Rising Marco Cecchinato the Star of ATP Umag Steen Kirby, Tennis Atlantic
Despite losing the World Cup final in Moscow, the fun loving nation of Croatia is ready to host another edition of the ATP Umag 250 on clay. Here is your look at all the action.
Top Half:
With the withdrawal of top seed Kyle Edmund, Albert Ramos will start in a reseeded position against Dusan Lajovic or Nikoloz Basilashvili. On clay I’ll back Ramos to edge Lajovic and reach the quarters. Guido Pella should be favored to defeat Taro Daniel, and Aljaz Bedene/Joao Sousa to reach the quarters opposite Ramos, with Ramos favored at that stage.
Andrey Rublev, the defending champ, is hoping to be fit as he returns to tour after a few weeks off due to injury. Rublev will face a qualifier or Felix Auger Aliassime, with Robin Haase, Nicolas Jarry, or a qualifier lurking in the quarters. I’ll pick a qualifier against Jarry in this section, with the Chilean Jarry emerging the winner, Rublev will likely have a slow return.
The bottom half features a relatively pedestrian (on clay) Damir Dzumhur facing either a struggling Paolo Lorenzi or journeyman Evgeny Donskoy. I’ll take Dzumhur to win the section and emerge opposite Marton Fucsovics or Benoit Paire. I have Fucsovics winning the quarter with wins over Paire and a qualifier, then Dzumhur.
Pablo Cuevas has played himself back into a bit of form and will open against Laslo Djere, presuming he can defeat the in-form Djere, he’ll face Max Marterer or wild card Nino Serdarusic in round 2. Marterer should win the section and end up opposite Marco Cecchinato in the quarters. The rising Cecchinato will be favored over Jiri Vesely/qualifier, and then Marterer in the quarters.
Cecchinato looks well positioned to lift this trophy after reaching the top 30, the Roland Garros semifinals, and lifting an ATP title on clay earlier this year.
Elite player Dominic Thiem squared off with home favorite Gilles Simon in the Lyon final, Thiem emerging the winner 3-6 7-6 6-1, as he recovered from a slow start to power past the defensively minded Simon. Presuming he’s fresh for Roland Garros, this week should prove a great warmup for the Austrian star he dropped sets against Dusan Lajovic and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in the semifinals and quartefinals respectively, but won those matches in the end. His first win game against Roberto Carballes Baena.
Simon also looks good for Paris as he found form and defeated Jordi Samper-Montana, Joris De Loore, Mikhail Kukushkin, and Cam Norrie to reach the final, his only set dropped coming against Kukushkin.
Nick Kyrgios and Jack Sock won the doubles final against Jebavy/Middelkoop.
Marton Fucsovics looks to be finally fulfilling his promise as he claimed his first ever ATP title with a 6-2 6-2 drubbing of Peter Gojowczyk. Fucsovics has put together the best season of his career in 2018 and earned wins against Albert Ramos, Frances Tiafoe, home hero Stan Wawrinka, and Steve Johnson (in 3 sets) to reach the final.
Gojowczyk has also put together a career best year with wins against Ivo Karlovic, David Ferrer, Andreas Seppi, and Fabio Fognini in Switzerland. He beat Seppi and Karlovic in 3 sets, and his win against Fognini was a major upset. Now he hopes to be a factor at Roland Garros.
Marach/Pavic defeated Dodig/Ram in the doubles final.
Rising Stars of Hungarian Tennis Marton Fucsovics and Zsombor Piros Feature in Budapest 250 Steen Kirby, Tennis Atlantic
The ATP 250 on clay in Budapest is one of the handful of ATP events in Eastern Europe and Hungary’s marquee tennis event. Here is your full preview, with predictions.
Top Half:
Lucas Pouille is the top seed and defending champion but he’s struggling right now. Pouille will open with John Millman or Radu Albot, with Hungary’s own Marton Fucsovics likely to follow. Fucsovics opens with Yannick Maden, while his likely round 2 opponent Max Marterer takes on Viktor Troicki. This section is full of strugglers, but I’ll back Fucsovics to rise at home to defeat Marterer and Pouille and reach the semifinals.
Richard Gasquet will be a heavy favorite to win out in his section. Gasquet faces Hurbert Hurkacz or Lorenzo Sonego in round 2, with Aljaz Bedene likely awaiting in the quarters. Bedene’s path is Marius Copil, then Attila Balazs or Matteo Berrettini. Gasquet is in great form on clay and I’ll back him over Bedene.
Bottom Half:
With Damir Dzumhur, the #2 seed, in poor form, I’ll go with Marco Cecchinato to beat Mirza Basic and Dzumhur in consecutive upsets. J.L. Struff takes on Jurgen Zopp then Alexander Bublik or Denis Istomin for a spot in the quarters. I’ll take Struff over Cecchinato to reach the semis.
Andreas Seppi or Denis Shapovalov look set for a good week. Shapovalov gets either Nikoloz Basilashvili or a struggling Paolo Lorenzi in round 2. Seppi opens with Thomas Fabbiano, local young gun Zsombor Piros or Mikhail Youzhny will follow. I’ll take Seppi on clay against Shapovalov in the quarters.
Predictions
semis Gasquet d. Fucsovics
Seppi d. Struff
Gasquet should be the favorite among this weak field. The veteran Seppi also looks primed for a solid run.
2018 ATP Pune Preview and Predictions: In-Form Kevin Anderson Highlights Field Steen Kirby, Tennis Atlantic
Fresh off an exhibition victory in Abu Dhabi South Africa’s #1 Kevin Anderson is the star of the ATP Pune field. Formerly held in Chennai, India’s only ATP Tournament has 250 points up for grabs on hard courts to start the season. Here is your full preview with predictions.
Top Half:
Marin Cilic should be happy to be able to start the season in good shape. He should ease past either Roberto Carballes Baena or local wild card Ramkumar Ramanthan before running into Pierre-Hugues Herbert or Yuki Bhambri in the quarters. PHH will serve it up against Marco Cecchinato followed by either Bhambri or wild card Arjun Kadhe. Bhambri has been a player of promise for a wild and he posted a solid season, mostly below the ATP level, last year.Look for Cilic over Bhambri in the quarters.
Abu Dhabi finalist Roberto Bautista Agut is as steady of a contender as they come, the Spaniard will get either veteran Gilles Simon or Tennys Sandgren in round 2. Simon had a miserable 2017, while Sandgren broke out last year, starting the year off right is big for both players. RBA looks likely to face Jiri Vesely in the quarters, Spaniard Ricardo Lara is Vesely’s round 1 opponent and making his ATP main draw debut. Ilya Ivashka takes on Sumit Nagal in a battle of qualifiers in the other match in this section. Bautista Agut should put away Vesely in the quarters unless Vesely has really improved in the offseason.
Bottom Half:
The bottom half should be dominated by Anderson, who served masterfully in Abu Dhabi, he’ll face either Ruben Bemelmans or Thiago Monteiro round 2, with Mikhail Kukushkin seemingly the best choice to sneak into the quarterfinals opposite the South Afircan. Kukushkin faces Radu Albot, challenger level players Laslo Djere and Marius Copil will face off for the right to face Kukushkin/Albot round 2. Anderson should cruise into the semis.
Enigmatic shotmakers Benoit Paire and Robin Haase could be set for a quarterfinal meeting, Haase faces the grinder Blaz Kavcic in round 1, while Paire will face Nicolas Kicker or Marton Fucsovics. Hungary’s Fucsovics is the dark horse here, he showed improvement last year and could make a run, especially since Paire struggled to end 2017. Haase needs to keep building his ranking after some good performances in 2017. Haase should beat Kavcic and either Jarry or Andujar, Andujar hasn’t played a match since 2016 and is returning from injury. Haase over Fucsovics is my pick in the quarters.
It would be a rematch of the Abu Dhabi final, but a sensible one, RBA and Anderson should ride a wave of good form into the final, with Anderson the favorite. Cilic leads the h2h with RBA 4-1 and won both matches last year but I’m not sure he’ll be at his best.
France and Belgium to Meet in 2017 Davis Cup Final Steen Kirby, Tennis Atlantic
European neighbors France and Belgium will face off in the 2017 Davis Cup final, as the depth of France will contrast with the team spirit of Belgium. The French saw off an outmatched Serbian side in the semifinals 3-1. Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut combined to take the doubles rubber, and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga won both his singles rubbers against Laslo Djere and Dusan Lajovic, making Lajovic’s win against Lucas Pouille in the opening rubber a moot point. Belgium had a great Sunday against Australia, winning the final 2 rubbers for a 3-2 victory in the tie. David Goffin and Steve Darcis combined to defeat Nick Kyrgios and Jordan Thompson in the Sunday rubbers, dropping just one set between them. John Peers and Jordan Thompson won the doubles rubber for Australia, Kyrgios beat Darcis on Friday, and Goffin defeated Millman in the opening rubber, as Goffin was the hero of the tie.
In the World Group Playoffs, young gun Denis Shapovalov led Canada to a 3-2 win over India, Marton Fucsovics led Hungary to a 3-1 upset of Russia, Yuichi Sugita got a pair of wins to help Japan beat Brazil 3-1, Cedrik-Marcel Stebe and Jan-Lennard Struff led a depleted Germany to a 3-2 win over Portugal, veteran Marco Chiudinelli starred for Switzerland as they defeated Belarus 3-2, Marin Cilic won two singles rubbers and the doubles rubber to help Croatia defeat Colombia 4-1. Holland and Kazahkstan were the upset victors in the playoffs. The Dutch led by Robin Haase won the doubles rubber and the last two singles rubbers for a 3-2 win over the Czech Republic. Thiemo De Bakker defeated Lukas Rosol in the decisive 5th rubber. Mikhail Kukushkin was a double victor for the Kazakh’s against Argentina in a 3-2 win.
South Africa, Sweden, Barbados, and Pakistan reached Group 1 for 2018 in their respective regions.
As Novak Djokovic and Tomas Berdych battled it out in the final of the Monte-Carlo Masters. Things were also heating up in Barcelona as the final stage of qualifying for the ATP Open Banc Sabadell commenced with four seeded player’s booking their place in the main draw.
Top seed James Ward produced a convincing match as he dropped only five games against Portugal’s Rui Machado. Going into the match the British number three had to overcome a tough three set match against wildcard entrant Eduard Guell Bartrina, a Spanish 16-year-old who is ranked 50th in the juniors. Fortunately for Ward he didn’t encounter such difficulty against Machado in the deciding round as he remained unbroken through the match to ease himself to a 6-2, 6-3, victory.
Andrey Rublev’s progression from juniors into the pro circuit got yet another boost as he knocked out second seed Norbert Gombos 7-6(4), 6-3. The world junior number one produced his first ever main draw Masters win last month when he beat Pablo Casrreno Busta in three sets at the Miami Open. It wasn’t all plain sailing during the match, however, as Gombos opened a commanding lead in both sets (5-2 in the first and 3-1 in the second) before the current French Open boy’s champion battled his way back to take both sets.
Rublev wasn’t the only junior to reach the main draw as Spain’s Jaume Munar produced a 6-2, 7-5, win against Argentina’s Pedro Cachin. Munar was the runner-up to Rublev in last year’s French Open Boy’s final. In the first round the 17-year-old was leading 6th seed Daniel Munoz de la Nava 6-3, 5-4, before he retired due to an apparent issue with his left knee. At 835th in the world, Munar will be the lowest ranked player in this year’s draw.
Dutch third seed Thiemo De Bakker endured two close sets before edging his way past Germany’s Peter Torebko. After losing his first two service games of the match, Bakker started started to generate more consistency on court against Torebko to enable him to take the 7-5, 6-4, victory. Bakker has only played in the tournament once before which was in 2010. On that occasion he produced back to back top 20 wins over Juan Carlos Ferrero and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to reach the semi-finals.
During the only three setter match in the final round of qualifying, Marton Fucsovics spent over two hours on court to beat Kenny de Schepper. The Hungarian 7th seed came from a set down to win 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(2). He had two opportunities to take the final set 7-5 but failed to convert as Schepper forced things into a deciding tie-break. Unfortunately for Schepper in the final, he suffered three consecutive breaks of serve as Fucsovics surged to the win.
The final qualifier into the Barcelona main draw is Yuichi Sugita. The Japanese world number 140 came into the qualifying draw with good form following his run to the final of the ATP St. Brieuc Challenger in France where he lost to Nicolas Mahut. St. Brieuc had been his first Challenger final since October last year. During his Barcelona qualifying campaign Sugita only dropped a total of five games (one against Juan Lizariturry in the first round and four to Oriol Roca Batalla in the final round).
The teens, Rublev and Munar both got interesting round 1 matchups against Benoit Paire and Fernando Verdasco respectiely, while Sugita will face Thomaz Bellucci, Fucsovics will face Andrey Kuznetsov, de Bakker takes on Elias Ymer, and Ward gets a winnable match with Marsel Ilhan
2015 Noumea and Happy Valley Challenger Previews and Predictions Chris de Waard, Tennis Atlantic
The Challenger Tour is ready to start off again, with two tournaments on hardcourts. One in Australia and the other one on the small island of New Caledonia, about 1200 kilometers east of Australia.
2015 Noumea Challenger Preview
Noumea Challenger
Challenger BNP Paribas
ATP Challenger Tour
Noumea, New Caledonia
January 5-January 10, 2015
Prize Money: $75,000
Seeds: (ATP ranking in parentheses)
1: Adrian Mannarino (44)
2: Kenny De Schepper (106)
3: Horacio Zeballos (123)
4: Jimmy Wang (124)
5: Yuichi Sugita (131)
6: Stephane Robert (134)
7: Adrian Menendez-Maceiras (135)
8: Bradley Klahn (148)
The last direct acceptance is Jonathan Eysseric, ranked 245th. Young Frenchman Laurent Lokoli entered the draw on a wild card and plays American Chase Buchanan in the first round.
First round match-ups to watch
(1)Adrian Mannarino vs. Enzo Couacaud
A French encounter between players who are almost ten years apart. 19 year old Couacaud made a big rankings jump in his final tournament of 2014, when he reached the semi-final of the Rennes Challenger, launching him from outside of the top 300 to inside the top 250. Mannarino ended 2014 with two Challenger victories in the United States, giving him a career high ranking of #44. He took a wild card into this tournament and should be a strong favorite to win it, considering he is the only player in the top 100.
(3)Horacio Zeballos vs. Gonzalo Lama
This is a match-up you would expect to find at the other side of the ocean, in South America and played on clay. But in preparation for the qualifying draw of the Australian Open, a lot of clay grinders are hitting the warm-up Challengers on hardcourt. Zeballos had an awful 2014 and was lucky to win a Challenger in Quito without beating a top 300 opponent, keeping his ranking somewhat respectable, albeit still almost seventy spots lower than he started 2014 with. Lama failed to win a set in his four hardcourt tournaments last year, but against this Zeballos, who knows?
Adrian Mannarino is clearly the favorite here and realistically I can only see two players challenging him. The first one is comeback kid Steve Darcis, who ended his 2014 with a final, win and quarterfinal in three Challengers, launching him from #355 to his current ranking of #160. In 2013 he beat Mannarino in straight sets in Montpellier. The other one is #6 seed Stephane Robert, who is making his comeback after being out with injury since Wimbledon. But naturally it’s hard to predict how his form is going to be. Both Darcis and Robert can not face Mannarino until the semi-final.
Bottom Half:
The bottom half has a lot more uncertain factors, making it harder to predict. #2 seed Kenny De Schepper had a reasonably strong finish to 2014, qualifying for the Paris Masters and Basel, but in his last tournament he had a first round loss in a French Challenger against #295 Laurynas Grigelis. The safe bet is to back De Schepper and #4 seed Jimmy Wang to face each other in the semi-final.
Predictions
Semis: Darcis d. Mannarino
De Schepper d. Wang
Ranking wise Darcis beating Mannarino might look like an upset, but his level is a lot higher than his ranking suggests. 2015 may well be the year we see Darcis back into the top 50.
Final:
Darcis d, De Schepper
Happy Valley Challenger
2015 Happy Valley Challenger Preview
City of Onkaparinga ATP Challenger 2015 ATP Challenger Tour
Happy Valley, Australia
January 5-January 11, 2015
Prize Money: $50,000
Seeds:(ATP ranking in parentheses)
1: Blaz Rola (80)
2: Marcos Baghdatis (85)
3: Andrey Kuznetsov (92)
4: Paul-Henri Mathieu (96)
5: Aleksandr Nedovyesov (129)
6: Hiroki Moriya (146)
7: Michael Russell (158)
8: Marton Fucsovics (161)
The last direct acceptance is Liam Broady, ranked 196th. There are a couple of dangerous Australian wild cards in the draw as well: Alex Bolt, Jordan Thompson and John-Patrick Smith.
First round match-ups to watch
Philipp Petzschner vs. Matteo Viola
Former world #35 Petzschner came back in June, after a lengthy injury lay-off, but hasn’t been able to make an impact yet. His best result was a second round in Kuala Lumpur, where he lost a three set match against #13 Ernests Gulbis. Currently ranked 421st, he faces Matteo Viola. The Italian will be looking to start off 2015 better than he finished 2014, racking up five consecutive losses.
1 seed Blaz Rola is projected to play former prospect Ryan Harrison in the second round. Will 2015 be the year where Harrison returns to his 2012 form? We will see. #7 seed Michael Russell will turn 37 this year, but will keep up the grind. He has a good draw, facing a qualifier in the first round and another qualifier or last direct acceptance Liam Broady in the second. In the second section there are a lot of guys who can get through to the semi-final, it’s a tough one to predict. #8 seed Marton Fucsovics has a kind draw and perhaps he can take advantage of the other heavy hitters being in the other section.
Bottom Half:
#2 seed Marcos Baghdatis made some pretty daft statements in the off-season, saying he aims to return to the top 50 in 2015 and eventually even the top 10 in 2018 or 2019, which seems wildly delusional. Nevertheless, top 50 should be possible for the current world #85, if he is healthy and motivated. He can make a firm beginning here, as he should be the favorite to win the title. Another player to watch in this half is Jurgen Zopp, the former world #71, who has struggled with his comeback from a serious injury in 2013 and 2014. But he finished off the year with a victory in the Helsinki Challenger, beating top seed and world #65 Jarkko Nieminen in the first round, so he should feel good coming into 2015.
