Tennis Prose




Jul/18

21

Newport Weekend

 

Marcel Granollers defeated Newport top seed Adrian Mannarino 63 61, the identical score of their first meeting in a 2005 Futures event in France when Mannarino was 17 and Granollers was 19.

Granollers has Mannarino’s number, he beat him in their last meeting in Rome three years ago on clay 63 60. Mannarino won their only other clash in Segovia, Spain semis 76 63 (hard court in 2009).

Granollers, age 32 and now ranked 124, will now meet Steve Johnson in the top semi, Johnson defeated Dudi Sela 62 63. Johnson won both meetings with the Spaniard, on hard court in 2014 and 2015.

In the other half (6-2), tall, long-limbed Indian Rankumar Ramanathan will battle Tim Smyczek, who defeated Jason Jung 64 in the third. Ramanathan beat Vasek Pospisil yesterday 75 62. The 23 year old Ramanathan, ranked 161, has never played the 30 year old American who is ranked 123. Ramanathan has a career ATP record of 14-16 compared to Smee’s 38-77.

Both players are in Newport this week without their coaches – Dustin Taylor for Smyczek and Juan Balcells, Sergio Casal and Emilio Sanchez for Double R.

 

The doubles final will pit Artem Sitak and Jonathan Ehrlich vs Marcelo Arevalo of El Savador and Miguel Angel Reyes-Varela of Mexico. The South Americans will be gunning for their first ATP title while 41 year old Israeli Ehrlich has won 19 doubles titles and Sitak has won three.

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18 comments

  • dan markowitz · July 22, 2018 at 7:51 am

    Could be difficult getting the finals in. I’m up in Newport to cover the finals and the 11 am Powershares Seniors event (can it really be a Seniors event when two of the players Lleyton Hewitt and Tommy Haas, could probably be still playing on the ATP Tour and James Blake is less than a year older then Roger Federer?), but as I write at 7:43 am, it is raining hard and the forecast is for “periods of rain.”

    Stevie Johnson is really capitalizing at the minor US tournaments having already bagged a title at Houston and now being in the finals against a Challenger player. But I guess that’s what Houston and Newport have become, events rarely played in, especially Newport, by the tour’s top players. The best here were Mannarino and Mueller, but with the quirky grass, they were both out before the semis. You either love the pot luck quality of Newport’s draw and the emergence of players who rarely get ATP-level eyeballs on them and then are rarely seen again after their Newport blip, or you get disconsalate like my son when he hears we’re going to be watching a Johnson-Ramanthan finals.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 22, 2018 at 8:43 am

    Ramanathan is a good player to watch, he has a nice game, Johnson is always a warhorse who gives you 110%, good example for Cal to see. I think Ramanathan can beat Johnson. I like this final, Ramanathan has been waiting for this breakout for a long time. He’s a good guy, did a Biofile with him at US Open, he was watching from he first row, the entire Paes Cerretani dubs match vs Krajicek and his Indian partner, I liked how he applauded Paes and Cerretani as they left the court. The draw was good this year but upsets decimated the bigger names. The biggest name of the draw Isner was forced to pull out.

  • Dan Markowitz · July 22, 2018 at 1:00 pm

    Cal and I are sitting right behind baseline closest to clubhouse for finals between SteveJo and Ramanathan. I’m struck by how big the Indian is. There have been tall Indian players, but none with the thick legs of Ramanathan. He leads 2-1 and has served and volleyed every point. On deuce court, he’s surprisingly served out wide each time to Johnson’s forehand. Ramanan has the softest of hands. SteveJo is having a tough time holding only two service games in.

  • Dan Markowitz · July 22, 2018 at 1:33 pm

    5-all first set and Johnson hits beauty inside out passing shot dipping past the lanky Indian at net. There’s not a ball Ramanathan can’t reach on this dead grass court. Steve just hit run around inside in passing shot to get BP and breaks with a deft backhand chip down the line at Ramanathann’s feet that he he sinks into bottom of net.

    This is Johnson’s fifth finals and the first finals for an Indian in seven years since Devarrman. If Ramanathan wins it’ll be first Indian victory on tour in 20 years since Paes won Newport in 1998. It’s sick that a guy #161 is in a tour finals. Steve wins first set.

  • Duke Carnoustie · July 22, 2018 at 2:57 pm

    Dan, my favorite Indian player was Rajesh Krishnan. He may be before your time. An elegant fellow with the racket.

    Jung get a crushed by Rubin in Atlanta. The feel good story has an unhappy ending.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 22, 2018 at 5:45 pm

    Well that is a very very good win for Rubin as we all know how well Jung was playing and with so much confidence. Rubin is that type of player who can evolve into a Ferrer or Schwartzman type juggernaut. Absolutely possible.

  • Duke Carnoustie · July 22, 2018 at 6:50 pm

    The Atlanta organizers have a sense of humor because tomorrow’s night session is DY v. Karlovic followed by Harrison v. Duckworth. I expect Harry to be the bigger man, like last time.

    Ramanathan heads from Newport to Atlanta and will face Taylor Fritz in his opener. Expect the American to destroy him as he comes in off the grass.

    Rubin faces Kokkinakis in the first round, with the winner facing Kyrgios. Kyrgios and Kokk are playing doubles.

    Bradley Klahn wins the Gatineau Challenger. He is slowly but surely showing why he was once the second-best American in the world.

  • Duke Carnoustie · July 22, 2018 at 7:01 pm

    In other news, Martina Hingis married today in St. Gallen, Switzerland to a former Fed Cup team doctor. He certainly cured her!

    It was her second marriage. She notably dated a bunch of ATP stars, including Stepanek (of course) and Magnus Norman. She also dated golfer Sergio Garcia.

    Once again, my invitation got lost in the mail!

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 22, 2018 at 7:37 pm

    Duke, I think your list of Hingis paramours is severely inaccurate. I think if you researched the matter more thoroughly you will add several more names to your list.

  • Duke Carnoustie · July 22, 2018 at 9:24 pm

    Scoop I was going to do that but the list was too long so I stopped and just mentioned a few. Others can undertake this important research project.

  • Dan Markowitz · July 23, 2018 at 4:47 am

    Duke, I thought his name was Ramesh but if you say Rajesh, I’ll go along with that spelling. (actually I just looked it up, it’s Ramesh, and he twice reached the quarters of the US Open and was all of 5-7, 140 pound) Yes, I remember him and loved his game. I had the privilege and delight once of sitting on the indoors court at the Rye Racquet Club in Rye, New York and watching Krishnan play in the finals of an ATP tournament that used to be held in Rye Brrok, NY when tennis was a popular spectator sport in the US and there were at least 5 or 6 tournaments including the U S Open and the Masters in the New York-area.

    The finals had to be moved inside because of rain and the courts were those lightening-fast indoor courts that used to abound at indoor clubs in the 1970’s and 80’s, and Krishnan’s hands and his footwork, even though I remember him being a little chubby, were mint. He had beaten Tommy Ho earlier in the tournament, but lost in the finals to Milan Srejber (I had to look this up too). Great player.

    By the way, I stayed and watched some of the Hewitt-Blake seniors event after the Newport finals and it was entertaining for awhile until Blake started missing forehands all over the place and double-faulted three times in one game, to which Hewitt said on each DF, “Sorry, mate. Out.”

    I like the format where its only one set, the players call their own lines with a challenge system and the players warm each other up before hitting the main court to play (they only take serves before the match) so they get right into the play. Haas and Courier who were playing the next match, were warming up on the hard court near the Media Room as we left.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 23, 2018 at 9:33 am

    Hewitt was training at the Newport site every day with top 200 ATP pros so it’s no surprise he dominated this event. I highly doubt Blake, Courier or Haas prepared on grass for this event and if they did their grass was not like Newport grass. Hewitt probably took the event far more seriously than the others, according to his IG he skipped his 13th wedding anniversary and his wife’s birthday to be in Newport last week.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 23, 2018 at 9:35 am

    Duke; Gimelstob, Stepanek, Sol Campbell, Magnus Norman, Julian Alonso, Ivo Heuberger, Sergio Garcia and former WTT coach Joe Guiliano.

  • Hartt · July 23, 2018 at 12:16 pm

    This seems like the active thread, so will post here.

    I just had the pleasure of watching 17-year-old Rudolf Molleker win in Hamburg over David Ferrer in 3 sets. Ferrer is past his prime and had a lot of UFEs, but he is never an easy opponent. Rudi was very impressive, has a good serve, good groundies, an effective backhand DTL, and was very composed in what had to be a big match for him at his home tourney. He has won one match on the main Tour before this and has one Challenger title. He is a few weeks younger than Felix – turning 18 in late Oct.

    Speaking of Felix, he won in SS over Andreozzi in Gstaad. So a good day for the kids.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 23, 2018 at 12:26 pm

    Molleker is stepping up this year. I saw him lose at Herr about four years ago and he was clearly a major prospect, a racquet company guy from Germany told me he needed to improve changing direction and opening up the court more instead of straight line down the middle of the court tennis. It’s evident now this kid is the real deal and on the way to big things possibly if he can stay on track. Good win for Felix to beat the hard hitting Andreozzi who beat Fritz in Paris in five sets and has two SS wins over Kozlov who has disappeared for about a month now. Kozlov was last seen training with Kyrgios in the Bahamas last week. Boris Kozlov just played two Futures qualies but didn’t get an ATP point.

  • Hartt · July 23, 2018 at 1:49 pm

    Felix has been making steady progress lately and is now at a career high of No. 131 in the live rankings.

    He needs to get back to Canada soon, though, and get some practice on hard courts before the Rogers Cup begins. He turns 18 on Aug. 8, so I imagine he will be scheduled to play that day.

  • Scoop Malinowski · July 23, 2018 at 1:55 pm

    Has anyone heard that Zverev is now being coached by Lendl who is with him at Saddlebrook right now.

  • Duke Carnoustie · July 23, 2018 at 2:32 pm

    Yes sorry Ramesh Krishnan, typo by me. We will call that an unforced error.

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