Sebastian Korda

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It’s R16 Thursday at @CitiOpen

Posted by Admin on August 5, 2021
Posted in: ATP, Citi Open, Washington. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment
Photo Credit:  Peter Staples/Citi Open, Mike Lawrence/Citi Open, Ryan Loco/Citi Open

It’s R16 Thursday at @CitiOpen

Steve Fogleman, Tennis Atlantic

It’s hard to bust through Nadal’s wild opening win in Washington last night, but many other players advanced to the Round of 16 yesterday at the Citi Open and they’re ready for battle today in what is traditionally the best day of this tournament. Eight singles matches will determine the warriors of the weekend with the right to claim an ATP 500 title.

American players are common at American events, and that should surprise no one. In recent years, though, most of them are knocked out in early rounds by higher-ranked international players. This year is different Of the 15 Americans in the draw, seven advanced to the third round – the most at the Citi Open since eight in 1993. You can’t ask for more than that as a local fan. and you still have a chance to see six Americans in the quarterfinals and guaranteed to have one American in there as countrymen Denis Kudla and Brandon Nakashima do battle today for one of those spots. Nakashima is 10-2 since July 19.

Brandon Nakashima (Photo by Peter Staples, Citi Open)

Other opening matches today include Steve Johnson against Ricardas Berankis and Next Gen stars Jannik Sinner taking on Sebastian Korda, who are collectively aged 40 years.

Reilly Opelka

Late afternoon matches feature Kei Nishikori against Cameron Norrie, Reilly Opelka facing off against John Millman, and another Next Gen showdown with a pair of 20-year-olds: #2 seed Felix Auger Aliassime and Jenson Brooksby. Ilya Ivashka and Mackenzie McDonald will fight for a quarterfinal berth in the early evening match before all eyes turn to Stadium Court for Rafael Nadal and Lloyd Harris, the #14 seed.

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Deep @CincyTennis Qualifying Has Six 2021 Tournament Champions…and One @Sloanestephens

Posted by Admin on July 29, 2021
Posted in: ATP, Cincinnati, Western & Southern Open. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Deep @CincyTennis Qualifying Has Six 2021 Tournament Champions…and One @Sloanestephens

CINCINNATI, Ohio (July 28, 2021) – Six players who have won tour titles this season highlight the qualifying field entrants for the 2021 Western & Southern Open. 

The qualifying tournament occurs during Opening Weekend, presented by Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Aug. 14-15. Fifteen players – seven women and eight men – will advance out of the two-round qualifying tournament into the 56-player main draw fields for the Western & Southern Open. 

Four players who have won WTA titles in 2021 highlight the women’s qualifying field, including Sara Sorribes Tormo (Guadalajara), Liudmila Samsonova (Berlin), 18-year-old Leylah Fernandez (Monterrey) and 19-year-old Maria Camila Osorio Serrano (Bogota).

The field also includes Olympic quarterfinalist Camila Giorgi, who is fresh off two singles wins over opponents ranked in the top 15. Former US Open champion and 2017 WTA Comeback Player of the Year Sloane Stephens has also entered the qualifying field. 

Carlos Alcaraz and Sebastian Korda have claimed titles on the ATP tour in 2021, with Alcaraz, 18, winning in Umag and Korda conquering the championship in Parma. The 21-year-old Korda is the son of two-time Western & Southern Open quarterfinalist Petr Korda.
The men’s qualifying field also features players who went deep in previous Western & Southern Opens, including Jan-Lennard Struff (2020 Quarterfinals), Richard Gasquet (2019 Semifinals) and Yoshihito Nishioka (2019 Quarterfinals). 
An additional four players will be awarded wild cards for each qualifying field while an additional three players may join the ATP field through a special exemption. 

Dominic Thiem and Stan Wawrinka have both withdrawn from the ATP main draw entry list due to injuries. Alternates John Millman and Dusan Lajovic will now join the field. 

While the qualifying matches take place over opening weekend, many main draw players will also be on the grounds practicing. The main draw action begins Sunday for the ATP with a full slate of main draw play on top from Monday, Aug. 16. The full schedule is available here.

All tickets, including full series, mini-plans, single session and hospitality packages, are now on sale and information about available tickets can be found here. 

The Western & Southern Open will be held Aug. 14-22, with first serve taking place at 10 a.m. on Aug. 14 for the qualifying tournament. The men’s and women’s singles finals will take place on Sunday, Aug. 22.
The schedule is available here.

The Western & Southern Open, an ATP Masters 1000 and a WTA 1000, is part of the US Open Series and is held at the Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio.

2-4-8! Who Do We Appreciate? Three Seeded Players In @DelrayBeachOpen Quarterfinal Play Today

Posted by Admin on January 11, 2021
Posted in: ATP, Delray Beach. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

2-4-8! Who Do We Appreciate? Three Seeded Players In Delray Beach Open Quarterfinal Play Today

Steve Fogleman in Delray Beach

January 11–-John Isner, Hubert Hurkacz and Frances Tiafoe are clearly the ones to beat in this tournament at the moment. Those seeded Delray Beach Open seeds have a lot of contenders at their tails. Sebastian Korda, who beat John Isner at Roland Garros last year, is set for the challenge against the second seed nig man Isner.

Roberto Quiroz, the 28-year-old Ecuadorean with deep pro tennis roots and in his first ever ATP quarterfinal, will square off against the 4 seed, Hubert Hurkacz. Hurkacz hopes to be the 7th 4 seed to win this tournament. It’s been tours since his last semifinal berth, but former Texas Christian University standout Cameron Norrie will do his best to move on against 8 seed and 2018 champion Frances Tiafoe.

Finally, you’ve got a match this afternoon that will result in an automatic underdog advancing to the semifinals between Christian Harrison and Gianluca Mager. This is Harrison’s first quarterfinal and Mager beat his brother Ryan to open the main draw of the tournament. In fact, Mager is looking to defeat his third American in a row after a win over Sam Querrey in the second round.

I’ve said it many times and it seems to hold true. At the lower level tournaments, seeding means little.The experience and confidence the players earn on the courts prior to the main draw are often enormously valuable.

As far as coronavirus and social distancing protocols here, there seems to be a ramped-up enforcement. With fewer fans in attendance on Friday, there were more groups together in the upper areas of the stadium and plenty of chin-strapping. I looked at the ushers on the concourse below and was worried that these mature-aged volunteers wouldn’t be up to the task. Meanwhile, Delray Beach Police Officers were all over the facility and didn’t seem interested in managing the new rules. By the weekend, that had changed. Frequent announcements were made that all fans were required to be in their assigned seats and that ushers would be coming around to check those seat assignments. Seats were sold in blocks of 2 or 4 with alternating rows and the protocols appeared to be enforced more stringently. Though it’s completely understandable, my heart sunk a little during announcements that fans were prohibited from asking for selfies or autographs from the players. And that photo of Frances Tiafoe above? He says he requested it. The only reason his mask was down was because he’d just finished answering a few questions for me twelve feet away. Throughout the weekend, the announcer made a point to inform the fans that they were about to be part of a national telecast on Tennis Channel, as if to remind them that they didn’t want to give their own town a bad look on TV. Maybe that was the trick.

Armstrong Stadium Returns to Competition Today @USOpen

Posted by Admin on August 23, 2018
Posted in: ATP, New York, US Open, WTA. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Ernesto Escobedo, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)
Fanny Stollar, 2018 US Open (Photo: Steve Fogleman for Tennis Atlantic.com)
Nao Hibino, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)
Anastasia Potapova 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)
Katie Swann, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)
Mitch Krueger, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)

Many eyes will be on Louis Armstrong Stadium at the US Open in New York this morning for the first ever competitive matches since the stadium’s impressive rebuild. The building was dedicated yesterday and christened with an exhibition match and a concert, but today is where the shoes hit the hardcourts.

Young American Sebastian Korda takes on Argentina’s Facundo Bagnis in the opener on Armstrong. Three other Americans will have a chance to win on Armstrong today, as Kristie Ahn faces Ons Jabeur, Chicago’s Evan King plays Stefano Travaglia and Ernesto Escobedo finishes up the day against Marc Polmans of Austria. Yesterday, Escobedo had the support of a jam-packed Court 11 crowd cheering the American all the way to a frenetic 2-6, 6-3, 7-6(4) victory over top qualifying seed Jozef Kozalik that left Escobedo nearly speechless. After the match, I asked him what were the keys to his victory, and he replied with “I have absolutely no idea right now,” and then with a smile on his face, proclaiming that “it’s such a special place to play.”

Ernesto Escobedo, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)

Ernesto Escobedo, 2018 US Open (Photo: Tennis Atlantic.com)

 

Chung Out, 2018 AO Boys’ Champ Korda In @NewYorkOpen

Posted by Admin on February 2, 2018
Posted in: ATP, New York, New York Open. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

 

Sebastian Korda, 2018 AO Boy's Champion

Sebastian Korda, 2018 AO Boy’s Champion

Chung Out, 2018 AO Boys’ Champ Korda In @NewYorkOpen

LONG ISLAND (Feb. 2, 2018) – The world’s No. 1 tennis player on the International Tennis Federation (ITF) junior rankings and 2018 Australian Open boys’ singles champion, Sebastian “Sebi” Korda, has been awarded a wildcard into the main draw of the New York Open ATP World Tour tennis tournament taking place Feb. 11-18 at NYCB LIVE, home of the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

The 17-year-old Korda is the fifth American to win the Australian Open boys’ singles title and the third in the last 50 years (Donald Young, 2005; Andy Roddick, 2000; Butch Bucholz, 1959; Gerry Moss, 1955). His victory marked 20 years since his father, Petr Korda, won the 1998 Australian Open title. Sebi Korda’s commitment to the New York Open, his first ATP World Tour main draw event, also brings his family’s tennis legacy back to Long Island. Petr won the 1992 Waldbaum’s Hamlet Cup in Commack, NY, where he defeated legend Ivan Lendl 6-2, 6-2 in the final.

“I’m eager to get to New York and continue to follow in my dad’s footsteps,” said Korda. “This will be my biggest tournament to date on the ATP World Tour, and I’m looking forward to playing alongside a lot of great players.”

Hyeon Chung (Photo: TennisAtlantic.com)

Hyeon Chung, South Korea’s No. 1 player and Next Gen ATP Finals champion has withdrawn from the New York Open. Chung developed a blister injury on the bottom of his foot, which had forced him to retire during his semifinal match against world No. 2 Roger Federer at the 2018 Australian Open.

“Unfortunately I have to announce that I can’t play in New York next week,” Chung said. “I had been really looking forward to playing in front of the fans there as it’s one of my favorite cities. I was especially looking forward to seeing many Korean fans there. My feet have still not recovered from the events in Melbourne so I need more time. I am sorry not to be there, but I am wishing everyone a great week.”

“Naturally, we are disappointed that Hyeon had to withdraw, but clearly his foot injuries, as many of us have seen digitally and socially, validate the physician’s instruction not to play,” said Tournament Director Josh Ripple. “In the same breath, we are proud to present the world’s No. 1 junior and Australian Open Junior Champion, Sebi Korda, to the New York market as one of our main draw wildcard entries.  There’s no bigger stage to debut your skills than New York, and we are certain the community will love watching him compete.”

—New York Open

Korda Wins @AustralianOpen Boys’ Title

Posted by Admin on January 27, 2018
Posted in: ATP, Australian Open, Junior Tennis. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Sebastian Korda Wins Australian Open Boys’ Championship

Sebastian Korda, 2018 AO Boy's Champion

Sebastian Korda, 2018 AO Boys’ Champion

Seventeen-year old Sebastian Korda, of Bradenton, Fla., won the Australian Open boys’ singles title over Korean Chun Hsin Tseng, 7-6(6), 6-4, in Melbourne.

Korda, whose father and coach, Petr, won the Australian Open men’s singles title 20 years ago, became the fifth American ever to win the Australian Open boys’ singles title and the third in the last 50 years (Donald Young, 2005; Andy Roddick, 2000; Butch Buchholz, 1959; Gerry Moss, 1955).

An American has now been victorious at the last four junior Grand Slam tournaments, after Whitney Osuigwe (French Open), Claire Liu (Wimbledon) and Amanda Anisimova (US Open) all won major girls’ singles titles in 2017.

—USTA