Daniel Evans. David Rice. Joshua Milton. Tim Hewitt.
Qualies:
Scott Sears.
Evans hasn't played on clay for ages. He is obviously a major force on indoors, but he has said that he likes clay, so let's hope that he will do well here. Loads of easy points on offer - an opportunity he should grab with both hands.
Rice is good on clay (he defeated Eysseric on clay last year ), so he has a good chance of ensuring a direct entry into Wimbly.
Josh Milton is more of a hard court specialist, but he defends very little in this period, so he is another one who will be going for a direct entry into Wimbly.
Ratty wrote: It would be very odd if Rice is a good clay court player. He is a net rusher with very flat ground strokes in the Max Mirnyi mould.
That's strange.
Some of the stuff he has done on clay is pretty special -
Beat Jon Eysseric. Dragged Klizan to three sets. Took Marcin Gawron to three sets. Won a G2 doubles title.
Mind it, I'm posting stuff based purely on results. Number don't always tell the story. Thanks for the game descriptions!
Scott Sears is of course... Nigel's son.
Maybe Rice's success on clay in the past is because his opponents weren't used to facing a net-rusher on clay. They could have been expecting to be involved in long baseline rallies rather than having to keep coming up with passing shots. As Henman showed in 2004 at Roland Garros and at Monte Carlo in 2002, you can have success on clay as a net-rusher if you mix it up well enough to unsettle the clay-courter specialists.
If you have a really big serve you can also succeed on clay as guys like Ljubicic, Ancic and Karlovic showed last year. They all hit the ball fairly flat but produced some phenomenal serving performances. Ancic and Karlovic in particular, attacked the net with great success in Rome and Hamburg (possibly the slowest clay on the tour !)
Ratty wrote: Milton on the other hand can grind away for hours from the back of the court with lots of spin.
Evans is an all courter with a lot of flair.
Sears ... mmm that name rings a bell!!! I wonder ......
Sounds like Milton should have a good chance of doing well. From what I've heard, Evans is a great ball-striker and has a wonderful single-handed backhand to watch but he doesn't currently have enough power to make inroads in the men's game. What would you say Ratty ?
Have you seen Sean Thornley play at all, if so what's he like ? He's currently training in Spain and playing some futures there...do you think his game will be suited to the clay ?