Week 7 - ATP 250 - Marseille Entry List

seagull · Hall of fame

Week 7 - ATP 250 - Marseille Entry List

Mikeduke · County player

RE: Marseille Entry List

seagull · Hall of fame

16th Feb

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

RE: Week 7 - ATP 250 - Marseille Entry List

Shhh · Challenger level

ForeverDelayed wrote:

Plus, with his Doha title, he's already taken up one of the two 250 spots in his ranking already, so he can only add points from one more event, and so there isn't a real need for him to play here.

Obviously 5 non-Slam and masters events will count towards his ranking. From the above, does that mean only 2 of them can come from 250 events????

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

His points will have to come from 18 tournaments: four slams, eight Masters 1000s, four 500 series (one of which must be after USO) and two 250 series. This applies to all the players who were in the top 30 at the end of 2008.

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

Marseille appears to have taken a leaf out of the Wimbledon play book as they have only given out 2 WC's, while there are 5 qualifier spots listed in the main draw.

I think the problem came from Clement making the cut when he was going to get the 3rd WC and thus having no-one to give it to, but surely they could have found some random Frenchman to give a WC to to make up the numbers, but apparantly not.

The upside to this is that there is a guarenteed lucky loser spot, which according to the rule book will go to the highest ranked player in the qualifying draw... so Istomin only has to win his 2nd round match to be in the main draw (as he'll get the LL spot), leaving him free to tank in the final round, which hopefully will be against Bloomers.

So the lack of a 3rd WC = greater chance for Bloomers to qualify!!!

Shhh · Challenger level

Madeline wrote:

His points will have to come from 18 tournaments: four slams, eight Masters 1000s, four 500 series (one of which must be after USO) and two 250 series. This applies to all the players who were in the top 30 at the end of 2008.

I didn't know all that so thanks Madeline.

steven · Tennis legend

ForeverDelayed wrote:
So the lack of a 3rd WC = greater chance for Bloomers to qualify!!!

I hope you're right, not that I agree with tanking. I don't really understand it either - why tank your FQR match and risk getting a tough R1 draw and no ranking points at all when you get 12 points for qualifying.

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

steven wrote:

ForeverDelayed wrote:
So the lack of a 3rd WC = greater chance for Bloomers to qualify!!!
I hope you're right, not that I agree with tanking. I don't really understand it either - why tank your FQR match and risk getting a tough R1 draw and no ranking points at all when you get 12 points for qualifying.

The fact there are 5 qualifier spots in the draw means that it's not like the lucky loser will get the hardest draw as it will be completely random, so there's no draw advantage to qualifying.

There does seem to be a convention though to tank when you know you are already in the draw - just look at how often someone who knows there is a lucky loser spot available loses in the final round of qualifying - why it seems to happen I don't know - maybe tanking is done to reduce the chance of getting injured as you aren't going to overexert yourself.