They may eventually become the new “fab four”, but they have yet to show the kind of talent that Nadal, Djokovic, and Murray have shown.  These “fab four” are Tomic, Harrison, Raonic, and Dmitrov.  All four are playing this week at the Shanghai Masters 1000 and three of them played today.

Of the four, Tomic is the most interesting.  In a way, he’s a bit like Murray.  Tomic loves playing off-pace shots goading his opponent to hit harder, and it can be difficult to deal with because you’re thinking about your shots just a bit longer.  Tomic’s Achilles heel is his speed.  Were he blessed with Murray-speed, he might truly be scary.  Tomic’s twist is his willingness to go for shots near the lines.  Murray off-pace shots generally aim kinda crosscourt.  He’s not using his lack of pace to put the ball close to the lines which would be a nice tradeoff.

This was the second time that Mardy Fish had played Tomic.  Where Tomic kinda faded in Tokyo, just played a week ago, Fish came out a bit quicker taking the first set.  Tomic won the second set handily 6-1.  Fish and Tomic were “even” in the third set, but it was Fish struggling to get out of his games in the final set, while Tomic was holding his fairly easily.  His lack of pace really seemed to bother Fish who wanted to use power to put Tomic away, but found himself hitting too many errors.  This lead Fish to serve and volley, and for the most part, he was able to do that effectively, but he found himself down again in the 4-5 game doube-break point.  He got out of one, but not out of the other, so gave Tomic a nice top ten win.

Earlier in the day, Grigor Dmitrov had hoped to upset Roddick.  Roddick, who lost in the first round last week in Tokyo, which lead him to a bratty “when are you going to retire” to a reporter that asked if Roddick, whose recent results have not been that of a top ten player, have prompted reporters to ask if he might not retire.  This didn’t stop Connors from playing years after he was relevant in tournaments merely because he loved to play tennis.

This time, Roddick held off the Bulgarian who, of the new “big four”, has yet to have a great win despite the moniker “Baby Federer”.  Alas, these names are always bad luck just like Harold Miner (who?) was nicknamed “Baby Jordan”.  You see my point.

Roddick won in a tight 7-6, 7-5 match.

Ryan Harrison played Viktor Troicki.  The two have met once back in Washington DC which Troicki won.  This time Harrison had the upper hand, 6-3, 6-3.  Troicki hasn’t actually played so well lately losing early in Tokyo (to Tomic), the US Open, and Washington DC although he did pretty well in Kuala Lumpur.  Harrison won this 6-3, 6-3.

The fourth of the new four, Milos Raonic, needed 3 sets to dispatch veteran, Michael Llodra: 6-7, 6-2, 7-6.

The two Croatians, Cilic and Ljubicic, who both went deep in Shanghai, lost early in Shanghai.  Cilic lost to Ramos (of Spain) in straight sets, while Ljubicic lost to 14th seed, Jurgen Melzer, also in straight sets.  Stan Wawrinka got a win over Donald Young, but it did takes 3 sets, including 2 tiebreaks in the first two sets which they split.

The top two seeds, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray, should play tomorrow.