Week 31 - Challenger (€42,500) - Segovia, Spain (Hard)

Spectator · All-time great

RE: Week 31 - Challenger (€42,500) - Segovia, Spain (Hard)

steven · Tennis legend

paulisi wrote:
Good win for Brydan - hope he draws the wildcard.

He did! Recap of the R1 draws for all 5 Brits with all the rankings updated:

L32: (Q) Brydan Klein WR 429 v (WC) Jorge Hernando Ruano (ESP) WR 698 (CH 692 earlier this month)
L32: Marcus Willis WR 350 v (5) Marco Chiudinelli (SUI) WR 175 (CH 52 in 2010)
L32: Dan Cox WR 206 v (8) Adrián Menéndez Maceiras (ESP) WR 187 (CH 169 in 2012)
L32: Kyle Edmund WR 225 v Dave Rice WR 285

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

R1: Brydan Klein & Nikola Mektic (CRO) CR 514 (268+246) defeated (2) James Cluskey & Adrián Menéndez (IRL/ESP) CR 310 (183+127) by 6-4 7-6(3) biggrin

Stunning - & totally unexpected! That win means that both the top & the second seeds have been unceremoniously ejected from the competition on the same day! wink

Priesty · Challenger level

Coxy 3rd on Centre tomorrow, second match is not before noon local time so I imagine he'll be on at lunchtime.

Meanwhile Willis is 2nd on court 1 not before noon local time followed on the same court by Kedders and Ricey.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Spectator wrote:
Your comment, CD, inspired me to go check the statistics - and here's a random and not necessarily accurate sampling of countries with the number of their 23-and-under players in the top 300. The number in the top 100 is, where relevant, in parentheses. In reality, the US will shortly be 10: Jared Donaldson is just outside the top 300, but is unlikely to stay there long. And the statistics flatter GB: two of our 1990s (Cox and Smethurst) have late birthdays, but will be dropping off this list by the wintertime. But generally interesting stuff: very few young Spaniards coming up ... the 5 flatters them, too, as they're largely much older and close to 300. France, Australia and Argentina have the largest "young" contingents (ie more U21 than U23) - the Australian lot are indeed striking - very young and rising quite fast. US top young players are largely not ex-university, except for Steve Johnson ... but the 170 - 300 range has lots of ex-university types. Canada doesn't have much in terms of men's tennis behind Raonic - there's Peliwo (in the 200s) and then a drop-off.

Australia 9 (2)
US 9 (2)
Argentina 8 (2)
France 7
Spain 5 (1)
Croatia 3
GB 3
Canada 2 (1)
Austria 2 (1)
Czech Republic 2 (1)
Japan 2
Serbia 2
Germany 1

Very interesting chart, Spec.

The Argentinians' exploits had passed me by - I'll go and look up the individual players.

Glad to see the numbers back up the Australians' position. And the French certainly have a good stable of young players, although no generally accepted 'stars' until the 18 year-olds.

murray_2k9 · Challenger qualifying

Coup Droit wrote:
Spectator wrote:
Your comment, CD, inspired me to go check the statistics - and here's a random and not necessarily accurate sampling of countries with the number of their 23-and-under players in the top 300. The number in the top 100 is, where relevant, in parentheses. In reality, the US will shortly be 10: Jared Donaldson is just outside the top 300, but is unlikely to stay there long. And the statistics flatter GB: two of our 1990s (Cox and Smethurst) have late birthdays, but will be dropping off this list by the wintertime. But generally interesting stuff: very few young Spaniards coming up ... the 5 flatters them, too, as they're largely much older and close to 300. France, Australia and Argentina have the largest "young" contingents (ie more U21 than U23) - the Australian lot are indeed striking - very young and rising quite fast. US top young players are largely not ex-university, except for Steve Johnson ... but the 170 - 300 range has lots of ex-university types. Canada doesn't have much in terms of men's tennis behind Raonic - there's Peliwo (in the 200s) and then a drop-off.

Australia 9 (2)
US 9 (2)
Argentina 8 (2)
France 7
Spain 5 (1)
Croatia 3
GB 3
Canada 2 (1)
Austria 2 (1)
Czech Republic 2 (1)
Japan 2
Serbia 2
Germany 1

Very interesting chart, Spec.
The Argentinians' exploits had passed me by - I'll go and look up the individual players.
Glad to see the numbers back up the Australians' position. And the French certainly have a good stable of young players, although no generally accepted 'stars' until the 18 year-olds.

Thanks for sharing the chart. CD - who are the French stars you're thinking of? Hamou has caught my eye recently and seems to be one to watch

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

It's Spectator's chart, murray, no credit to me :)

What I meant was that although there's a good group of 19-23 year-old players, the French seem to think that there's no superstars amongst that lot.

Whereas Halys, Tatlot etc. (the 17-18 year-olds) are getting a lot of attention.

But, frankly, it's a bit circular i.e. the U18 French national championships, the junior Grand Slams and the European Junior Championships get a reasonable amount of coverage but this is only for the 18 year-olds. As soon as the pass 19, they fall off the public radar unless they do something spectacular (hopefully at a Grand Slam, in particular Roland Garros, as Lokoli did).

It's true that Matthias Bourgue, age 20, is all in the news at the moment as he's just won his 30th consecutive match, winning 6 Futures titles on the trot. It's a great achievement. And he's now top 300.

But the point is, frankly, that there are so many of them (young-ish, promising players) that nobody gives them much attention. Which may well take the pressure off them and be all to the good. It certainly 'keeps them real'. And because it's easier to earn a decent-ish living playing tennis in France, they often come through later too. I do think that a deep pool of potential is the key to success.

I don't know much about Hamou but I'm seeing the head FFT trainer for one area in France on Friday so I'll ask him - mind you, he's a real 'doom and gloom' merchant, bless him, so he'll probably dismiss Hamou (and nearly all the others) as useless - but he's usually wrong - as I delight in pointing out to him years later !

Spectator · All-time great

Interesting, CD. By the way, there's a mistake in the text of my comments (though not, I think, the count) re the US players. I should have said that Klahn was the outlier, not Steve Johnson ... who is 24 and hence not counted in the list. Also a potential lack of clarity in that my comment about "more U21 than U23" referred to the way I'd defined "young" ... not to the cohort.

-- Edited by Spectator on Monday 28th of July 2014 08:22:43 PM

BeefyDeedz · Pro player

Happy for Klein qualifying. His win in dubs and his attempt at singles make this a worthwhile tournament for definite. Who knows what will happen this week?:)

BeefyDeedz · Pro player

With Marcus on imminently, and four Brits scheduled for 12:30, this tournament will unfurl fairly quickly.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

One break apiece, and it's all on serve in the Marcus/Marco battle.

3*-4 - our one to serve

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

into a tie-break . . .

but the TB gets away from him pretty quickly and Marco takes it 7-2

-- Edited by Coup Droit on Tuesday 29th of July 2014 11:47:53 AM

steven · Tennis legend

... which sadly Chiudinelli wins 7-2

Still, Marcus certainly isn't getting blown away by the former world no. 52!

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Chiudinelli will probably run away with it now: 0-3* in the second... cry

steven · Tennis legend

Since I last looked, Marcus's serve seems to have gone to pot - he has got to deuce in all three of Chiudinelli's service games in the 2nd set so must be playing pretty well but has lost his own service games to 40, 0 & 15

He has already saved at least 2 match points as Chiudinelli serves for a 2nd set bagel.