Dominika Cibulkova def. Angelique Kerber, 6-2 6-2

Lucie Safarova def. Sandra Kloesel, 6-1 6-1

Anastasiya Yakimova def. Hsieh Su-wei, 6-7 (4-7) 7-5 6-4

Selima Sfar def. Stephanie Dubois, 7-5 6-2

Galina Voskoboeva def. Youlia Fedossova, 6-0 6-7 (4-7) 6-1

Milagros Seguera def. Lilia Osterloh, 7-6 (7-5) 7-5

Ekaterina Makarova def. Catalina Castano, 7-5 6-1