2009 Wimbledon 'Battle of the Boards' pick 'em contest

wolf · Tennis legend

RE: 2009 Wimbledon 'Battle of the Boards' pick 'em contest

steven · Tennis legend

The results are now up at http://www.britishtennis.net/Competitions.html, up to Verdasco and Andreev wins. I'm knackered and off to watch some tennis - three Brits on court at once

Silver · County player

Oh my freakin' 'eckers, this isn't a good start at all from me. Tell you what, Josh to beat Llodra and that'll be my highlight of the day.

Owt else and I may as well just bugger off home now.

Smidster · Challenger level

Can we start again please?

steven · Tennis legend

Grrrrrr as at the Roland Garros, it all goes fine during the day (17/20 and 2=), then as soon as evening sets in, it all goes horribly wrong (6/10 and down to 80=) disbelief

Btw, there's only one team behind GBTG after day 1, and you don't want to know who it is! ashamed

-- Edited by steven on Monday 22nd of June 2009 08:41:01 PM

steven · Tennis legend

WIMBLEDON BOTB - DAY 1 'SYNDICATED' REPORT

448 people (plus 6 robot players) and 15 teams with 5 or more entrants are taking part in the BOTB for Wimbledon. This is about 10% more entrants than there were for Wimbledon 2008 and back up to around the 450 level as for the previous two slams which had a Monday start. GB entries are up on the AO but US entries are down, with the honourable exception of TAT.

Day 1 saw all 32 R1 matches in the bottom half of the draw started and 30 finished, with the main shocks of the day the early losses by Flake and Floppy (both picked by 98% to win R1 and by significant numbers to reach the second week - could those nicknames be any more appropriate?), while wild card Mahut (74%) wasted a kind draw in a way that even the GB WCs would be embarrassed about.

Curiously, both Becks were involved in upsets - Andreas from Germany (picked by 81%) went down to Karol from Slovakia (2%) was the player who beat Floppy!

Detailed results can be found at http://www.britishtennis.net/competitions.html and from now on they will be updated regularly each day.

TEAMS

As they were after day 1 at RG, the Ducklings are in the lead, and by quite a distance this time. I guess they may have gone big for Querrey, who benefited from Ljubo's last minute withdrawal. They are followed by the Feddies and BBC 606. No. 2 ranked AM.com in 4th place are the only team in the top 5 of the overall rankings who are currently in the top 5 at Wimbledon as well.

At the other end of the table, WTA experts GBTG, new to BOTB this time, are struggling (perhaps not surprisingly - after all they may have picked Floppy thinking he was WTA!) but they have avoided last place, which goes to a red-faced BT.net. New no. 1 team Rusedski.co.uk are only just in the top 10.

INDIVIDUALS

Seven players currently share 1st place with 26/30 - sirfredperry (CC), who was out on his own in 1st place for a while but got reeled in later on, Jessie181 (TA), at WR 64 the only one of these seven who was ranked in the top 100 after RG, Kirkus (TA), fightfan (TN), mugzzer (BB), gwenda (AR), and Kathy T (LH) - the last two are playing in their first pick 'em!

Best of the overall top 10 so far is world no. 2 miffy (AM) in 33=, 2 points off the lead, while world no. 1 Pebs (MP), defending 3rd place points from last year, is 3 points further back in 239=.

However, the new no. 1 is doing better than pre-RG no. 1 and defending Wimbledon champion Ashley Harkleroad's ***** (MP) who, like the real defending champion, isn't even playing. Unlike Rafa though, it's nothing to do with his knees - he disappeared in a puff of smoke before the RG Final (the thought of Fed winning being just too much for him to take) and hasn't been seen since ...

At the other end of the table, just mysterX (TA) on 14/30 and agustin (SG) on 13/30 are in the gorillas' cage.

WINNER PICK OF THE MONTH

Bethan alerted me that Robin Bo Carl Söderling's mum must have entered when she saw that the Swede had been picked to win Wimby by one entrant, but Alien (CC) (actually doing fine so far in 239=) turned out to be a friend of Dark Necrofear (CC)'s mum MACBORG (CC) - Dark and Mum are in 8= and 33= respectively, so overall the team seem to be benefiting from the South African connection!

WINNER PICKS

64% Fed
30% Muzza
5% Duckboy
1% Nole

... plus one pick each for former slam champions Hewitt & Safin and former slam finalists Tsonga and the Sod.

Other players picked by at least one entrant to reach the Final are Potty (picked by 22 to get there), Gonzo (5), Verdasco (4), Kolya (3), Haas (3), Cilic (1), Simple (1), Fish (1), Malisse (1) and Grisha Dimitrov (1) - seriously, who's been going to the same parties as Richard Gasquet?!

(for a nicknames guide, see http://www.andymurray.com/forum/showthread.php?t=253)

I might be back with some quotes before play starts tomorrow.

Drew · Jun 22, 2009

33rd...wont last im sure!

wolf · Tennis legend

Oh christ.

I'm not even going to bother to check how badly I'm going.

Where's that bottle?

steven · Tennis legend

8 of you outside the top 400 when there are 448 entrants is quite 'impressive'. Btw GBTG might not be doing quite as well as they seem to be - definitely one and possibly two of their players hit one team too low on the list having meant to enter for CC - that'll get sorted out tomorrow.

steven · Tennis legend

PRE-TOURNAMENT & DAY 1 QUOTES

The lists of which ATP players each BOTB player is 'twinned' with based on their pick 'em ranking being the same as the player's ATP ranking has caused a fair bit of comment, and some concerns:

LINK3 (BT) "I feel a little apprehensive going into this pick 'em as, using Steven's earlier technique, I am twinned with Safin... "

eblunt (BT) was also feeling the day 1 nerves and managed to be remarkably prescient with one of his predictions, even though the GEMs largely behaved: "We're off ! who is going to be the target for earliest abuse ? Will we get an an early Flake? Perhaps an early GEM departure?"

He continues: "I always have that surge of excitement when the starting gun goes off. Which will steadily give way to despair, resentment and deep anger by about 16:00 today. It's always the same pattern, I really wonder why I torture myself ...." Don't we all!

Needless to say, the crumbliest, flakiest choker did come in for a bit of a hammering:

fishflaps (MP) "Blake you numpty, how dare you do a Karlovic* on me!!!"

"* To do a Karlovic - verb (used with or without object) - 1. to play exceptionally well at Wimbledon warm up tournaments and then imitate a brain dead chimp while playing your first round match at SW19."

eblunt (BT) again: "Right on Cue, Flake is Flaking. Do you think his wife asks him 'Were you flaking it darling?' ... 'No I really was just crap!'"

Russiafan (CC) belatedly realises that you should always back yourself whatever the odds: "So I'm [twinned with] Seppi???? Who knocked out Flake....stupid Flake. I clearly should have picked myself for that one......"

Meanwhile, being the world no. 17, nelslus (TA) was experienced enough to realise this and DID back his twin ... Oops!

Dark Necrofear (CC)'s recruitment activities are coming in for a fair bit of scrutiny:

"Well good guesses Lex. My mum is indeed MacBorg and her best friend is Alien.Im so chuffed as its their first time playing and they are behaving like to school kids with this BOTB. Guess no one is immune to the BOTB virus."

Later on: "Well steven just to let you know, BOTB hasnt failed to deliver yet again! Mum and friend were on the phone last night waiting for me to get back from gym just after 9. And I quote their words 'Battle Of The Boards has turned both of us into monsters,we have been checking websites,news channels and listening in on the radio stations for results! What have you done to us???' Evidently I am to blame for the lunacy that has ensued in the form of BOTB! Looks like mum will be kicking me out the house all in favour of your insane competition."

That's good to hear, and if Dark is wondering how Alien managed to pick the Sod to win the tournament, Sher (CC) manages to trump her: "i somehow came on a final between Federer and Dimitrov" ... well it could happen ... in a few years' time.

tinamarie (TA) was having a bad day. "After each time I've played this game, I think "okay, this can't get any worse". mhm... wrong. actually it could and it did."

World no. 16 wolf (BT) was having a bad day too, but at least he had one consolation: "Mad Dani is two sets up though on Bolleli so at least something is going right." ... until Koellerer lost the next three sets! Still, when your ATP 'twin' is David 'numpty' Nalbandian, you know there's trouble ahead!

Finally, the new world no. 1 gives us an idea of the deep analysis that got her to where she is today:

Pebs (MP) "*runs in to offer amazing, critical view about the Verdy match....*" ..... "yum!"

wolf · Tennis legend

I might be 431rd but at least I can sit here and say I am not one of the 56% of people who picked Oscar Hernandez to win.

Quite possibly the worst majority pick I have ever seen.

ForeverDelayed · Grand Slam Champion

I cannot think of one possible reason why Hernandez was picked. Those who did pick him should be eliminated from the game as a matter of principle, for clearly knowing nothing about tennis.

-- Edited by ForeverDelayed on Tuesday 23rd of June 2009 12:13:42 PM

wolf · Tennis legend

I wholeheartedly agree.

steven · Tennis legend

Two CC players had picked GBTG as their team by mistake and have now been switched, so the BT.net team wasn't last at the end of day 1 after all.

Peter too · Tennis legend

It says my twin Stepanek is playing a fella. I mean who else would they expect him to play.....though come to think of it....