Julien Benneteau has been on the tour a while.  He joined the tour back in 2000, making it his 11th year on tour.  His ranking is normally around the top 40.  He played a few doubles ties in Davis Cup with Michael Llodra.  His ranking has slipped some, and now he’s 113.  It’s so low that France decided to name Benneteau as its wildcard choice to the US Open.  A few years ago, the French, US, and Australian Open made a deal.  The other two nations would get their choice of a wildcard in exchange for similar deals at the respective Opens.

Let’s look at example to make this clearer.  At the US Open, Australia sends one wildcard and so does France.  Australia picks whoever they want.  France does too.  Similarly, at the French Open, one American gets a wildcard.  The US usually does this by holding a small 8-man tournament.  The winner goes to the French Open or the Australian Open (they run a tournament per Slam).

France seems to avoid this, and just pick a player.  Given Benneteau’s once high ranking and his dedication to the Davis Cup, it seemed a natural choice to pick him.  Just in case you’re curous, Marinko Matosevic is Australia’s choice for a wildcard.

Benneteau seems to be showing he’s worthy of this by reaching the finals of the inaugural Winston-Salem Open, but his road hasn’t been easy.  He had to play qualies just to get in the main draw.  Then, in three consecutive matches, he’s had to play three sets.  He played a third set tiebreak to beat Andreev, then won a close second-set tiebreak against Stakhovky, fending off match point, then took an easy third set, then tonight, he had to win a close tiebreak in the second set against Dutch player, Robin Hasse, then was down a break, 4-1, before coming back to a tiebreak and winning it.

Early in the third set, the chair umpire had suggested that a shot Benneteau hit was in, and Hawkeye showed it in.  Benneteau thought it was a winner, and thought the point should be his, but the umpire called it a let.  Benneteau let this bother him to a break, but was able to claw back.

It wasn’t easy.  Hasse held serve to 5-2, then Benneteau held to 5-3, then Hasse got nervous trying to hold, and Benneteau played aggressive to break, to 5-4.  In the next service game, Benneteau was brought to deuce twice, then a third time, with Hasse lobbing over Benneteau’s backhand after luring to net, but Hasse got the overhead and returned it, then hit a forehand crosscourt winner.  Hasse hit a wild forehand error to give Benneteau the ad.

Even the tiebreak looked like it would go Hasse’s way.  Benneteau made an error to get down 6-4 in the tiebreak, with two match points.  Benneteau played aggressive to win the next point.  Hasse played a wild forehand out to get to 6-6.  Then, he double-faulted on his serve, to 6-7, then in a rally, Hasse hit a forehand wide to lose 4 points in a row and lose the match.

Hasse was looking to get to his second consecutive final.  He last played at the end of July, when he won in Kitzbuhel.

Earlier in the day, Andy Roddick, who had been playing pretty well at Winston-Salem, couldn’t get past tall John Isner, and lost, 7-6, 6-4.  Roddick said this was fine.  He got enough match practice, and while he would like to have done better, it’s good enough prep.

This means the final is between John Isner and Julien Benneteau.  It’s unlikely that Benneteau can win given the number of long matches, but if he does, he’s likely to win it in three sets, and appear to be down-and-out, but somehow come back anyway.  Isner should be favored to win with his power, but stranger things have happened.