Mutua Madrid Open

[inseedious]

What do you think about this hybrid draw? Will it be balanced, or will it advantage Pro/Regular characters?

[Woowhat]

Hybrid draw? Whats the difference between this and the one in Monte Carlo?
btw am I the only one who is not able to see which character are some guys using?
Vito DI MAIO , pidzi, tolsimir , Gmanke , Juani, kyuuji?

[C4iLL]

Well, what is sure is that the Pro tour draw is perhaps the less balanced since the creation of the tour, with most of the guys in form in the upper part (Cerji, Butcher, Clog, Richie, Vramvrim, VMoe & me). Robbin of course is in the other part tssss

[Woowhat]

aha, perhaps it would be more realistic to draw according to race list but thats not in the spirit of sport.

[VMoe86]

What do you think about this hybrid draw? Will it be balanced, or will it advantage Pro/Regular characters?

Are you joking? There is currently a bug (since the new tour has been introduced) so that the character chosen for some players is not displayed, but there is no hybrid draw.

Anyway, a normal draw for me: tdbchess will be interesting and tough first match, possibly someone from isaldor/Nadi madi/spencercarlos, but let's not think that far first.

Richie wins the price for the biggest balls when choosing his character.

[inseedious]

What do you think about this hybrid draw? Will it be balanced, or will it advantage Pro/Regular characters?

Are you joking? There is currently a bug (since the new tour has been introduced) so that the character chosen for some players is not displayed, but there is no hybrid draw.

Anyway, a normal draw for me: tdbchess will be interesting and tough first match, possibly someone from isaldor/Nadi madi/spencercarlos, but let's not think that far first.

Richie wins the price for the biggest balls when choosing his character.

Sorry, since Madrid regular tourney had just 5 signups, and I remember that the guys with no Pro player displayed are the ones who signed up for Madrid regular tourney, I thought the staff chose to merge the 2 draws. It would be quite a discutible choice, so asked for an opinion... Sorry for the misunderstanding.

[Vramvrim]

And here I thought that I had tough draws lately ! Going further than R32 would be a fantastic result for me.

[Florian]

Wow the worse I play the luckier I get concerning draws it seems...^^

[El Croato]

Mutua Madrid Open - First Round

El Croato (R. Federer) VS. lemonstroso (J. Del Potro) 3/6 6/1 6/4

Well, another three-set thriller for me. It seems like this has become a tendency with me.

In the first set, I tried to give my all, but nothing worked as expected and this was because of the fantastic tennis show lemonstroso was keen on putting up on the Madrid central court. He was everywhere, I had the feeling his Del Potro lost some weight and ran the same way as the Duracell rabbits. When he broke me, I knew I would never come back to win the first set, he was just too good back then, which kinda made me lose confidence for the second set. If I didn't succeed in raising my level, I would probably lose this in straight sets. Fortunately, I played the set of my life against the Del Potro character, who is - together with Richard Gasquet (the so-called Riri) - my biggest bugbear on the tour, as I hit the lines quite often and found good depth on most of my strikes, to say nothing of the high percentage of my first serves (55/69 --> 80%, a new record for me). This resulted in me winning the second by six games to one. There, I was on fire, but I tried to remain clear-sighted and knew exactly what was waiting for me in the third set: a merciless battle.

The breadstick lemonstroso received in the second set did not seem to have affected him at all as he rapidly got back on track, hitting extremely powerful forehand winners. My strategy was to weather out the storm and wait for the right opportunity to break him. This happenned in the middle of the final set. So all I had to do was to confirm that golden break, which was far from being a child play. At 5-4, he had one or two break points if I remember well, but I managed to serve them out. I had the feeling I would have to hit only winners if I wanted to snatch victory as he was returning every strike of mine. The last point was the most intense of our match, it is worth watching in my opinion as both of us bombed each other with insanely powerful strikes, but in the end, Roger hit a short forehand acceleration of his own and it was over. Lemonstroso, if you have the .dmo of that point, could you please post it onto this forum?

Funny stat: I hit more winners with Fed's backhand than with his forehand. ^^

So, thank you for that match, lemonstroso, and good luck in your next tournaments. As for me, I hope I can achieve some good result here in Madrid and I'd better learn how to tap-dance properly so as to celebrate an unexpected exploit.

[C4iLL]

Second round, C4iLL (Gasquet) vs Sorauze (Djokovic) = 6-7, 6-4, 4-6

Well, I faced an excellent Sorauze today, the work I did with him paid, regarding the great level he managed to reach !
On my side I really think I did everything I can with Gasquet on this surface. I thought I made a great choice by picking him, but once again I made a mistake in this domain : as the rebound is less present, and the ball faster, you lack of power with Gasquet to hit winners from baseline against a fast player as djokovic. I felt it in practice yesterday vs Florian and today it was a real confirmation of that...

In defense, the Spin can't neutralize Djokovic's backhand here as it's less high. And as the match and the exchanges goes on, your stamina decreases a lot, which is less the case of Djokovic, and you finally can't hit a single winners. The unique solution to earn points is simple : Service Volley. Without that I would have lost in 2 sets, perhaps even a baggel or breadstick !
So what could have been a good matchup in the usual clay became something like a nightmare unfortunately ^^

First set, I was quickly led 3-0 and nearly 4-0 due to both mistakes and a high level from Sorauze. I increased my level to come back at 3-3 but that required a lot of stamina. Till the tie-break I think I had several opportunities to win the set, but I was a bit overconfident, thinking I will win at the end lol.

Tie-break, we had several mini breaks each other, and I lost it because I was too passive I think, thinking nothingcan happen to me.

Second set : I was really angry against me, I had a break soon, I was always close to get a second break, but didn't manage to do it.
I think I used too much stamina there and this was a mistake, I should have only focus on my service.
I finally won it 6-4 by doing a lot of SV but he was extremely close to break at 5-4. At the end of the set I told myself that it would be a miracle if I won the third because to my ability to hit winners was dead.

Third set : it's extremely simple : all my services games were played as a SV. All of them went pratically to deuce. I don't know how I survived till 5-4 ^^

He was really dominant, impossible to beat from baseline because of the lack of power, so he won all his service game 40-0 Except at 2-2 where I had one break point opportunity. As I had no more energy there, we played a 70 shots exchange, and Gasquet finished to make a fault...

At 5-4 for him, I finally made errors at the net, and he logically won.

This defeat is a combination of three things : great technical and tactical level from Sorauze, my mistake to pick Gasquet on this surface, my inability to manage stamina well on this matchup. I made 55 faults at the end, because of these three factors, and then logically lost...

[VMoe86]

No reports here since last Saturday? Time to summarize my path to the QF! I picked Verdasco since he seemed to be a good choice.

R32 against tdbchess (Djokovic): 6-1, 6-1

The conditions were slightly windy and the day before (when we arranged the match for Monday evening) he told me that he is not that comfortable with Djokovic as he is with Federer or Haas. So, I was quite confident going into that match since I also had good practice before against other Djokovic users. The start was difficult, though, quickly 0-30 down in my first service game, but I turned it around was never in danger in the first set. I noticed that from the baseline alone he'd be a tough opponent, but eventually he was too defensive and allowed me to finish points at the net consistently. Second set he got a bit more into service games, but I broke his resistence and it got easier. I certainly don't remember any match in which I won 17 out of 21 net approaches.

R16 against isaldor (Wawrinka): 6-2, 6-3

I expected a tougher match simply due to facing Wawrinka. Then isaldor also told me before the match that he has little connection problems and indeed the ping was variating a bit, resulting in some turtles/lag. So, we both started with holding serve until 2-2 and then I caught some fire to clinch the next 4 games to win the 1st set, but he played some great points, turning around long rallies and winning them, some good net play.

Second set I start with 40-0 on serve and suddenly it is deuce, he was catching fire on return! I survived that first game and held for 1-0, but couldn't do anything on his serve, 1-1. Then he continued with great returns and broke, 2-1 for him in 2nd set. I was then extremely focused to break back immediately and I did. Then it was also easy on serve, which allowed me to put pressure on him. Somehow he held for 3-3, saving BPs, but then at 4-3 I could finally break and served it out without any problems.

Here I was worse at the net, but could be aggressive in the Short and Medium Rallies, so it was not a problem. He made a bit too many mistakes, but showed some great level at times, turning around points I thought were mine. Good game!

Next up is either Vramvrim or Richie. I expect Vramvrim since that match-up (Federer vs. Lopez) should be favourable for him, but let's see -- he certainly must be in great form winning 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 against Clog!

[Michael.D]

R16: Robbin92 def MichaelD 6/7 6/0 6/1

I really tried...
Robbin is better than me. (Carlos-Serena gif pls)

http://img541.imageshack.us/img541/7787/serenagif.png

[spencercarlos]

R16: Robbin92 def MichaelD 6/7 6/0 6/1

I really tried...
Robbin is better than me. (Carlos-Serena gif pls)

http://img541.imageshack.us/img541/7787/serenagif.png

After such result..MichaelD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... 45E#t=320s

Very weldone Robbin, you have fully exposed this non sense of a player yet one last time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... JweA#t=87s

[Michael.D]

Paulina Martinez (LA USURPADORA)
After such result..MichaelD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... 45E#t=320s

Very weldone Robbin, you have fully exposed this non sense of a player yet one last time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... JweA#t=87s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=LGQCepITzGc#t=1398s

[C4iLL]

Too bad, I would have appreciated a lot a MichaelD's victory :s