Caught in the heat wave that has gripped much of the nation, the Atlanta quarterfinals were played today. Andy Roddick played a rematch of his very first final, coincidentally in Atlanta when he won his first final as a wildcard over Xavier Malisse. Roddick played Malisse again (as a wildcard, but number 1 seed) and
Today, four singles matches were played, and five Americans played, and in every match, the American won. Taylor Dent took on fourth seed Horacio Zeballos 4-6, 6-2, 6-0. In the only all-American second round, Mardy Fish took on Robby Ginepri. Fish continued to show the form that got him to the finals at Queen's and
Ah, I forgot to wrap up the weekend tournaments, so let me get that done. There were two clay court tournaments held last week. In the Swedish Open, there was only one non-Spaniard in the semifinals, namely Robin Soderling. He made the finals, but lost to Nicolas Almagro 7-5, 3-6, 6-2. Similarly, at the Mercedes
After Wimbledon winds down, the tour diverges for a few weeks. Those who head to the US, can play Newport, the last grass event of the year, and a little over a week after Newport ends, the US Open Series starts up the hard court season. There are, much to Nadal's chagrin, three hard court
Both Mardy Fish and Olivier Rochus have been on the tour for a long time. They've only met three times, but each time, it's been a challenge. They first met back in 2002 at Long Island which Fish won 6-4, 1-6, 6-3. They met once again, this time in Lyon, France, and Rochus won 6-7(5),
Much like Queen's, nearly all the seeds lost (Newport only has 8 seeds), including top seed, Sam Querrey. The only remaining seeds were Olivier Rochus, 4th seed, and Mardy Fish, 5th seed. Fish's ranking has dropped some since he last played. He was the top seed last year, but left the tournament to play Davis
Newport doesn't attract the best players in the world. At times, Fabrice Santoro who never got his ranking higher than about 20 and most of the time had his ranking around 40, was sometimes a top seed. The top 8 seeds at Newport are barely contained in the top 100. Having Sam Querrey, now number
There's only 5 weeks of grass tennis in the entirety of the tennis schedule. The week after the French Open (Queen's and Halle). Two weeks after the French Open (Eastbourne and the UNICEF Open). The two weeks of Wimbledon. And the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships held in Newport, Rhode Island, that coincides with the
AEGON must have a monopoly on all UK grass court tournaments which aren't Wimbledon. Sam Querrey just won Queen's, also known as the AEGON Championships. This week, there's another small men's tournament held in Eastbourne called the AEGON International. Most players like to take the week before Wimbledon off to fine-tune their game. You won't
Few players have won on three surfaces. Sure, we look at the best of the best, at players like Nadal and Federer who have either won career Slams or may win career Slams. But the average top 100 player does well to win maybe a dozen matches in their careers. It's not easy when you
