Posted by Steven on 9/11/2009, 7:13 am, in reply to "Re: Paris masters Battle Of The Boards"
81.86.247.14
PARIS MASTERS BOTB - DAY 1 'SYNDICATED' REPORT
Many thanks to all those who entered this competition - 207 entrants is a record for an autumn Masters, the first time we have gone over 200 for either Shanghai/Madrid Indoor or Paris Bercy!
Bercy is the players' last chance to affect the qualifying places for the WTF and our last chance to affect our teams' year-end BOTB rankings, not to mention our own individual rankings.
Despite so far unsubstantiated rumours of Potty not playing (not to mention rumours that Haas had swine flu, Tsonga was injured, etc, etc), there haven't been any late w/ds yet and the top 8 seeds have been heavily backed to reach the QFs, which should mean lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth in the next few days if past experience of Bercy is anything to go by!
DAY 1
Only two main draw matches were played on Sunday - James Flake made the Magician disappear in a cloud of dust then Llodra proved that he was a proper GEM, confounding the bookies and most of us (though not the ATP rankings) by losing to Becker.
Detailed results can be found at http://www.britishtennis.net/competitions.html and from now on they will be updated regularly each day, with 'headlines' appearing on http://twitter.com/botb1 as well.
TEAMS
Tennisopolis are the early leaders after they and the Feddies in 2nd managed to be the only full teams without any pointless entrants on day 1. They are followed by the top team in the overall rankings, Rusedski.co.uk, whereas current world no. 2 team TAT are bringing up the rear, just behind BT.net, the only other team that failed to average 50% on Sunday.
POSSIBLE YEAR END NO. 1 TEAMS
None of the top four teams in the overall rankings have points to defend in Paris, but their 7th best scores (which they will need to exceed in Paris to affect their total ranking points) vary slightly.
In order to overtake current leaders Rusedski.co.uk, the Feddies (currently 3rd) need to finish at least two places above them in Paris and no lower than 3rd, whereas TAT (currently 2nd) can only finish as the year end no. 1 team if they win Paris with GR and RF both failing to finish in the top two.
2008 year-end no. 1s Team CC (currently 4th) cannot repeat that feat this year, but they could finish 2009 a very honourable 2nd if they win Paris and the three teams above them fail to get counting scores.
INDIVIDUALS
77% of entrants picked Flake to reach R2 but only 37% picked Becker to beat Llodra. As a result, 59 entrants share 1st place after day 1, headed by new world no. 7 Jose Javier/Buyaka86 (RF), world no. 11 Dark_Necrofear (CC), world no. 16 Fiercehart (TA) and world no. 18 Porlock (BB).
At the other end of the table, 30 entrants failed to get either winner correct, including world no. 5 Jtdrum10 (TA).
WINNER PICKS
Only the top 8 seeds have been picked as winners:
56% Fed (despite him never having got past the QFs here!)
20% Muzza
11% Rafa
8% Nole (he's a 50% bottom half finalist pick to just 32% for Rafa though)
3% Potty
1% Tsonga
0.5% Verdasco
0.5% Kolya
The only finalist picks from outside the top 8 are Simon (3), the Sod (2) and single picks for Monfils & Cilic.
MONDAY
The most crucial Monday matches from a BOTB point of view are the two where the picks are almost 50:50, i.e. PHM v Tricky and Hanescu v Montanes. The full list, courtesy of Yorkie (AM), is:
CC-1: Kohlschreiber (88%) v Seppi (12%)
C1-1: Karlovic (92%) v Cuevas (8%)
CC-2: Berdych (96%) v (Q) Millot (4%)
C1-2: Beck (77%) v (Q) Kubot (23%)
CC-3: Mathieu (54%) v Troicki (46%)
C1-3: Hanescu (52% v Montanes (48%)
C1-4: Isner (89%) v (Q) Falla (11%)
CC-5: (WC) Safin (87%) v (Q) Ascione (13%)
CC-6: Ljubicic (91%) v (WC) Grosjean (9%)
QUOTES OF THE DAY
cazza99 (AM) causes mild panic: "The Valencia commentator has just announced that Potty has withdrawn from Paris." - there is still no corroboration (let alone confirmation) of this anywhere as far as I can see.
There were rumours about the Sod too, but Linda (AM) ended up wondering if playing safe about this made any real sense: "I have Sod losing to Cuevas, and on reflection that's unlikely to happen even if Sod has his arm tied behind his back!"
Given all these nasty rumours and the experience of previous years, NorthernLight (CC) suggests a new name for the Paris Masters: "Maybe they should rename it 'the Trainwreck Masters'."
mwoods (TA) may have worked out why things keep going wrong: "Gilles Simon in the semis...and I wonder why I'm never even in the top 50%..."
