Week 35 - Futures - Spain F31 (15k) - Santander - Clay

British_is_Best · County player

Week 35 - Futures - Spain F31 (15k) - Santander - Clay

The Magician Santoro · Top national player

(1) James Ward WR 269 def. (Q) Ivan Martinez Montoro (ESP) UNR 6-2, 6-2 :)

R16: (1) James Ward WR 269 vs. Juan Lizariturry ESP WR 545

Wardy opponent is 19 years of age but hasn't beat anyone of real note

steven · Tennis legend

L16: (1) James Ward WR 269 beat Juan Lizariturry ESP WR 545 by 6-2 7-6(1)

QF: (1) James Ward WR 269 v (7) Jonathan Eysseric (FRA) WR 313

Eyserric was the young Frenchman who took Muzza to 5 sets in R1 at RG in 2008. Since then, he has a good record against lower-ranked Brits, but Eaton, Bloomers and Slabba have all beaten him.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

QF: (1) James Ward WR 269 defeated (7) Jonathan Eysseric (FRA) WR 313 by 4 & 2 biggrin

SF: (1) James Ward WR 269 vs (3) Laurent Rochette (FRA) WR 284

Long may the Frog-bashing continue!

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

James continues on his merry way:

SF: (1) James Ward WR 269 defeated (3) Laurent Rochette (FRA) WR 284 by 3 & 4 smile

Final: (1) James Ward WR 269 vs (2) Guillermo Olaso (ESP) WR 240

The ranking quoted for Olaso is the current one shown on the ITF site. Here's hoping James won't let it put him off!

indiana · Tennis legend

Good stuff.

Now win the final and James will more than defend the 21 points from the last 2 tournament points he had to defend from last year.

Anything he earns after this week is credit, and he currently has 7 no scores in his "best 18" points so go get'em for the final here and the rest of the year, James !

chavkev · Intermediate Club Player

This is quite impressive from James. He is competing well with these tier 2 challenger players on clay. Next he needs to reacquaint himself with the likes of Machado, Gil, Berlocq, Ungur, Volandri etc. These are your regular clay players in the upper reaches of challengers.

Great work so far. Olaso will be a tough challenge, he has been on a good run of form in futures as he works his way into a good position for direct acceptance to high value challengers.

steven · Tennis legend

The reason Olaso is now ranked higher than Wardy is that he won two Futures in a row in Belarus, the second of which went on the rankings last Monday, though they were very weak and he didn't have to beat anyone ranked in the top 400 either week.

The H2H is 1-1 - Olaso won from a set down in R1 of a Futures event in Xativa in 2006 and James levelled things by also winning from a set down in qualifying for a Futures event in Mallorca in 2007.

-- Edited by steven on Friday 3rd of September 2010 11:55:38 PM

alex03maccy · Grand Slam Champion

F: (1) WARD, James def. (2) OLASA, Guillermo (ESP) 7-5 6-4

Maza1987 · Challenger level

wohooo

The Magician Santoro · Top national player

Nice one wardy 27 points in the bag!

steven · Tennis legend

That's very impressive from Wardy, winning the title without dropping a set. I know it's 'only' a Futures event, but he clearly dropped down here to try and make sure of defending his Freudenstadt Challenger QF points and has managed to do that AND defend his Sevilla Challenger L16 points from week 2 of the USO last year AND add a few more. biggrin

He's now going to be top 260 with no more points to defend in 2010 (and this year's Sevilla Challenger still to come next week) and, I would say, odds on to be GB no. 2 at the end of the year if he can stay fit, since he leads Boggo by 53 points in the GB 'race' - the top 10 in that race are now:

4045 Muzza (actual GB ranking pre-USO: 1)
175 Wardy (4)
122 Boggo (2)
116 Bloomers (5)
91 Baker (3)
85 Goodall (6)
62 Evo (7)
59 Cox (10)
59 Milton (11)
56 Dr No (12)

-- Edited by steven on Saturday 4th of September 2010 04:53:13 PM

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Good to see James back on the

's trail.

helki · Futures qualifying

alex03maccy wrote:

F: (1) WARD, James def. (2) OLASA, Guillermo (ESP) 7-5 6-4

Very pleased for James and I'm glad to see he's back to winning ways.

johnnylad · Tennis legend