Alex doing really well here, but had 2 bps to go *4-0 up in the 2nd only for Nieminen to save them.

tense times for oli and dan
4*4 in tb

oli and dan didnt take their first mp, but they took their second.
76(2) 76(8)
Well done lads.

and he wins 61 in third.
top day

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That's Oli's 1st Futures doubles title and Dan's 4th (the first two were in 2009), while Alex will be in his 3rd singles Final in 3 weeks (with probably his best chance of winning one so far) and he will have 100 ranking points on 10 Oct, almost certainly enough to break into the top 400, though he has 8 points coming off the following Monday so will need to win tomorrow's Final to have a good chance of staying there for longer.

steven wrote:

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TimProper wrote:

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nice win for alex. anyone else happen to notice he played guys from the same countries - NED, SWE and GBuRton - in the 1st three rounds of both swedish futures? a meaningless tidbit, for sure, but i found it slightly interesting. of course, timo had to mess up the sequence by being from FIN instead of FRA, that jerk. 

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Timo's so up and down at the moment (witness his scorelines v Oli and Alex and other recent tournaments) that he's an erratic enough tennis player to apply for a French passport.

Takes nothing away from the fact that it was a really good win for Alex

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an honourable GEM? that'll do nicely, i think. sequence restored! now too bad there can't be another brit in the final like last week!

indiana wrote:

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It was just over 2 weeks ago in the Ningbo thread after some discussion re how close GB ranks 4 to 9 were, that I wrote :

"Quite some gap to GB no 10, Alex Ward on 73 points, who will be over 100 world ranking places behind ( currently WR 469 ). I wonder who will be the next guy to get himself over 100 points and into the top 400 "

Well, it just took 3 successive finals by Alex to take him to 100 points on Monday week, 108 points if he at last wins a final.  It will at least for that week take him above Josh Milton in 9th and, if he wins the final here, above Dan Cox in 8th.

As it is he is heading to a clear career high and has probably already done enough to enter the top 400. 

Alex does seem a guy who has made steady year to year progress, not a supposed shooting star, but has steadily progressed in the right direction and from the 89 / 90 generation,  come Monday week, possibly only Evo will remain ahead of him in the rankings.   

Maybe I should write something similar about the gap after Djokovic in the rankings, mention Andy's name in passing and sit back.  It might take a bit longer, but hey   

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I've been thinking about what you said then each time Alex has closed further in on 100 points (with Cox and Milton unfortunately closing the gap fast from the other direction) and I've been wondering ever since Alex started making waves in the Spanish Futures whether, having done things more independently, he might eventually overtake those two. It'll be fascinating to see which of the three of them ends up doing best.

Of the others who are 21 at the moment (i.e. born in the 12 months between Oct 89 and Sep 90, so younger than Sean but older than Dan S & Marcus), Evo should surely end up the highest ranked *if* he can get his act together on a consistent basis, while it'll be interesting to see how Neal Skupski does once he gets out of college, though there must be a risk (if that is the right word) that he will become a doubles specialist, perhaps even pairing up with his brother.

I imagine (and hope, for the younger guys' sake) that whatever happens with the players who are 21 now is likely to end up being a sideshow alongside the exploits of those who are 17/18 at the moment, but equally I wonder if it might give the 'lost generation' (to paraphrase Roger D) a bit of extra impetus when they see the younger ones start to overtake them. (Ratty will laugh at me trying to make a connection there, I know )