Tennis Discussion Thread

(05-06-2018 19:35 )snookered Wrote:  

(05-06-2018 13:16 )circles_o_o_o Wrote:  This seems a strange situation with the rankings, for Alexander Zverev. He is number 2 seed here, and the World number 3, yet this is the first time he has ever made it to a quarter-final at a major tournament.

He does well in a lot of ATP tour events over 3 set matches which wins him a lot of ranking points. His record at majors though is not so good as you so rightly eluded to

I remember on the WTA that Dinara Safina reached number one in the world without ever winning a Grand Slam event. Similar to Zverev she won lots of tour tournaments and the points that go with it. Same with Simona Halep. She's seeded one at Roland Garros but has never won a slam title. Also number 1 ranked in the world above Muguruza and Wozniacki who've won slam tournaments.

Sharapova has been mugged 6-2, 6-1 by Muguruza

Halep beat Stephens in 3 sets to win her first Major

^^ I won £30 with a correct bet of Halep to win by 2 sets to one.

I'm tempted to place another bet for the men's final tomorrow. The safe bet would seem to be on the match going to at least four sets. A slightly riskier way to achieve that result would be Nadal winning by 3-1. If Schwartzman was able to take a set off Nadal in the QF then surely Thiem can. I just don't see Nadal losing in best of five sets on clay.

Nadal won an 11th French Open title in straight sets.

Nadal must be hot favourite for Wimbledon

(10-06-2018 21:26 )babelover48 Wrote:  Nadal must be hot favourite for Wimbledon

I don't think so.

While Nadal's near invincibility on clay was proven yet again with today's straight sets demolition of Thiem and of course we say many congratulations to the Spaniard on an 11th French Open, his record on grass in recent years is very poor.

Nadal hasn't reached the Wimbledon final since 2011 and hasn't progressed beyond the fourth round at SW19 in the last six tournaments. These appearances include one first round loss (2013), two second round losses (2012 and 2015), two fourth round losses (2014 and 2017) and one year where he was absent altogether because of injury (2016). There remain serious doubts about his movement on grass. A good result for Rafa at Wimbledon would be to make the quarter finals which would be some achievement given his fragility on the surface in recent years.

Realistically, there are better players than and too many dangerous opponents for Nadal on grass. I think Federer is still the hot favourite for Wimbledon assuming he's fit, and he'll probably continue dominating it for as long as he wants to, in a similar vein to how Nadal dominates Roland Garros. Then there's players like Cilic and Dimitrov who are more accustomed to success in recent years on the green turf. We assume Murray's coming back too and if Djokovic can get his head together, he's not far away from the level he was at when he was mopping up practically everything a few years back.

That's a long list of players who are probably ahead of Nadal right now at Wimbledon.

I'd say Nadal is the favourite to win Wimbledon, Federer is nearly 37, Djokovic and Murray are all over the place atm, and the new generation are bang average

Maybe this is Cillic's or Del Potro's best chance of winning it as they are the best of the rest imo, Dimitrov has to be the most overrated player ever, he will probably get to the final or win it now i said that

Jo Konta is through to WTA Nottingham final to play Ashley Barty. Dan Evans, continuing his comeback is though to the final at the ATP Challenger event also at Nottingham where he faces Alex de Minuar.

Heather Watson is in the final of the doubles event at WTA Nottingham with partner Michaela Buzarnescu where they play Abigail Spears and Alicja Rosolska

nice to see Heather in a final bee a good prep for Eastbourne