Week 18: Rome Masters [Blanco]

[SirBloody Idiot]

Internazionali BNL d'Italia II – Singles
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Daniel Páez Blanco successfully defended his title against József Boros 7-5, 3-6, 6-0, 6-2 in a rematch of the Season I final.

[SirBloody Idiot]

Internazionali BNL d'Italia II – Doubles
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Heath Davis and Jojo Mustard won the in final, defeating Antonio Bachunelli and Jean-Alain Depuis 6-1, 6-1.

[Samuel_Vimes]

Trusting Drake will go out before the QF. No chance to better the H2H.

EDIT:

Draw Analysis

Blanco is the defending champion here having beaten József Boros last year 6-7(6), 6-3, 6-2. He's still active in Barcelona where he seems to have put his injuries behind him, but faces an awful run to the final here. Potentially Emelio-Micic-Murdoch-Oxenstierna just to have a chance to defend his title. The big money matches there are a possible quarterfinal rematch with Dwayne Murdoch in the quarters and a Roland Garros final rematch against Sven Oxenstierna in the semis (first time on clay since then?).

For the CW contingent, hopefully nothing stands in the way of an Oxenstierna-Jefferson Drake quarter final but this is clearly the stacked half of the draw with some soft seeds and heaps of qualifiers in the top half. The Ox faces difficult second and third round matches - maybe Becker Haas and Miroslav Brdar but should get through unscathed in current form. Drake has it easier with Almen Benaglio and Carlo Amato the only real threats.

Jojo Mustard has been given a dud run and I would be surprised to see him replicate his form from Monte Carlo. He has wildcard compatriot Brett Read first who he should beat (though Read is a quarter finalist here), before Micic and then Blanco. Lights out there, you'd expect. Heath Davis gets a tricky first round clash with Pierre L'Estrange and then maybe eighth seed Radivoj Daneu who, although out of form, isn't likely to lose there.

Jarkko Maxum is the last CWLander in the main draw so far (not including quallies), and he will face eleventh seed Zoltán Varga again. The two are currently set to meet in Barcelona with the match just underway as of posting.

In Qualifying: Rob Bowenburg; Spas Delev; Roy Daniels.

Last year:
Quarter Finals: Read (lost to Carlo Amato, 6-7(4), 6-7(1))
Third Round: Oxenstierna (lost to Davis Kennedy, 3-6, 6-3, 3-6); Smeltz (lost to Brett Read, 3-6, 6-7(5)
Second Round: Drake (lost to Randy Smeltz, 6-4, 3-6, 3-6); Mustard (lost to Becker Haas, 2-6, 4-6)
First Round: Maxum (Qualified: lost to Rasmus Olesen, 4-6, 1-6); Hancianu (lost to Carter, 4-6, 5-7); Davis (lost to Antonio Bachunelli, 4-6, 4-6); Spleen (Qualified: lost to Sergio Joaquín, 7-5, 4-6, 4-6)
Second Qualifying Round: Bowenburg (lost to Jarkko Maxum, 4-6, 7-6(3), 4-6)
First Qualifying Round: Korpinen (lost to Atthaphol Sae-ul, 4-6, 4-6); de Wet (lost to Gregor Gorshkov, 6-7(1), 7-5, 5-7); Delev (lost to Billy Spleen, 6-7(9), 1-6)

[HeathDavisSpeed]

No points to defend. Any progress is a bonus. Bring it on, Froggy.

[morgieb]

Go Readie. Slightly disappointed I drew a fellow CWLander first though.

[HeathDavisSpeed]

Originally Posted by morgieb

Go Readie. Slightly disappointed I drew a fellow CWLander first though.

Mustard could well be the highest ranked unseeded player as well. Tough one.

[morgieb]

I did make the Quarters last time apparently, but that was before the year layoff...

[SirBloody Idiot]

Internazionali BNL d'Italia II
PTA Masters 1000 - Saturday (1st Round Qualifying) - Rome Italy - Clay (Red)

• Top seed Spas Delev has survived a tricky encounter to advance to the qualifying round in three sets over Uzbekistan's Anvar Juraev. The dangerous CWLander struggled with the Uzbek's big and accurate serve, but would not have expected a 3-6 scoreline in the second set as he played poor tennis. He was forced to come from a break down in the third to take it to a tiebreaker, where he found his touch just in time to beat the Asian player 3-6, 6-3, 7-6(1).

• There were no troubles for Rob Bowenburg as he blitzed Cypriot Takis Georgilas 6-1, 6-1. Georgilas isn't a great clay court player and showed exactly that here as the West CWLand fifth seed finished him inside of an hour with aggressive tennis. He faces an uphill battle, though, next against Dênis Rodrígues after the Brazilian was a straight sets winner in his match.

• The up and down year of Roy Daniels continued as he was beaten by Paolo Mandonna of Argentina. Mandonna was fresh off an embarassing defeat to Norway's Tom Vollan in Monte Carlo, but was too good for Daniels as he drew a bundle of unforced errors to win 6-4, 6-4.

[ripper868]

Play underway and Maxum hasn't even played his final yet. Going to be tough to beat Varga straight off the plane.

Congrats to the Lob for his victory.

[SirBloody Idiot]

Internazionali BNL d'Italia II
PTA Masters 1000 - Sunday (Final Round Qualifying/1st Round) - Rome Italy - Clay (Red)

• Spas Delev is through to the main draw in Rome after a fifty-four minute thrashing of Belgian veteran Mark Harmel. In an embarassing display, Harmel didn't win a game against the top seed who was on fire with his forehand racking up twelve winners. After a brutal first round clash that would be classified as a near miss, Delev had no such troubles here as he earned his qualifying points with a dominant win 6-0, 6-0.

• His West CWLand rival Rob Bowenburg had more trouble in his qualifying round clash, but was successful in straight sets against Dênis Rodrígues. Both players breezed through their first matches in Rome against Central Asian opponents, but in a tough scrap it was Bowenburg who prevailed against the Buenos Aires semi finalist. Rodrígues is a clay veteran but doesn't have many weapons other than his great athleticism. Bowenburg, meanwhile, has power on both wings and turned it on at the right times to win 6-4, 7-6(5).

• Meanwhile, three low-key first round clashes were completed on Centre Court. In the biggest one, local hope Antonio Bachunelli was forced to save four match points before beating David Champion of Australia 3-6, 7-6(1), 7-6(3). Champion has never enjoyed the red clay but should have won this match - he dropped three of his match points with unforced errors.

Will announce qualifying spots later.

[Johnners]

Gun. Fingers crossed for a seedless first round draw.

[SirBloody Idiot]

Cbf with uploading the pictures, but the first round draw for the CWLand qualifiers is:

Spas Delev CDR vs. Ivan Genov BUL
Rob Bowenburg FRC vs. Pablo Scalforo ITA

Could be worse tbh

[Mister Wright]

A third round for Mustard not out of the question. Must get past first round to defend ranking points. Anything can happen from there.

[Johnners]

Originally Posted by SirBloody Idiot

Cbf with uploading the pictures, but the first round draw for the CWLand qualifiers is:

Spas Delev CDR vs. Ivan Genov BUL
Rob Bowenburg FRC vs. Pablo Scalforo ITA

Could be worse tbh

AWTA, happy with this.

[SirBloody Idiot]

Really should have done one of these for Monte Carlo, but I cbfed. Basically to make up for how few doubles tournaments there'll be, I've increased this draw to 28 teams and allocated 6 Continental Allocations whereby each continent gets one wildcard of sorts for this sized draw. Probably allows me to sneak more CWLanders in if need be!