Brasil Open Sao Paolo 250 Clay

[herios]

Draw:

http://www.atpworldtour.com/en/scores/current/sao-paulo/533/draws

 

[GameSetAndMath]

They would have given Ralph a WC, if he wanted one. :cover

 

[Fiero425]

They would have given Ralph a WC, if he wanted one. :cover

:lolz: :clap :angel:

 

[mrzz]

This time I will get to see some matches...

By the way, it is "São Paulo", and not "Sao Paolo".

Edit: Tickets for finals and semis in hand... maybe I can also see something tomorrow.

 

[isabelle]

They would have given Ralph a WC, if he wanted one. :cover

Too strong field for Nadal !!

 

[herios]

They would have given Ralph a WC, if he wanted one. :cover

Too strong field for Nadal !!

:laydownlaughing

 

[mrzz]

As I noted elsewhere, Thiago Monteiro has a short but quite good ATP carrer so far. Three matches, one win over Tsonga, one competitive loss to eventual Rio champion Cuevas and now a win over Almagro.

He is 21 (I now that most here like to follow the younger generation. With few exceptions, I root against them), and some years ago won one slam as a junior (I guess AO), but after that had to deal with a lot of injuries. Just before Rio Open he was around #330...

 

[mrzz]

As I am basically the only one posting on this thread, I will start to offend posters to get attention:

Front, you are a Nadal fan that screams in front of the TV when you see him.

Kieran, Irish beer tastes like English piss.

El Dude, 45% of your stats are wrong, 35% are useless and 30% are biased. This is so bad that it doesn't even sum up right.

Murat, Yoda is just a green old Smurf.

Administrators, all ATP players take all PED's available in the market, twice a day. I have photographic proof but I don't wanna show it.

Kirijax, you are a Berdych fan. Oh, wait...

Now that I got this out of my system, Brazilian wild card Thiago Monteiro won another match. I saw the last set and the guy can keep his cool. Facing break points at 15-40 (serving at 3-2 in the last set), he fired two straight aces, and went on to win the last set 6-2.

He is now 3-1 in ATP matches. Not bad for a guy who was #338 in the world last week.

 

[isabelle]

Top seed Paire is out, poor Brasil Open !!

 

[herios]

While Monteiro does so well, the top Brazilian, Bellucci does not take advantage of this weaker field and loses to an unheralded Spanish player, Carballes Baena, who has never been in the top 100 yet.
Some good opportunities here for less known clay court players.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Ok. We have a battle betwee two Pablos in the finals. Talking of the Pablos family, what happened to the other Pablo (Andujar) who choked against Rafa last year in Rio. He does not seem to be in action?

 

[mrzz]

I watched the Cuevas match yesterday. The guy is pretty solid, specially on break points. Good defensive back hand slice, defends well. The classical clay courter. If he had a DTL backhand, he would be dangerous even for the top dogs at the big stages.

 

[herios]

Ok. We have a battle betwee two Pablos in the finals. Talking of the Pablos family, what happened to the other Pablo (Andujar) who choked against Rafa last year in Rio. He does not seem to be in action?

Pablo Andujar had a pectoral injury since October, which led to end his season early. He did not come back in January either, just started competing on clay in February, but with timid results so far.
He played here but was upset by Elias.

 

[mrzz]

Just came from the match, a few words about it (I'm posting this in two different forums):

Cuevas won, in a good match, closely contested first set, blowout in the second. Cuevas, as always, pretty solid, but in a few games here and there. He takes some risks in some receiving games, but hardly puts a foot wrong in his serving games. He always steps up in the pressure points. He is more a grinder than an attacker, but he surprises the opponent with some winners out of the blue. Good back hand, good slice, he can keep the ball very, very low. He really should practice the DTL BH. This time he tried twice (zero in the semis), one net cord (lost the point) and one winner.

Careno-Busta is a good player, good forehand, more aggressive than the average Spanish clay-courter, but lacks some explosion, and his shot selection is sometimes poor. Could have a better foot work too (by the way, Cuevas is pretty good in that department).

If you find some re-runs or internet videos of the match, please watch the third game from the second set. It was a classic. Five or six insanely good points. It was worth my both tickets.

The only bad thing about today's match was the way it ended. Cuevas served for the match at 5-2, played quite bad, two double faults, one near miss and one ugly miss, and lost the game. It was more lack of focus than anything else, as Careno-Busta was already more than beaten at this point. Cuevas breaked for the title in another poor game, as Careno-Busta was playing with his head down since he missed an easy overhead at 40 all while he was trailing 1-3, and trying to stay on the match.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

This week results basically shows if you beat Rafa could things happen to you not only in that tourney and in later tourneys due to confidence gained.