SMB Tennis thread (note there is a specific Wimbledon 22 thread)

The Bridge Lad said:
Yeah, women's tour is on BT until the end of 2019 and there will be a big fight to retain / claim the rights with all this feminist movement of late and Sky with all their Sportswomen stuff. There are plenty of decent streams kicking about and obviously the betting streams as well.

Miami starts on Tuesday (for the women, Weds for the men) and this week, before the clocks go forward, we are just 4 hours ahead of Miami, so play will usually start from 3pm UK time. Really interesting now with Serena and Azarenka back and with the emergence of all these youngsters, it's as exciting as I can remember especially with Serena not currently a big favourite for the titles.



Interesting draw overall, but that's by far the standout match. Winner of that plays Svitolina as well who was the main guest at the draw ceremony as I'm sue she will have been thrilled :lol:. I think that match will be during the day on Weds, rather than the night session.

I see Katie Boulter has randomly got a wildcard for the qualifiers.
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Bit of a surprise, how did that happen?
 


Session said:
Bit of a surprise, how did that happen?
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Not sure, Miami often have random wildcards and they do seem to often go to the 'lookers'. She won anyway, beat Taylor Townsend who is ranked in and around the top 100, so has one more match to go.

Norrie won his match and now has a WC himself in the final round, so hopefully get at least 1 of those through to the main draw.
 
JL1985 said:
Good night for the Brits. Only Naomi Broady lost, which isn't a surprise based on her form.
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Yeah, she's in terrible form mate. Norrie is about 1/14 so 'should' come through. The others look more 50/50 with Liam a very slight favourite and Boulter an underdog. Would be happy if 2 of them qualified overall.

Norrie is 2nd on court so should be on before 4pm.
 
Winnable matches for all three in the first round today. Watson out first round for the fifth tournament in a row though...

Backed Djokovic to win @ 12's after the draw came out. Can be pretty happy with that draw if JMDP is feeling a bit leggy.
 
Boulter lost 4-6 5-7 to Hseih earlier. She played pretty well considering it was her first WTA tour match and she had a few chances to make it even closer. She'll be disappointed she didn't take a set there, but still a great learning experience against someone 140 places above her in the rankings.

Norrie also lost. Tie break in the first set and the 2nd set basically ran away from him, broken twice and lost 2-6. Never really looked like breaking the big serving Jarry. On to the clay now for him now. Liam Broady currently on Sky Sports Arena now and has just taken the first game (on serve).

Serena Williams is so far away. Not sure if this comeback was too early or if this will stand her in good stead for the upcoming Grand Slams, but she could hardly move in her match against Osaka, think she ended up losing 6-3 6-2 and it was a bit of a hard watch. Osaka is obviously in stunning form, but she didn't really need do anything special at all here.

Decent win for Azarenka, also on a comeback trail, easily beating Bellis 6-3, 6-0.
 
The Bridge Lad said:
Boulter lost 4-6 5-7 to Hseih earlier. She played pretty well considering it was her first WTA tour match and she had a few chances to make it even closer. She'll be disappointed she didn't take a set there, but still a great learning experience against someone 140 places above her in the rankings.

Norrie also lost. Tie break in the first set and the 2nd set basically ran away from him, broken twice and lost 2-6. Never really looked like breaking the big serving Jarry. On to the clay now for him now. Liam Broady currently on Sky Sports Arena now and has just taken the first game (on serve).

Serena Williams is so far away. Not sure if this comeback was too early or if this will stand her in good stead for the upcoming Grand Slams, but she could hardly move in her match against Osaka, think she ended up losing 6-3 6-2 and it was a bit of a hard watch. Osaka is obviously in stunning form, but she didn't really need do anything special at all here.

Decent win for Azarenka, also on a comeback trail, easily beating Bellis 6-3, 6-0.
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Serena looks miles off the pace. Azarenka is just starting to get back to her old self after having a baby but she has had other problems admittedly. Ozaka is going to be a Slam winner without doubt. I thought Jarry looked good last night, I was surprised at the odds he was priced at beforehand and the odds were still good even in play when it was clear, on the day, he was the superior player.
 
Good win for Liam Broady. He plays Krajinovic next, who's obviously a different class of opponent to Fratangelo, and seems to be one of the circuit's improving players (although much of his current high ranking is down to his Paris Masters final appearance).
 
JL1985 said:
Serena looks miles off the pace. Azarenka is just starting to get back to her old self after having a baby but she has had other problems admittedly. Ozaka is going to be a Slam winner without doubt. I thought Jarry looked good last night, I was surprised at the odds he was priced at beforehand and the odds were still good even in play when it was clear, on the day, he was the superior player.
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I'm not sure where Vika currently stands with her custodial battle and playing outside of the USA. Hopefully that's sorted soon and she can get her career back on track. Interesting match for her tonight against Keys, the first time they've played. First of the evening session matches and starts at 11.30pm UK time. Good looking match tomorrow between Osaka and Svitolina, I like both, both would be good to see Naomi really make a statement and really back up last week with another top 10 (or 5) win.

I was also looking forward to that 16 year old Anisimova (who played so well last week) vs Muguruza, but the youngster pulled out with an ankle fracture picked up during her win over Wang Qiang.

Arkle said:
Good win for Liam Broady. He plays Krajinovic next, who's obviously a different class of opponent to Fratangelo, and seems to be one of the circuit's improving players (although much of his current high ranking is down to his Paris Masters final appearance).
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Yeah, he literally jumped from something like 90 odd to around 30 with that random run. I'd hardly heard of him before and then the next minute he's in a Masters final. Just had a quick check of his recent results and he does seem to have picked up again and started 2018 reasonably well, taking advantage of his now high seeding. Great win (and week) though for Liam as you say - went from losing to Aragone in the first round of a small challenger (whilst seeded) to reaching the L64 of arguably the 5th biggest event of the tour in 8 days.
 
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Final set tie break in the Federer match. It would be strange if he lost consecutive matches.

What a win for the Kokk.
 
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Gerrin :cool: Kokk's a quality player. Should be top 20/30 if he can ever stay fit. Deserves that win after his last few years.

Good win for Azarenka just there, great battle. Don't think I've ever seen a moonball winner on set point before. Hopefully takes advantage of a slightly open draw now Halep's out.
 
Arkle said:
That's a massive shock! Kokkinakis was superb... I know he's had injuries but how has he never been a top 50 player?
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Was well on the way before the injuries like you say. Only played one match in 2016 at the Olympics and then 13 last year. Pretty brutal stuff.

No Federer until June, just confirmed he's not playing any clay court tournaments again.
 
MarcoG said:
Was well on the way before the injuries like you say. Only played one match in 2016 at the Olympics and then 13 last year. Pretty brutal stuff.

No Federer until June, just confirmed he's not playing any clay court tournaments again.
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I thought Federer might have waited for Nadal to be fully fit before dropping clay again.

As for Miami, it's now wide open Would love to see del Potro do the Indian Wells/Miami double though.

Looking at the women's draw, 17 of the 32 seeds are out already.
 
Federer is going to skip the clay court season. Rafa ties up anoth French Open. He would win it if Federer played to be fair.
 
Some good matches in that top half of the women's draw:

Azarenka vs Radwanska is a blast from the past.
Muguruza vs Stephens is the reigning Wimbledon vs US champs with the latter showing some signs of getting it back together after an awful run since her big win.
Wang Yafan's run is interesting as well and I'm sure there will be big hopes for her, especially being relatively young at 23. A lot of Chinese players seem to develop and breakthrough much later for some reason.

Interesting match for Konta vs Mertens at 4pm today, would be good to see Jo put a bit of a run together here and she did look better the other day vs Flipkens. One of Puig, Sakkari, Collins or Vekic will reach the quarters.
 
Verdasco just started mouthing off at Kokkinakis' dad sat behind him in the crowd on break point and now Verdasco and Kokk are shouting at each other on the change overs :lol: hope there's a good scrap to end it.
 

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