Week 34 - US Open Qualifying - 2008.

Yorkie · Lower Club Player

RE: Week 34 - US Open Qualifying - 2008.

Sheddie · administrator

(1) I don't see the point of bashing one of our best players out there after losing 1 qualies match at the USO. Is there any need to post that he's overranked, will never make top 100/top 200 ????? what is the point ??? Especially after just 1 loss.

Personally I reckon he has a good chance but time will tell whether he does or doesn't. Players who read this site (and there are a lot) get p*ssed off by posts like this

Most of you guys are posting this without having ever seen the guy play, so what are you really going by ?

A lot of people said Jamie Baker would never make top 400, he made top 200 and could go further...just shows what work ethic and drive can do

Sheddie · administrator

Yorkie wrote:

Everyone has off days i agree, but a really good example is a loss to Matt Illingworth in April 7-6 6-4 (i mean no disrespect to Illingworth)

not only was this loss just one week after beating Illingworth in straight sets, but can you Honestly see players like Ward, Bloomers, Baker, Goodall or Boggo losing even a set to someone like Illingworth let alone the match. It just wouldn't happen! it really wouldn't.

thats why i don't rate Slabba quite as highly as some of the other Brits

Yorkie, never make statements like that without knowing the full story behind a result

Alex had a raging fever that week.....have you ever played a match with a temperature of 100 degrees ?? Probably not...imagine it.......he spent most of the week in bed, just got up to play the match....hardly good preparation against a very dogged, consistent opponent, could hardly serve or move.

Around the same time James Ward lost a match to Marcus Fugate, an American ranked 630ish in the world. It was 6-3, 7-6. You could say, could you see Boggo, Goodall, Slabba, Bloomers or Baker losing a set to Fugate and so therefore Ward is overranked......

but that would be daft because players have off days....Ward could have been ill, struggling with the heat, his opponent might have been a mighty server who just managed to string it together that day or he just made too many errors that day - we don't know.........doesn't mean he's overranked

Salmon · Tennis legend

Exactly the last point. Fugate serves over 130 on a regular basis.

Drew · Aug 21, 2008

The Shedman wrote:

(1) I don't see the point of bashing one of our best players out there after losing 1 qualies match at the USO. Is there any need to post that he's overranked, will never make top 100/top 200 ????? what is the point ??? Especially after just 1 loss.

Personally I reckon he has a good chance but time will tell whether he does or doesn't. Players who read this site (and there are a lot) get p*ssed off by posts like this

Most of you guys are posting this without having ever seen the guy play, so what are you really going by ?

A lot of people said Jamie Baker would never make top 400, he made top 200 and could go further...just shows what work ethic and drive can do

I agree.

Well done to Josh for the win. At least he knows what its like here...it was great when he qualified before.

Most of our pro's really do know their level...but also where they hope to be. And they try their best to achieve it.

Slabba, Josh, Jamie, Coxy, Evo, Bloomers, Boggo etc etc IMO really really try and do their best...most of the time. As humans we are all fallable.

I love the support we give to our guys / girls but the criticism sometimes is off the mark and pretty unhelpful...especially if they come on here and read it.

Yeah it is down to Andy again but lets not say it as if its a surprise. It will be this way...until Slabba is ranked 98 with Evo breathing down his neck at 103 wink

Salmon · Tennis legend

Berankis beat Stakhovsky.

Sheddie · administrator

Akhenaten wrote:

The 301-400 ranked players that Slabba has played in the last year -

Olejniczak, Dawid (POL) 301 L 6-7(4) 4-6

Snobel, Pavel (CZE) 314 L 3-6 3-6

Motomura, Gouichi (JPN) 321 W 6-1 6-3

Klec, Ivo (SVK) 345 L 1-6 3-6

Niland, Conor (IRL) 353 L 1-6 3-6

Iwabuchi, Satoshi (JPN) 353 L 3-6 2-6

Kirillov, Evgeniy (RUS) 364 L 1-6 2-6

Mannarino, Adrian (FRA) 364 L 3-6 1-6

King-Turner, Daniel (NZL) 375 W 7-6(7) 6-2

Ebden, Matthew (AUS) 379 L 7-6(5) 5-7 6-7(4)

Motomura, Gouichi (JPN) 380 L 3-6 4-6

Motomura, Gouichi (JPN) 380 W 6-2 6-4

Ouanna, Josselin (FRA) 389 L 2-6 4-6

Biasella, Adriano (ITA) 392 L 6-7(11) 6-1 6-7(2)

That's a record of 3-11.

If that's the record of a Top 250 player, I don't know what to say!

You gotta look into that though, there's no substance in just quoting results.....at least 6 of those matches were last year back when Slabba was ranked outside top 500 and so was expected to lose to these guys ranked in 300s

Lets go through the others:

Loss to Ouanna: 2-6, 4-6:     Ouanna is shooting up the rankings and is currently at 213 having qualified for Roland Garros among other things. So its fair to say he was some way underanked at the time. He's a huge hitter in the mold of Tsonga so always a tough guy indoors

Loss to Motomura: 3-6, 4-6:   As I've already posted in the past, Alex had food poisoning the day before the match. If it hadn't been postponed by rain he would have given a walkover and could hardly move. These things will happen every so often when you play so many tournaments

Loss to Snobel: 3-6, 1-6: Fair enough, it wasn't a great match, Alex had an off day.....but temperatures were boiling in Uzbekhistan and in those conditions on slow hard Snobel is not an easy opponent - no big shots but very fast and consistent. Just ask Boggo who he's beaten a number of times before. I'm pretty sure that on an indoor surface it would have been a different story

Loss to Ebden: 7-(5), 5-7, 6-7(4): The Aussie is a big server, was a tight match but Alex should have won, had 4 match points, missing forehands by inches on 2 of them. Again though it was a match against a man on the up, Gazzpash thought he would get to the final in Manchester after watching him. Ebden is now ranked 330 and will be top 300 soon

Loss to Ivo Klec: 3-6, 1-6:   Klec has been top 200 in the past for a start. Not only that but after a marathon 3 hour win over Rob Smeets the day before, Alex finished on court at midnight but then got put first on court the following day in the soaring midday heat so very little recovery time. Not surprisingly he was still exhausted from the day before

Loss to Kirillov: 2-6, 1-6: Kirillov was simply on fire that day, served bombs and blasted winners from everywhere. Alex didn't have enough preparation time for the surface after French league at the weekend I think so it was tough

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

Salmon wrote:

Berankis beat Stakhovsky.

Expected result - Stakhovsky is nothing special, and didn't even look like a top 200 player when I've seen him play, while Berankis will be top 50 minimum.

And on the Slabba issue....

I've seen him play, and I think there's a top 150 player there, but not sure whether he'll go any higher than that unless he adds something more to his game, as although he has the shots, there was that little something missing that would get him to the top 100 (but with an improvement to his game, some nice draws etc, he could make it)

The thing that worries me more is that 2 or 3 times this year he's either failed to serve out a match, or wasted match points, which is getting towards the realm of choking a bit too often, and it's not a habit you want to get into.

Yeah, Slabba has had some surprising losses, but so does every player... if he's still losing to players ranked outside the top 350 as often as he is at the moment this time next year then there's more of a problem, but as he's still improving, occasionally you get these losses, and his results over the last 9 months have been encouraging for the most part (futures title, 8/9 challengers in a row where he's won his opening match etc)

He does lose matches he shouldn't in theory lose, like yesterday to KJ who is not a better player than Slabba by any means, but give it a year, and if he still does it more often than not, then it can be claimed that he is vastly overranked (and there is no such thing anyway... you are ranked where you deserve to be based on the number of points you've gained, regardless of where you got them)

Yorkie · Lower Club Player

The Shedman wrote:

Players who read this site (and there are a lot) get p*ssed off by posts like this

I have already said i rate Slabba, in fact i think he's probably the most improved player of 2008 bar none.

But as for your comment above, if you want to be a sportsman/woman you take the rough with the smooth. Any sportsperson that can't handle criticism is seriously in the wrong job!

imoen · Admin: Moderator+Tennis Legend

Interesting debate here about what makes a player "overranked" or "underranked" etc. I would like to say though that people need to be slightly careful about taking criticism so personally, everyone is entitled to their own views and to disgree with others'.

As for my opinion in the debate? Slabba has done far better than I expected him to, after watching him in a futures last year, and I think that fact is absolutely fantastic. In terms of the rankings, maybe the ranking system isn't perfect but it is what it is and everyone gains a ranking in the same way, so it's a fair comparison. If you are ranked 300, there are 299 people in the world better than you, on these criterea. Moreover, the argument that someone is only ranked as high as they are because of tournament wins in the past year falls down completely in my opinion. If they won a tournament then of course the points for that make up a part of their ranking - a 52 week rolling system. The rankings don't claim to show who is better than whom on that specific day but rather who is better than whom over the last year therefore there will always be ranking "upsets" but to say that someone is 'overranked' is redundant in my opinion. Especially in the case of Slabba, who is raising his ranking week by week so clearly isn't falling back.

Of course, I'm fully aware that this is just my opinion, if you wish to disagree please do, but don't be offended if you fail to persuade me, just as I won't be offended if I fail to disuade you.

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Slabba's match stats have appeared as if by magic.

He managed 38% of first serves in play with 6 aces and 6 dfs, winning 84% on first and 35% on second. Failed to save any break points, and took 2 of 6 bp chances. On return he won 32% against first but only 39% against second (despite 5 dfs from his opponent which meant Slabba won 4 of 18 when H got 2nd serve in play).

In the first set Slabba served at 29%. (I can recall Andy once serving at 25% for a set. I think it was against Ginepri)

Hippensteel lost 2-6 1-6 in the next round.

Josh got blown off court by a brilliant serving display from the in-form Hartfield who won 79% behind first and 46% on second but the key was 76% of first serves in play and 12 aces. Josh created just the one bp and couldn't take it.

-- Edited by kundalini at 03:07, 2008-08-22

Count Zero · Tennis legend

Boggo's stats appeared too:
1st set his 1st% was only 53, but he won over 90% of them. won 33% on 2nd. 2 aces, 4 DF!
2nd set 1st% was even worse at 46, wining 63%. winnind also 63% om 2nd. 0 aces 3 DF's.

so looks like more than anything alex served badly, his 1st serve % was way too low, you can get away with that is you win most of them like alex did in the 1st set, but then he needs to be winning his 2nd serve points more often which he wanst doing, he started winning more in the 2nd but thsi seemd to be at the exposne of his 1st. plus hitting 7 df's over 2 sets is not good enough.

freerider · Futures level

i dont really care if slabbas overanked or not (which i [personally think he isnt) to me hes someone else to cheer on at challenger level and to me thats all that matters.

Keep going slabba!

Count Zero · Tennis legend

i have to say i'm not bothered by all this over/under ranked malakry, your ranked where you are, and if its wrong it will sort itself out soon enough. congrats to slabba to gettign where he is.

Akhenaten · Pro player

ForeverDelayed wrote:

Yang is a junior, so better than the ranking (but he served for the match, so probably choked that away)

Hippensteel is better than his ranking, but he's not a top 300 player, so it's a match that Slabba should be winning, given he's ranked in the top 300.

Tut tut FD! smile

The rankings don't lie... wink

I sure Freerider & the Count have the best approach to all this. Sanctimonious b*****ds! biggrin

Come on Slabba - prove to me I'm talking out my bottom - Top 150 by next Wimbledon!