T44: Nur-Sułtan, Wiedeń 2020

[Damian]

Scouting Report: 10 Things To Watch In Vienna & Nur-Sultan

Spoiler:

An executive summary of what every fan should know about the coming week on the ATP Tour
Six of the Top 10 players in the FedEx ATP Rankings will be in action this week. The Erste Bank Open is an ATP 500 taking place in Vienna and the Astana Open is an ATP 250 in Nur-Sultan.

World No. 1 Novak Djokovic leads the way in Vienna, where he tops a loaded field. There are plenty of jaw-dropping first-round matches to watch, with Daniil Medvedev opening against Aussie star Alex de Minaur, Karen Khachanov playing Grigor Dimitrov in a battle of former Top 10 stars, Casper Ruud facing reigning Next Gen ATP Finals champion Jannik Sinner, seventh seed Gael Monfils challenging US Open semi-finalist Pablo Carreno Busta, and more.

Benoit Paire is the top seed in Nur-Sultan, the last of four new ATP 250 events that were added to the 2020 schedule as tennis continued its return following suspension of the season due to the COVID-19 pandemic. There is a good mix of home talent — including Alexander Bublik and Mikhail Kukushkin — and other stars pursuing a tour-level crown in Kazakhstan.

Listen To The Latest ATP Podcast:


Draws: Vienna | Nur-Sultan

Five Things To Watch In Vienna
1) Djokovic Returns: Djokovic will play the Erste Bank Open for the first time since 2007. That year, the Serbian lifted the trophy in his second appearance at the event. Djokovic, who is 37-2 on the season, will begin his run for a fifth title in 2020 when he faces good friend and countryman Filip Krajinovic.


2) Thiem’s Home Event: Dominic Thiem admitted before the tournament that his 2019 Vienna triumph remains the second-biggest victory of his career behind only his US Open title. The Austrian first visited this tournament as a fan when he was a young kid and he made his debut in qualifying 10 years ago, aged 17. This year’s second seed will begin his title defence against former World No. 4 Kei Nishikori.

3) Red-Hot Rublev: Andrey Rublev cracked the Top 10 of the FedEx ATP Rankings for the first time after Roland Garros and he maintained his momentum by winning the St. Petersburg Open. Rublev, who is chasing his first Nitto ATP Finals qualification, made the Vienna quarter-finals last year. The fifth seed will try to improve on that result this week, starting with a match against qualifier Norbert Gombos.


4) #NextGenATP Stars & FedEx ATP Battle For London: The Vienna draw is full of #NextGenATP stars, with Denis Shapovalov and Felix Auger-Aliassime leading the way. Two of the wild cards went to #NextGenATP players: Sinner and home favourite Jurij Rodionov.

The FedEx ATP Battle For London is heating up, with two spots remaining in the singles field at the Nitto ATP Finals. Diego Schwartzman, who is fresh off the Cologne final, currently occupies the final spot. The Argentine, who is having the best season of his career, will play 2019 Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters finalist Dusan Lajovic in the first round.


5) Loaded Doubles: The Vienna doubles draw is so deep that two-time Roland Garros champions Kevin Krawietz/Andreas Mies and the sixth-placed team in the FedEx ATP Battle For London, John Peers and Michael Venus, are playing each other in the first round and neither pair is seeded. The top seeds are reigning US Open champions Mate Pavic and Bruno Soares.

Five Things To Watch In Nur-Sultan
1) Paire Top Seed: Frenchman Paire is the top seed in Nur-Sultan, where he will pursue his first trophy of the season. Last year, Paire claimed two ATP Tour crowns (Marrakech, Lyon). The 31-year-old will play home favourite Kukushkin or Argentine Federico Delbonis in the second round.

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2) Kecmanovic Climbing: Serbian Miomir Kecmanovic won his first tour-level title in Kitzbühel following the ATP Tour’s resumption. Will he double his trophy count in Kazakhstan? The second seed will face a tough opening test against Frenchman Corentin Moutet or American Frances Tiafoe.


3) Bublik Leads Home Favourites: Kazakhstan’s Bublik is the sixth seed. He is a two-time tour-level finalist and he will try to go one step further on home soil. Bublik opens his tournament against American Mackenzie McDonald.


4) Aussie & American Flair: Four of the eight seeds in Kazakhstan are from Australia or the United States. Aussies John Millman and Jordan Thompson are the fourth and eighth seeds, respectively, while Americans Tennys Sandgren and Tommy Paul are seeded fifth and seventh.

5) Purcell & Saville’s London Pursuit: Max Purcell and Luke Saville made a dream run to the Australian Open final. Will they be able to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals? The Aussies can make progress towards that achievement with a big run in Nur-Sultan, where they are the second seeds.

https://www.atptour.com/en/news/vienna- ... eport-2020

[Damian]

Nur-Sultan Ready For Debut: How Do You Say 'Deuce' In Kazakh?

Spoiler:

Players to sample local delicacies during the Astana Open. But will they pass on qarta?
Tennis history will be made this week in Kazakhstan, as the Central Asian nation situated on the historic Silk Road hosts its first tour level event, the ATP 250 Astana Open in the country’s national tennis center in the capital, Nur-Sultan. Before we delve into what’s special about this new tournament, let’s start with a primer on the country and its sporting landscape.

Kazakhstan is a resource-rich nation of 18 million people that was part of the Soviet Union. It was the last Soviet republic to declare independence in December 1991. In fact, for a period of four strange days, Kazakhstan was the Soviet Union, as Russia declared independence on December 8, leaving just Kazakhstan as the lone republic of the once impossibly vast nation until they formally left on December 12.

Kazakhstan is the world’s largest landlocked country and the ninth largest by area in the world. It has some 131 ethnic groups—with Kazakhs and Russians being by far the most numerous— and shares borders with Russia, China, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan.

If you’ve never heard of Nur-Sultan that may be because the capital city was renamed last year. Located roughly 1,200 km north of Almaty, a large city of wide, leafy boulevards that was the country’s first capital, Nur-Sultan was originally called Akmola, then Akmolinsk, then Tselinograd during Soviet times, and then Astana, which means capital in Kazakh shortly after the city became the nation’s capital in 1997.

In 2019, the city was renamed to honour Nursultan Nazarbayev, who retired after serving as the country’s president for nearly 30 years. The Ishim River runs through the city; on one side, there are neighborhoods replete with Soviet-era architecture, but on the other lies a gleaming new city with striking, futuristic buildings, fountains, statues and monuments.

We spoke to Yuriy Polskiy, Vice President of the Kazakh Tennis Federation to learn more about this fascinating Central Asian nation and to get a sense of what this exciting new tournament will be like. Polskiy told us that the tournament won’t have fans, and players will be confined to their hotel and the tennis center due to ATP protocols. But don’t feel sorry for them, they’ll be holed up at the opulent Ritz Carlton, an award-winning resort hotel opened in 2017 that’s owned by Bulat Utemuratov, the tennis federation’s president.

Nur-Sultan

For those who come to the country as tourists, Polskiy highly recommends summer as the best season and he says that Burabay, a spa town with numerous lakes and imposing mountain scenery, is a must visit destination located about 200 kilometers outside Nur-Sultan.

Although they won’t be able to roam the streets of the Kazakh capital, Polskiy says the players will get to see artworks from the country’s top artists at the venue, and they plan to introduce the players to some of Kazakhstan’s culinary delicacies.

One of Kazakhstan’s claims to fame is that it’s recognised as the birthplace of the apple. Polskiy says that local apples used to be “as big as a baby’s head.” They aren’t anymore but they’re still particularly delicious and there’s a government agricultural initiative underway to try to bring back the gigantic apples of the old days. As a nation that was once inhabited by various nomadic peoples, the horse is an important symbol of the country, and as such, the players will have an opportunity to drink kumis, which is fermented horse milk, though only in the players’ lounge, not on-court during changeovers, along with cold horsemeat sausages, a local delicacy that’s also popular in Italy, France and other countries.

“The horse is considered the best meat here,” Polskiy said. “From a nutrition standpoint, it’s the healthiest also, because there’s not much fat.”

Other local treats include boiled sheep’s head, baursak, a sinful fried dough treat, pilau, a rice dish with lamb bits, and for the truly adventurous, qarta, a boiled and pan-fried horse rectum, made from the last section of the digestive tract, not including the sphincter.

Kazakhs love sports and they have some fascinating traditional ones that are an integral part of the culture. Kokpar is like a kind of no-holds-barred polo, played since Genghis Khan's times, where teams try to score using a decapitated goat as the ball. There’s also kazaksha kures, a kind of wrestling-judo hybrid, and baiga, where boys race horses they’ve raised, among more familiar sports that are popular, like ice hockey, football, weightlifting, and boxing.

You May Also Like: Scouting Report: 10 Things To Watch In Vienna & Nur-Sultan
Polskiy says that tennis is increasingly popular, thanks in part to the federation’s efforts to make the sport affordable for the masses. “Just to rent a court for an hour used to be around $50,” he said. “Only Almaty had good facilities, but now we have courts, indoor and outdoor, in all the of our 17 main cities.” He added, “Now it’s $3-5 per hour for a court, and for the talented kids, we let them play for free.”

Kazakh and Russian are the country’s official languages. Chair umpires will use Kazakh and English at the tournament. For tennis playing linguists who want to add some Kazakh tennis lingo to their vocabulary, the Kazakh word for deuce is teń. Rahmet is thank you in Kazakh.

The country currently has two male players ranked inside the Top 100, the rock-solid veteran Mikhail Kukushkin, 32, who has been as high as No. No. 39 and is currently at No. 89, and Alexander Bublik, a promising 23-year-old currently ranked No. 49 who became a sensation at Roland Garros for his sensationally tricky underarm serve. They’ve made it to the Davis Cup (World Group) quarter-finals five times—2011, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2018—and have taken 12 of their past 13 ties played in the Nur-Sultan venue where the Astana Open will be played. Kazakhstan is No. 12 in the Davis Cup standings and will compete in group B of the 18-team 2021 Davis Cup, alongside Canada and Sweden.

Nur-Sultan

On the ladies’ side, Kazakhstan also boasts a number of excellent players, including Yulia Putinseva, Zarina Diyas, and Elena Rybakina among others. The women’s team is currently No. 18 in the world in the Billie Jean King Cup (formerly called Federation Cup) standings.

The tournament isn’t open to the public, but one celebrity, the country’s President, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, may attend some matches. He’s a keen tennis fan who greeted Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic in the Ak Orda Presidential Palace after they played a charity match in the country last year. Polskiy says that the President is also a very good tennis player in his own right, and an even better table tennis player. In fact, he moonlights as the President of the country’s table tennis association.

The tournament will feature an excellent collection of established and emerging talents including Benoit Paire, Tennys Sandgren, Frances Tiafoe, Bublik, Adrian Mannarino, Fernando Verdasco, Tommy Paul and many others in the 28-player singles draw. (There will also be a 16-team doubles draw.) The players will follow strict safety protocols that include being tested for Covid-19 prior to arrival in the country and again once they reach their hotel.

Polskiy says he and his team had just six weeks to organise the tournament, which was granted a one-year 250 license because of the cancellation of tournaments in China due to the pandemic. But he hopes the tournament will become a fixture on the ATP calendar, perhaps in late September. “We would love to be on the calendar at this time because that’s when the players move from Europe to Asia,” he explained.

Although fans won’t be able to watch the tournament in person, Polskiy says that Kazakhstan, unlike Canada and most European countries, is currently open to travelers from the United States and many other countries that have limited travel opportunities due to the pandemic.

“Guests are prized and honored in Kazakhstan; it’s our duty to make guests feel at home,” he said. “Here if you disappoint or harm your guests, it’s a big shame on you.”

https://www.atptour.com/en/news/nur-sul ... tour-debut

[Barty]

Może Bublik ogarnie ten śmieszny turniej? Byłoby miło.

[DUN I LOVE]

Na ile oglądam tenis to wygra ktoś z grona: Michaił Kukuszkin, Cameron Norrie, Adrian Mannarino, Lloyd Harris lub Miomir Kecmanović.

[Barty]

Na ile oglądam tenis to wygra ktoś z grona: Michaił Kukuszkin, Cameron Norrie, Adrian Mannarino, Lloyd Harris lub Miomir Kecmanović.

To moja grupa to Bublik, Mleczarz, Vesely, Tiafoe.

[DUN I LOVE]

U mnie jeszcze Verdasco do tych podanych przez Ciebie.

No i liczę, że Emil nie da ciała, wejdzie do MD i coś tam wygra.

[no-handed backhand]

Novak powiedział, że to najmocniejsza 500 w jakiej kiedykolwiek przyszło mu grać.

Spryciula.

[Damian]

Wiedeń:
OUT: Schwartzman (ramię)
OUT: de Minaur (osobista sprawa)
IN: Sonego,
IN: Jung

[Kamileki]

[DUN I LOVE]

Taylor Harry Fritz nie wygra Wiednia 2020.

[Damian]

Nur-Sułtan - pary II rundy kwalifikacji:

[6] Damir Dzumhur d. [1] Yannick Hanfmann 6-4 6-4 ( A. Gabas )

[2] Emil Ruusuvuori d. Viktor Troicki 6-3 6-7(3) 6-3 ( R. Haigh )

[3] Yuichi Sugita d. [7] Marc Polmans 3-6 6-2 7-6(5) ( M. Kaukeyeva )

[5] Aslan Karatsev d. [4] Alexei Popyrin 6-3 6-3 ( Y. Ignatchenko )

[Damian]

Nur-Sułtan - drabinka główna:
(uzupełniona o kwalifikantów)

[1] Benoit Paire wolna runda
Federico Delbonis vs Michaił Kukuszkin
[WC] Timofey Skatov vs [Q] Emil Ruusuvuori
Cameron Norrie vs [8] Jordan Thompson

[3] Adrian Mannarino wolna runda
[Q] Damir Dzumhur vs [Q] Yuichi Sugita
[Q] Aslan Karatsev vs [WC] Andreas Seppi
[PR] Mackenzie McDonald vs [6] Alexander Bublik

[7] Tommy Paul vs Stefano Travaglia
[WC] Dmitry Popko vs Radu Albot
Fernando Verdasco vs James Duckworth
[4] John Millman wolna runda

[5] Tennys Sandgren vs Jiri Vesely
Lloyd Harris vs Egor Gerasimov
Frances Tiafoe vs Corentin Moutet
[2] Miomir Kecmanovic wolna runda

[Alan]

Novak powiedział, że to najmocniejsza 500 w jakiej kiedykolwiek przyszło mu grać.

Spryciula.

Ale pier**** . Na bank któryś Dubaj był obsadzony mocniej. Chyba ten wygrany przez Roda.

Kasia Nowak zaprasza na Buste z Monfilsem. Są chętni?

[DUN I LOVE]

Nie wiem co się stało tym razem, ale niesamowicie zaszkodził ten Covid Monfilsowi. Trochę na wyrost, ale być może zaraza zabrała mu ostatnią szansę na naprawdę udany sezon.

Pachoł w dwóch w Kazachstanie.

[Barty]

Pachoł w dwóch w Kazachstanie.

Po tytuł, Francesco!

[DUN I LOVE]

Rubliow kontynuuje paziowanie słabszych od siebie.

[Damian]

Basel: Where Former Ball Kid Federer Has Won 10 Titles

Spoiler:

Learn more about the Swiss Indoors Basel, an ATP 500 event

Established in 1970, the Swiss Indoors Basel is one of three Swiss ATP Tour events alongside the Gonet Geneva Open and the Swiss Open Gstaad.

The ATP 500 would have been played this week if not for the COVID-19 pandemic.

ATPTour.com looks at five things to know about the tournament.

Honour Roll
Half of the 26 players to occupy the World No. 1 position in the FedEx ATP Rankings have competed in a Swiss Indoors Basel championship match. Hometown favourite Roger Federer leads the way with a tournament record 10 titles, while former top-ranked stars Ivan Lendl (1980-’81), Stefan Edberg (1985-’86, ’88) and Jim Courier (1989, ’95) won the event on multiple occasions.

Bjorn Borg (1977), John McEnroe (1990), Boris Becker (1992), Pete Sampras (1996) and Novak Djokovic (2009) also claimed single victories at the ATP 500. Another four former World No. 1 players — Ilie Nastase (1975), Mats Wilander (1982), Andre Agassi (1998) and Rafael Nadal (2015) — have finished as runner-up in Basel.

In doubles, five players share the titles record with four tournament victories. Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan own the team record with four team trophies (2002, ’04, ’07, ’10), while Tomas Smid (1983-’84, ’87-’88), Daniel Nestor (2003, ’06, ’09, ’12) and Nenad Zimonjic (2009, ’11-’12, ’14) have also won the trophy on four occasions with multiple partners.

From Ball Kid To 10-Time Champion
For two years, Federer was a ball kid at his home event. The Swiss rode his bike to the tournament site and got the chance to share the court with the biggest stars in the game. Following the 1993 championship match, champion Michael Stich awarded Federer with a medal for his service to the event, a ball kid tradition that runs to this day.

“I loved being a ball boy here,” Federer told Tennis TV. “I was able to see the best players in the world firsthand and see how they would prepare, how they would sweat, how they dealt with the pressure. They're good moments for me.”

Five years after meeting Stich as a ball kid, Federer made his main draw debut against Andre Agassi in the 1998 first round. It took the Swiss eight years before he claimed his first Basel trophy. The 2000 and 2001 runner-up captured the Basel crown for the first time in 2006 with a straight-sets triumph against Fernando Gonzalez.

That tournament appearance marked the beginning of a dominant era for Federer at St. Jakobshalle Basel. Federer has reached the Basel final in every appearance he has made at the tournament since his first title run. Between 2006 and 2019, the 20-time Grand Slam champion made 13 tournament appearances, winning 10 titles from 13 finals with a 61-3 record.


Federer’s Pizza Parties
Alongside the annual practice of presenting ball kids with medals to honour their work in Basel, Federer began his own tradition at the ATP 500 in 2006: post-final pizza parties. Since his first title run, the Basel native has hosted a pizza party with ball kids in every year he has reached the championship match. Fortunately for ball kids, Federer has made the final in every year he has competed at the event since he began the tradition.

<a href='/en/players/roger-federer/f324/overview'>Roger Federer</a>

Novak Ends Roger’s Run
Federer entered the 2009 championship match chasing his fourth title and 20th consecutive win at his home event. But he was stopped by one of the brightest emerging talents on the ATP Tour: 22-year-old tournament debutant Novak Djokovic.

The pair was meeting for the fifth time in 2009 (tied at 2-2) and it was Djokovic who found a way to earn his third ATP Head2Head victory of the year against his rival in a three-set battle.

“It is an even bigger achievement than just a win, winning against him in his own city and his own country,” said Djokovic. “I understand that there was a huge amount of pressure on him to win today… I think we played a great match and I am really satisfied with this week.”

Djokovic returned the following year and booked another final meeting with Federer. On that occasion, the Swiss emerged victorious in three sets to move clear of Edberg and become the first player to win four Basel trophies.

<a href='/en/players/novak-djokovic/d643/overview'>Novak Djokovic</a> defeated three-time defending champion <a href='/en/players/roger-federer/f324/overview'>Roger Federer</a> in three sets in the 2009 <a href='/en/tournaments/basel/328/overview'>Swiss Indoors Basel</a> final.

Del Potro Goes Back-To-Back In Basel
Since 2006, Federer has lost just three of his 64 matches in Basel. Juan Martin del Potro inflicted two of those defeats in back-to-back championship matches. The Argentine contested consecutive three-set finals against Federer in 2012 and 2013 and held his nerve late in deciding sets to claim multiple trophies.

“The fans were cheering for him a lot, but they also respected me. They made a fantastic atmosphere,” said Del Potro after the 2013 final. “I think we played the best match of the tournament today.”

Federer gained his revenge four years later in the 2017 final, rallying from a set down to deny the former World No. 3 a third title. The pair has met on four occasions at the tournament, with both players earning two victories.

https://www.atptour.com/en/news/tournam ... tage-basel

[Kamileki]

[Damian]

Wiedeń:
OUT: Nishikori
IN: Sachko

[DUN I LOVE]

Trochę po cichu kibicuję Verdasco w Nur-Sułtan. Szans na tytuł raczej nie ma, ale każda dodatkowa runda na plus.