2010 US Open 'Battle of the Boards' pick 'em contest

eblunt · Club Coach

RE: 2010 US Open 'Battle of the Boards' pick 'em contest

SMC1809 · All-time great

LadyTigress wrote:

What did I miss?! I had this graduation ceremony that took up most of my day today, but that's obviously nothing to finding out how I'm doing in Pick'em.

Congratulations!

It was the use of 'this' instead of 'my' that threw people, I expect. I assumed it was for someone you knew. smile

steven · Tennis legend

LadyTigress wrote:

Gee, thanks everyone for the INUNDATION of congratulations.

But you're not even in the top 100 at the moment! Get into the top 10 and stay there and then you're talking! wink

You don't really expect to be congratulated for a frivolous thing like getting a degree on a serious BOTB thread do you? disbelief

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P.S. Congratulations on getting your degree biggrin

LadyTigress · County player

Indeed.

Well I didn't like to create a thread because we don't seem to create personal threads on this forum (unless it's Count Zero's 30th birthday of course ;) ).

But I really appreciate the congrats from people. I realised when I was in my ceremony that certain people in my life have been trying to make me feel ASHAMED of going to the university that I go to and the work that I have achieved in my degree, and frankly I'm angry at their behaviour and I won't sit and take it anymore. It's just a shame that this comes from people who I share blood with, (my two aunts), but as the saying goes you can choose your friends but you're saddled with your family.

It's their issue that they regret not achieving more in their lives and can't accept that they couldn't live it through their children either. And frankly, the same goes for the one person who was basically a stranger and didn't know me at all who started foaming at the mouth and going ballistic over the fact that my university is 4th ranked in the world. A student at an American university. Sad that they clearly couldn't take pride in their own hard work and study.

But the speech from the Vice-Provost was excellent and appreciated by graduands and guests alike, and I spent the day and the evening reception afterwards in the company of intellectual equals who acknowledged my work thus far and encouraged me onwards, insteading of begrudging me, and met lots of new and interesting people. smile

I'm now ready to face a new challenge by starting my Masters degree in a couple of weeks. Yes, I graduated with Honours in the highest percentile, securing me a place on the post-graduate degree (news which we have been awaiting for some while).

Unfortunately, my Pick'em skills seem to be considerably less laudable. Although I would argue that on behalf of all of us beleaguered Pick'em entrants, we're only partly responsible for our poor performances, as clearly the GEMs, PEMs and other assorted muppets affect the results and their actions are out of our control! evileye

goldfish · Futures qualifying

Congratulations Lady T and also on being able to progress your studies. Very pleased that stage of my life is over though. Was your graduation at the Albert Hall?

LadyTigress · County player

No, it was in one of the (many) UCL owned buildings, one of the departmental institute buildings that possessed a big hall to serve as a suitable venue.

I got pinned up in the robes and mortarboard with tassel at jaunty angle and all that.

Didn't want to take it off, felt very priviliged to wear the historic UCL graduation robes.

EDIT: Just seen that Nishikori has succeeded in further completely c***ing up my Pick'em by putting out Cilic. bleh

-- Edited by LadyTigress on Thursday 2nd of September 2010 08:55:42 PM

indiana · Tennis legend

Belated congratulations Lady T.

Just sorry that the graduation ceremony was clearly playing on your mind and effecting your judgement for this pick'em. They really should not allow such events to clash smile

indiana · Tennis legend

Melzer eventually takes his 5th matchpoint in the game to win 7 - 5 in the 5th set against Berankis, following being taken to 5 sets in R1 by Tursunov.

Have him to reach R4 but am not at the moment convinced he will beat Ferrero if that is who he plays in R3.

-- Edited by indiana on Friday 3rd of September 2010 12:15:47 AM

SMC1809 · All-time great

I have the same prediction and conerns Indy. Let's hope he has enough recovery time.

The Knight · Challenger qualifying

Congratulations LT, good luck with your studies and well done on a good degree (even if it's from a heathen uni! wink

)

On the pick'em side i can't remember if i picked Gasquet to win, actually i think i picked him in US bracket, oh well at least one of my tournies go well...

SMC1809 · All-time great

Looks like you picked Davydenko (along with most other BT.netters cry

)

airsmashers · County player

Thank god I had Monfils beating both Roddick and Davydenko to get to the QFs, a decision that me wonder what the hell I was thinking at the time but things are looking good now. biggrin

SMC1809 · All-time great

Looking at the picks, there seems to be quite a lot riding on the Anderson v Bellucci match for BT.Net with 18 of us picking Bellucci and 10 choosing Anderson.

airsmashers · County player

ooops I spoke too soon, taken a bit of a drop.

steven · Tennis legend

2010 US OPEN BOTB - DAY 4 'SYNDICATED' REPORT

The remaining 14 bottom half R2 matches were played on Thursday and for the first time since Monday, a GEM lost a match! Admittedly, a GEM had to lose that one because the one who lost, Rufin, was playing PHM, but when they're misbehaving this badly, you have to start somewhere!

Although we split 14%-86% for Dammit v Kolya, I think most of us in the 86% knew that we'd end up flogging a dead (Davy)donkey given the 'GEM power' that has been on display this week and that was exactly how it turned out.

Other upsets included Nishikori 5% taking advantage as the recent run of muppetry from Cilic (whom 94% of us had picked despite that) continued and Anderson 25% taking out Bellucci 71% 7-6 in the 5th. Meanwhile, Flake 37% and de Bakker 46% continued to make Gonzo and Monaco pickers pay for their folly, though to be honest when I saw the pick %s after entries closed, I thought the 37% must have been blissfully unaware of the crumbliest flakiest choker's recent form - if so, then lucky them as it turned out!

Detailed results, lists of everyone's picks and so on can be found at http://www.freewebs.com/britishtennis/Competitions.html and these are now being updated regularly each day.

TEAMS

It won't come as a big surprise that the Dammitaires managed to jump from 5th to 1st on Thursday and they currently lead R2 by some distance. GBTG continue to embarrass the ATP specialist teams by holding onto 2nd and MTL, up 1 to 3rd, are looking more and more like they might be challenging for a place at the top of the overall rankings once they have played a few more tournaments.

The biggest risers of the day were MTF, up 6 to 5th, and the biggest fallers were overnight leaders AM.com, down 3 to 4th, BT.net, down 3 to 6th, and T4Y, down 3 to 9th.

INDIVIDUALS

Nevets (CC) hung on to the outright lead throughout the day, but only by the skin of his teeth. With 9/14 correct on day 4, 10/16 in R2 so far and 71/96 points overall, he now leads only on tiebreak from oohsalmon (DF), freerider (BT) & Jojo56 (RG), all up 26 to 2= after getting 11/14 correct on Thursday.

Just one point behind are world no. 1 Scotsguy (ML) & cazza99 (AM), both up 1 to 5=, theexpress (MT), up 46 to 7th, and --cj-- (TA), who shot up 130 places to 8th - see risers below. Babfive (GB), down 5 to 9th, and Smidster (BT), up 77 to 10th, complete the new top 10.

Those in the previous day's top 5 who left the top 10 were airsmashers (BT), down 9 to 11th, and SteveWalker (BT), down 16 to 20=,
both after getting just 8/14 correct, together with Gigi (AM), who had a terrible end to the day and fell 29 to 31st with just 7/14 correct.

ON THE RISE

The top scorer of the day was --cj-- (TA), up 130 to 8th after getting 12/14 correct. However, with 11/14 after starting off the day much lower, GrantTennis (MT), up 216 to 133=, was by far the fastest riser of the day. Togtdyalttai (TA) & marina36 (RG), both up 120 to 18=, also managed 3-figure rises with the same day 4 score.

Other 100+ risers were, with 10/14 on Thursday, Allan (AM) & irefusetotellyou (NB), both up 129 to 70=, Oploskoffie (TA), up 164 to 88=, bfp (SG) & doublelix (AR), both up 163 to 99=, David Thompson (AM), up 168 to 133=, and JTContinental (TA), up 106 to 261st, plus with 9/14, Boarder35m (MT) & liam_valid (CC), both up 104 to 148=.

DODGY DROPPERS

RobH (BT), down 69 to 370th, bottom scored for the day with just 5/14 correct, but Dusty Dick (BT) is still 4 points adrift at the bottom of the table, though now 8 points clear of the gorillas, who are going very hungry!

The joint biggest fallers came from among 20 more entrants who got 6/14 - kayce (JM), JM1138 (BT) & lbk77 (TA), all down 175 to 262=.

FRIDAY

The rest of R2 is due to be played on Friday, though 'My name is Earl' might have something to say about that - see http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/grap....shtml?5-daynl

One of the most intriguing matches of the day is Benneteau 30% v Robredo 27%, with a near-even split between the players and the 43% who picked Radek caught between a rock and a hard place. Nicole probably knows how you feel ...

TEAM KO

Halfway through the L16 of the team KO, the scores look like:

(1) AndyMurray.com 17.57 lead (16) NewBallsPlease 16.44
(9) MensTennisForums 18.33 lead (8) JamieMurray.org 17.14
(12) RogerFederer.com 16.57 lead (5) Tennis4you.com 16.40 - v close
(4) MyTennisLounge.com 18.55 lead (13) Rusedski.co.uk 17.06
(14) TalkAboutTennis 18.09 lead (3) BritishTennis.net 17.65
(6) Tennis-Warehouse 17.20 lead (11) BBC 606 boards 17.00
(7) RichardGasquet.net 19.69 lead (10) Centre Court Forum 17.76
(2) GBTennisGirls.com 18.86 lead (15) Tennisopolis.com 16.80