The 2016 In Between Grand Slam Thread

Floppybits

Nadal beaten by Thiem in the semi Final of the Argentina Open on clay. Next up for Nadal is Rio.

yerwanthere123

Biggest title of Vinci's career thus far, a week before her 33rd birthday. Given how the last six months have gone I wonder if she'll reconsider her planned retirement at the end of the year? Bencic is now top ten, at the age of 18. Needs to start doing more at the slams now.

McGee was playing qualies at Delray Beach but lost in the first round to Ito. Del Potro will make his latest comeback against Denis Kudla this week. Haven't yet seen Taylor Fritz play yet but the signs are encouraging, reaching a final at 18 and taking eight games from Nishikori isn't to be sniffed at.

Meanwhile, the Laura Robson comback is.. not progresing. At all. Lost in the first round of qualies for a 25K event... to an unranked sixteen year old. I'm not writing her off or anything but Jesus, you'd think she'd be winning these kind of matches.

cowboyBuilder

NSFW

Carloline Wozniacki swimsuit suit in body paint

http://www.sportsgrid.com/video/lindsey-vonn-and-caroline-wozniackis-si-swimsuit-body-paint-videos-are-cool/


yum

whiterebel

Delpo starts back today. Hopefully he'll be ok this time.

RosyLily

Think he's playing at 8pm Eastern time. If I wasn't working such long hours, I'd definitely be staying up to watch it. Hoping there will be highlights from it floating around YouTube tomorrow.

C'mon Delpo!!!

Rjd2

Del Potro wins easily, but very little positives to be taken from that as Kudla was absolutely brutal, we will know more about Del Potro when he plays someone who is not as garbage as Kudla later in the week.

The forehand looked ok, but the backhand will be the concern, it looked tentative, but heh it really didn't matter as Kudla was horrible.

whiterebel

Rjd2 wrote: »

Del Potro wins easily, but very little positives to be taken from that as Kudla was absolutely brutal, we will know more about Del Potro when he plays someone who is not as garbage as Kudla later in the week.

The forehand looked ok, but the backhand will be the concern, it looked tentative, but heh it really didn't matter as Kudla was horrible.

He was probably so bad because he was ecstatic finding out he was playing the world number 1024, until he realised it was Delpo.

Rjd2

top 8 seeds in Dubai out after their first match.:p

yerwanthere123

Rjd2 wrote: »

top 8 seeds in Dubai out after their first match.:p

First time in WTA history, apparently. It's never happened on the ATP either. The one that concerns me the most is Muguruza. She's done nothing this year so far, although I'm seeing on Twitter that she still has pain in her foot apparently. Might be worth taking an injury layoff rather than trying to play thorough the pain.

cowboyBuilder

Rjd2 wrote: »

top 8 seeds in Dubai out after their first match.:p

Goes to show what a joke the WTA is ..

yerwanthere123

Sam Barry has got a wildcard into the Dubai qualifying rounds. Would be amazing for him if he could do it.

Vinci will become the oldest woman to make her top ten debut on Monday. Not bad. It's also three years today since Serena reclaimed the #1 ranking. She currently has the second-longest streak at #1, if she can hold on until early/mid September she'll break Steffi's record. This could, potentially, also be around the time that she equals/beats Steffi's 22 grand slams.

Rjd2

cowboyBuilder wrote: »

Goes to show what a joke the WTA is ..

Its absurd somewhat, but the unpredictability of the WTA tour if at times for the wrong reasons makes it so much fun at times.:o

cowboyBuilder

Rjd2 wrote: »

Its absurd somewhat, but the unpredictability of the WTA tour if at times for the wrong reasons makes it so much fun at times.:o

Perhaps, but imagine if the runner up at the French Open (haha right now that is the greatest tennis player on Earth) lost in any tournament 2 golden sets ...

Thats 6-0 6-0 each game to love ... NEVER will happen in the ATP, it has happened in the WTA ..

yerwanthere123

cowboyBuilder wrote: »

Perhaps, but imagine if the runner up at the French Open (haha right now that is the greatest tennis player on Earth) lost in any tournament 2 golden sets ...

Thats 6-0 6-0 each game to love ... NEVER will happen in the ATP, it has happened in the WTA ..

Never happened, but continue lying and fabricating to your heart's content :pac:

Tough draw for Sam Barry in Dubai, Mikhail Youzhny in the first round. Obviously not the force he once was, but still tough.

yerwanthere123

Three wins out of three for Del Potro, and zero sets lost. Pretty good going to beat a top 30 player too. How perfect would it be if he won a title in his first tournament in almost a year?!

Interestingly, it's only been a little over two years since he last won a title, feels like much longer.

RobertKK

That was an easy enough win for Errani in her biggest win in her career so far.

Floppybits

Nadal lost in the semi finals of the ATP 500 Rio open to Pablo Cueveas 67,76,64 on clay. This is on the back of loosing to Thiem at the same stage in Argentina last week.

whiterebel

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Three wins out of three for Del Potro, and zero sets lost. Pretty good going to beat a top 30 player too. How perfect would it be if he won a title in his first tournament in almost a year?!

Interestingly, it's only been a little over two years since he last won a title, feels like much longer.

Eventually lost 7-5, 7-5 to Querrey. Not a bad start to his comeback.

yerwanthere123

Yay, first title for Kyrgios. First of many I'm sure.

Hat tip to Francesca Schiavone, who won her seventh career title in Rio at the age of 35! Back in the top 100 too.

Terrible defeat for Nadal. If he can't even win smaller tournaments on clay against scrubs like Cuevas, well.. I can't see him sticking around too much longer.

Floppybits

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Terrible defeat for Nadal. If he can't even win smaller tournaments on clay against scrubs like Cuevas, well.. I can't see him sticking around too much longer.

It's been a disastrous start to the year for Nadal, loosing in the first round of the Australian Open to Verdasco and now loosing to Thiem and now Cuevas in tournaments where he was the top seed.

As for him sticking around, I think that depends on how competitive he is in the remaining Slams and ATP 1000's and also if he remains injury free. I think if he is going out early in all competitions then I can see him retiring at the end of the season.

cowboyBuilder

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Never happened, but continue lying and fabricating to your heart's content :pac:

Tough draw for Sam Barry in Dubai, Mikhail Youzhny in the first round. Obviously not the force he once was, but still tough.

Eh, It DID happen .. in the WTA a few years back the runner up of the French Open lost 2 golden sets.


edit - apologies, it was one golden set .. (but point still stands)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/tennis/wimbledon/9367463/Wimbledon-2012-Yaroslava-Shvedova-claims-golden-set-as-Sara-Errani-makes-unwanted-history.html

cowboyBuilder

What happened Sam Barry ?

Youzny just lost to M. JAZIRI ...

yerwanthere123

Kyrgios still rolling, beats Berdych for the second week in a row. Will play a potentially spicy match against Wawrinka in the semi's.

Doha an utter shambles, pretty much all the top seeds lost early. Ostapenko-Petkovic is one semi-final, with Carla Suarez-Navarro to play either Vinci or Radwanska in the other. Radwanska a set down in that match. Azarenka, meanwhile, won a match in Acapulco and then withdrew from the tournament and next weeks one in Monterrey. I do wonder what is going on with Vika these days.

mickmackey1

Djokovic fails to make the final for the first time in 18 tournaments - retires apparently with an eye infection when 1 set down to Lopez. Might have been better off conceding a w/o to preserve his 100% record.

lostcat

mickmackey1 wrote: »

Djokovic fails to make the final for the first time in 18 tournaments - retires apparently with an eye infection when 1 set down to Lopez. Might have been better off conceding a w/o to preserve his 100% record.

He had a chance to equal Lendls' 18 finals in a row record here as well. Hard to see anyone coming close to that again for a long time....

I think Djokovic is so conscious of the bad rep he (perhaps justifiably) received earlier in his career as a 'quitter', that he attempts to play every match nowdays - including a few in the past few years where he wasn't fully fit.

Pity kyrigos also retired injured, he is really throwing some nice shapes thus far in the year.

yerwanthere123

Ugh, Sharapova out of Indian Wells with injury. Not sure how bright the future looks for Maria.

mickmackey1

The great Bud Collins has passed away at 86. R.I.P.

http://www.atpworldtour.com/en/news/bud-collins-obituary-march-2016

RosyLily

Maria Sharapova to make a "major announcement" tomorrow. Lots of rumblings on Twitter. Injury update? New Sugarpova flavour? Or worse....retirement?

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

RosyLily wrote: »

Maria Sharapova to make a "major announcement" tomorrow. Lots of rumblings on Twitter. Injury update? New Sugarpova flavour? Or worse....retirement?

I see twitter freaking out that she's retiring.

Probably launching her new chocolate line.

I don't want to be too flippant because she has had a pretty terrible year with injuries.....

Hunchback

Wow!

I hope she doesn't retire. It really wrecked my head when Justine retired early. She was the only one who could keep pace with Serena. I know Maria has not been able to compete with Serena since she was 17, but the excitement that surrounds their games is always unparalleled.

Hunchback

And she is such a massive personality in the game. Can any of the knowledgeable frequent posters here tell me who amongst the younger generation I should look out for? Who has the magic? The spark?

One of my earliest ever sporting heroes was Martina Navratilova. I also loved Jana Novotna, Gabriella Sabatini, Amelie Mauresmo and Maria Sharapova. I have grown to absolutely love Serena because she is an amazing champion and has so much racism and negativity to deal with.

But who will I root for if Maria goes? This is not ideal at all.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

https://twitter.com/FortyDeuceTwits/status/706501462449213440

I'd stab a guess at she's not going to be able to play in the Olympics.

yerwanthere123

Oh wow, I'm worried now. It might be too much of a leap to say retirement.. but would it be a massive surprise either? She hasn't played much since Wimbledon last year. Oh god I hope it's not retirement

In other news, good to see Genie slowly but surely playing her way back to relevance, up another ten places in the rankings to #42. If she continues like this she could be seeded at RG.

Ireland, meanwhile, will stay in Group 3 of the Davis Cup after losing to Cyprus. Tennis can be funny that way, one week Baghdatis is playing an ATP 500 final against Wawrinka in Dubai, and the next weeks he's playing Sam Barry in Estonia

mickmackey1

yerwanthere123 wrote: »

Tennis can be funny that way, one week Baghdatis is playing an ATP 500 final against Wawrinka in Dubai, and the next weeks he's playing Sam Barry in Estonia

He's now broken Borg's Davis Cup record with 34 singles wins in a row, not many against household names mind you :pac:

yerwanthere123

Hmm, interesting

https://twitter.com/CMCKENDRY_ESPN/status/706889039677411328

RosyLily

If not retirement then what? Is she finished for 2016? Maybe she's opening an academy or establishing a tournament/charity?

mickmackey1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWxoG3FrmlU

RosyLily

Have the YouTube stream open. Some of the comments are too funny.

She's pregnant and Kokkinakis/Wawrinka/Stepanek is the dad. She's gay. Running for President. To name but a few!:D

Edit: Now Kyrgios is the dad......and she's marrying Putin!

mickmackey1

Those are the less outlandish ones!

RosyLily

mickmackey1 wrote: »

Those are the less outlandish ones!

I don't know. Baby Stepapova is outlandish to me!:P

yerwanthere123

If it transpires to be some cheap publicity stunt for something she's promoting I'll be quite disappointed in her! Doubt it is though, can't be anything other than retirement or injury, imo. It sounds a bit sad I know, but I've actually been quite nervous thinking about it all day

mickmackey1

If it's a US citizenship thing what an anti-climax

RosyLily

Go time!

RosyLily

Nearly 17000 people watching on YT. She's got an audience anyway.

RosyLily

She's taking her sweet time, eh eh??

*crickets*

RosyLily

Whhhhaaaaa???

yerwanthere123

Um, wow.

Dirty Dingus McGee

Kinda shows what a sham supposed Performance Enhancing Drugs are if she's taking something for real life medical issues and it's now moved from one day not being a banned substance to the next day being on the banned list and she is cheating for dealing with genuine medical issues.

There seems to be a ridiculously fine line between what is supposedly cheating and what isn't.

yerwanthere123

Ok. Well. A lot to say, but we know very little yet. My first reaction is why announce it when it doesn't appear she's been banned yet, or if there's been any consequences as of yet?

Anyway, this is horrible for her legacy. Her name will be dragged through the mud forever because of this.

RosyLily

Oh. Of all the things that crossed my mind, a failed drugs test wasn't one of them.

Just an oversight on her part imo - and her team. Surely someone would have checked this new list. At least she's come out publicly and said it instead of keeping it quiet. I hope to God this doesn't tarnish her career.

Probably a stupid question but I'll ask it. Moldonium was banned from the 1st January and she was tested mid-month. How long would the substance linger in the body?

Also, why was it placed on the banned list?