Today, most of the top 16 seeds played, and 12 of the top 13 seeds advanced. The toughest match for a seed that won was probably Andy Murray's win over David Nalbandian. The two last met at Toronto when Nalbandian was particularly hot. Since then, Nalbandian has not played as well. Even so, Murray dropped
Roger Federer has a sense of history, doesn't he? He chose to play Stockholm, a tournament he hasn't played since 2000, because he knew it would be a relatively easy draw. He could always point to Peter Lundgren, one of his earliest coaches, who was from Sweden as one reason he played the tournament. Winning
Let's start in Basel. Roger Federer is a five-time finalist at Basel. He reached the finals back in 2000 and 2001 before he became the Roger Federer. He also won the title three times in a row starting in 2006. However, last year, in 2009, Djokovic decided to play on Roger's home tournament. In a
The semifinals are set for Basel and Valencia. Basel is Federer's home tournament, no doubt one reason it is an ATP 500 event. Fortunately for tournament organizers, Federer is still in the tournament. The semifinals include Roger Federer playing Andy Roddick and Novak Djokovic playing Victor Troicki. Let's took at the top of the draw.
With the Paris Masters and the ATP World Tour Finals and the Davis Cup finals up ahead, the end of the men's tennis season is wrapping up very soon. This week, a pair of ATP 500 events are being played: Valencia (in Spain) and Basel (in Switzerland). Last year, Djokovic went on Federer's home tournament
It's almost unheard of. Nadal is almost always good to the quarterfinals of every event he plays. Hot off the heels of his win in Tokyo, Nadal faced veteran Jurgen Melzer, a lefty that Nadal last beat at Roland Garros. One could argue that Nadal's toughest match came against Melzer who pushed him to a
What a difference a few months make. Nikolay Davydenko, the defending champ at Shanghai, has been out of sorts ever since his return to tour. Last year, in 2009, Davydenko had injury issues. He returned just before the French Open, and lost to Robin Soderling. Davydenko hit his stride just after the US Open winning
Djokovic had to wait a day to beat David Ferrer as rain washed out Sunday's play, with Djokovic up a break and 3-1 in the first. The extra day didn't do the Spaniard much good as he won only one more game in the first set, to lose 6-2. Djokovic then won the second set,
Nadal, it seems, doesn't like it when he plays poorly. If he plays a match, and it's as close as his near-loss to Victor Troicki, he gets upset, and sometimes, the next opponent pays the price. That opponent was Gael Monfils. Sporting mini-dreads, Monfils had few answers for Nadal in the first set as Nadal
Once you get to Labor Day, you move from the obligatory early round matches to the business end of a Slam. Those that want to seriously make a run need to get to Labor Day, when the fourth round begins. Let's begin with a quick recap of what happened so far. Among those coming in
