In awe of a narky Scottish God

[Janik]

Liam's reward for beating Dudi Sela on his favourite court in the whole wide world is to play Joris De Loore in the QFs. They also met last week in Aptos and Broady won 2&2 so he should be pretty confident about his chances. Naomi's victory over Arantxa Rus gets her a shot at #8 Danka Kovinic. N.Broady-Kovinic is a R2 match, so happens today, whilst Liam has the day off. Also due up today in Vancouver are doubles QFs featuring #2 N.Skupski/Cerretani and #4 Rae/Moore. And only those, despite all four Women's dubs quarters being on the schedule as #2 Smith/Melichar, N.Broady/Bonaventure and Webley-Smith/Grammatikopoulou all went out in R1 yesterday.
In other Challengers Tara Moore was beaten in R1 of Montreaux yesterday, which just leaves Clayton/O'Mara in Meerbusch, Germany. Their QF is today.

Meanwhile, up at the big show in Cincinnati, J.Murray/Soares won their R2 match against Carreno Busta/Verdasco yesterday. Their QF opponent is TBC. On the schedule today is Jo Konta versus Dominika Cibulkova in the last 16, third match on stadium 3. Best guess of start time is ~2:30pm local (it follows Wozniacki vs Barty which is to start not before 1pm). Add five hours for UK time, so 7:30pm ish depending on the length of the previous match.


In non-British news, I missed that all four no.1 rankings had the potential to change this week, which has to be rare as hens teeth.
The men's singles and doubles ones are already confirmed, both in underwhelming fashion. Rafael Nadal taking over the singles top spot from Andy Murray after Murray and then Federer withdrew was widely reported. Henri Kontinen's return to no.1 in the doubles less so - and Kontinen also got there somewhat by default as his and Peers R2 opponents in Cincy, Bautista Agut/Ferrer, handed them a walkover which was all the points Kontinen needed to displace Marcelo Melo.
On the Women's side Angie Kerber dropped out of the running for the singles no.1 when she was beaten by Makarova and Caroline Wozniacki is also now unable to return to the top (this week) after Karolina Pliskova won her R2 match. It means that only Halep and Svitolina can now displace Pliskova ahead of the US Open. The doubles no.1 is a match away from altering as well, though this will likely leave the new holder somewhat conflicted. If Safarova/Strycova win their QF today it will take Lucie Safarova to no.1. It will be a tough ask as their opponents are Barty/Dellacqua. If Safarova does claim top spot, she will be doing so at the expense of injured partner and BFF Bethanie Mattek-Sands.

[Janik]

On the injury front, another one bites the dust.
Keep the w/c 13th November clear in your diaries, people. At this rate ownership of a racquet might be enough to get a game...

[Satchmo Distel]

Venus lost but other American women did well. Must be a good chance that Venus will not be the American woman who goes farthest in the US Open. American men did not so good yesterday and I wonder if any of them will make the last 16. Svitolina and Wozniacki power on.

[Satchmo Distel]

OTOH I overlooked Tiafoe beating Zverev. Plays Isner next.

[Janik]

Venus lost but other American women did well. Must be a good chance that Venus will not be the American woman who goes farthest in the US Open.

I'm not so sure of that, myself. Madison Keys and Coco Vandeweghe are both highly talented, and showed good form on the hyper-fast courts of Stanford that really suit their power games, but Flushing Meadow is a bit slower. Still quick but not as thunderous fast as Palo Alto. And both of them run rather hot and cold - Keys tightened up noticeably today when she was in a winning position against Muguruza. And both have struggled with the pressure at slams before. Sloane Stephens has also played well in the last two weeks, the sort of controlled aggressive hitting from the baseline and big serving that she showed when she first broke through, which is nice to see after her injury struggles (apart from from a Czech perspective, as she has beaten Lucia Safarova and Petra Kvitova in both events!), but it is still early in her comeback. A deep run in a Slam would be a shock, even with her form. As for Venus, yes, she is going out early but then that has been in the case for most of the year... apart from the Slams. Her record in those is Final, QF, Final. She has the most match wins in them of anyone on the WTA tour. It wouldn't seem a wild suggestion that she might be targeting her effort at the Slams. And as such, she still seems the likeliest American to be involved at the end of the second week.

Someone else who hopes to still be around at the death in New York is Jo Konta. If she plays to the standard she just displayed against Domi Cibulkova, she has every chance. Konta won 6-3 6-4, which reads as quite straightforward. However it took one-and-three-quarter hours which is an age for a two set match not featuring tie-breaks to last. It did so as many games, particularly in the second set, went to deuce time and again. Konta came through, and ended in a rush breaking to 30 at 4-4 in the second and then holding to love when serving it out. Next up for her is yet another meeting with Simona Halep, which I make their fourth of the year. It's becoming a real rivalry. There is so often more than just getting through a round riding on their confrontations as well.

[Satchmo Distel]

Nadal v Ramos-Viñolas Round of 16 was rained off so is being played at 1pm EST. There will be an American semi finalist (Isner v Donaldson is a QF).

Fair points about Venus. She knows how to pace her season to peak in the Slams. However, she could get a tough draw as she is outside the Top 8.

[Janik]

The splits that seem more important to me are between 4 and 5, and then 12 and 13 rather than 8/9. As she is at no.9, i.e. in the 9-12 bracket, Venus would get one of the 5th to 8th seeds in R4, which is Muguruza, Kerber, Konta or Kuznetsova as things currently stand. That isn't massively different in level from the rest of the current 9-12 group, Radwanska, Cibulkova, Ostapenko, which is who Venus would have been drawn against in the last 16 if she was one spot higher (or still could be if one of the top 8 gets hurt and withdraws). 9-12 run into the top four at the exact same time as 5-8 do; the QFs. They do get different R3 opponents, as 9-16 face off with 17-24 rather than 25-32, which is who 1-8 get pitted against. But Elena Vesnina or Dasha Gavrilova? That is probably much or a muchness as far as Venus is concerned.


Last 16 match ups;
1-4 vs 13-16
5-8 vs 9-12

Last 32 match-ups
1-8 vs 25-32
9-16 vs 17-24

Current groupings

Karolina Pliskova
Simona Halep
Elena Svitolina (might be displaced by further wins for Wozniacki and Muguruza)
Caroline Wozniacki (keeps her top four spot if Muguruza doesn't make the final and Konta doesn't win the tournament)

Garbine Muguruza (can jump Wozniacki if she reaches the final and Caroline doesn't, could also go past Svitolina by taking the title)
Angie Kerber
Jo Konta (could reach top 4 by winning Cincy title, whilst Wozniacki goes out in the QFs and Muguruza doesn't make the final)
Svetlana Kuznetsova

Venus Williams
Aga Radwanska
Dominika Cibulkova
Jelena Ostapenko

Kiki Mladenovic
Petra Kvitova
Madison Keys
Anastasija Sevastova

Elena Vesnina
Caroline Garcia
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova
Coco Vandeweghe
Ana Konjuh
Shuai Peng
Barbora Strycova
Kiki Bertens (might be displace by Goerges)

Dasha Gavrilova
Anett Kontaveit
Shaui Zhang
Lesia Tsurenko
Mirjana Lucic-Baroni
Magdalena Rybarikova
Julia Goerges (still going in Cincy, could push into 17-24 bracket by making the Semis)
Lauren Davis (could be displaced by Ekaterina Makarova if the Russian wins one more match in Ohio)

[Janik]

Bad news for Naomi Broady in Vancouver yesterday - she retired after just three games of her R2 match with Danka Kovinic. Exactly the same happened, but in the Brits favour, in Rae/Moore's doubles QF with Dutch/Belgian partnership Rus/Zanevska (they may have some Russian heritage, though). N.Skupski/Cerretani must have felt the world was against them, having to play two full sets. They did win both, though. Schedule today has Liam Broady's singles QF against Joris De Loore and both N.Skupski/Cerretani and Rae/Moore's doubles SFs.
Just Vancouver left to consider this week at tier 2, as Clayton/O'Mara were beaten in their doubles SF in Meerbusch yesterday.

Oh, and Konta vs Halep is due on not before 7pm local time in Cincinnati (12pm UK), assuming the weather co-operates.

[Janik]

There are five Premier 5 tournaments (hence the name). Elena Svitolina won the first three, in Dubai, Rome and Toronto. It won't be four from four though as she has just lost Julia Goerges in the third round of Cincinnati. Goerges now plays the winner of Sloane Stephens and Ekaterina Makarova, which Stephens is about to serve for.

In other news, following years of injury and illness (not least a serious heart condition), Melanie Oudin has announced her retirement. She is only 25. Such a pity.

[Janik]

Stephens closed it out on Makarova. The Women's QF line up is therefore complete. It read Pliskova [1] vs Wozniacki [6], Muguruza [4] vs Kuznetsova [8], Goerges vs Stephens [WC], Konta [7] vs Halep [2]. Read in the past tense as the second match has already happened, Muguruza winning an epic that nearly went three hours.
On the Men's side Nadal is a set away from completing their QF picture after he took the opener on Ramos-Vinolas on a break. The winner of that match plays Kyrgios (who won earlier today), the other match ups being Thiem [3] vs Ferrer, Donaldson [WC] vs Isner [14] (as referenced up thread) and Dimitrov [7] vs Sugita.

[Janik]

Konta-Halep is underway, with a number of very high quality rallies already in the opening three games.
I feel that Halep is a better player than Konta, technically and tactically. But that isn't saying much as Halep is, in my view, the best player on the Women's tour baring Serena. She is probably the only one who could compete with Serena at her best. If Halep was on top of her nerves, she would already have multiple slam titles and weeks at no.1 to her name.
According to the WTA the h2h stands at 3-0 to Konta. This is because of their disdain for Fed Cup, a more realistic score is 3-2 to the Brit. However all three of Konta's wins are matches that Halep could have won, probably should have won in two cases. Wuhan 2015 - she led 5-1 in the deciding set but then lost six straight games. Miami this year and Halep served for the match at 5-4 in the second, and then having been broken with the tape in sight built a 5-3 lead in the subsequent tie-break but lost from there. Wimbledon and Halep again led by a set and a mini-break in the second set breaker, but from 5-4 up and two of her own serves to come lost the set and then the match. If Jo is to win she probably needs similar again - hang in there and hope Halep can't close it out.

At least, on this occasion, the no.1 ranking is not directly on the line for Simona, as Pliskova beat Wozniacki earlier, which means Halep would have to win the title to take over top spot.

[Janik]

First set to Halep 6-4. She looks lightening fast around the court today, even by her immensely high standards. It's forcing Konta into errors (the forced unforced sort), as hitting a winner is nigh on impossible. Konta is in bad need of both a higher first serve percentage, and more bite on those that go in; she has had break points in every Halep service game, but also I think vice versa. Unfortunately hitting harder AND getting more in at the same time is a tough ask...
She could also do with leaking few unnecessary forehand errors. There is still room for improvement on that wing.

[Janik]

Break point conversions in set one - Halep 3/5, Konta 2/10. That tells a tale.

[Janik]

Somehow, Christ knows how, Konta forces the second set to a breaker. There is a lot on the line here, now...

[Janik]

Unfortunately Konta, having battled so hard to get to the breaker (5 match points saved), then played it pretty direly. It probably counts as a more important psychological hurdle gotten over for Halep getting through in two after all that than if she had sealed it straightforwardly.

[Gerontophile]

That was all over the place, but yeah Janik, she was made to play badly by Halep.

[Gerontophile]

Kyrgios puts Nadal out after Rafa's second match of the day. Straight sets, bit of a mini-comeback by Nadal in the second.

[Janik]

To be fair, it was the second match in the day for Kyrgios as well. The player who was badly served by the weather was Pliskova - she played basically a complete match against Giorgi and then had to go out and face a fresh Wozniacki in the QFs. Which Pliskova won 2&4.
SF line-ups are Kyrgios vs Ferrer (who beat Thiem yesterday) and Isner [14] vs Dimitrov [3] on the Mens side and Pliskova [1] vs Muguruza [4] and Stephens [WC] vs Halep [2] for the Women.

Other Cincy notes are that J.Murray/Soares [3] beat Rojer/Tecau in the men's dubs QF. They play Kubot/Melo [2] in the Semi today. And that Safarova/Strycova [3] won their interrupted quarter-final against Barty/Dellacqua before subsequently losing their semi. However the QF win was enough to ensure that Lucie Safarova will take over as the Women's doubles no.1. If Halep can win the women's singles title, it will mean all four top spots changing hands on Monday.

Down a tier, up over a border and mostly across the continent, Liam Broady was beaten in this weeks meeting with Joris De Loore. There are Brits still going in Vancouver however as both N.Skupski w/ Cerretani and Rae w/ Moore won their doubles SFs.


Oh, and in US Open news, Andy Murray has announced he will give it a try. He will still cling on to the #2 seeding spot.

[Satchmo Distel]

Three of the top four women's seeds have made the semis, so maybe the cream is rising to the top just in time for the Open.

In the men's, OTOH, only seeds 7 and 14 are left of a field that was already depleted.

With Murray, I would be concerned if a premature return from injury leads to a longer lay-off, but I assume he has made those calculations. He stands to lose a huge number of ranking points if he sits out the rest of the year. How many rounds can he go with a rusty game (8 weeks out?) and worrying about the hip?

Sharapova - similar fitness and rustiness scenario to Murray but also with crowd hostility and just the whole wrongness of her being there.

[Janik]

Two good looking finals coming up in Cincinnati today - Nicky Kyrgios vs Grigor Dimitrov and Garbine Muguruza vs Simona Halep. For Kyrgios it's a first career Masters Series final and first of any stripe in 2017. It's also a debut Master Series final for Dimitrov. The Women's showpiece match features two more established residents of the very top table - Halep has six previous Prem Mandatory or Prem 5 titles and as noted repeatedly on this thread will take over as World No.1 if she wins the match. It also a big deal for Muguruza, as following her French Open triumph in 2016 she went over a year without reaching another final anywhere. Having broken that streak by winning Wimbledon (some way to do that), getting to another final in just her second subsequent tournament is big news as it suggests she is coping better with the increased expectations this time around.
Oh, and there is one other final to be played today in this event - the Men's Doubles. That pits Herbert/Mahut against J.Murray/Soares. Murray/Soares beat Kubot/Melo in the semis.

Over in Vancouver, Rae/Moore won the women's doubles title yesterday. N.Skupski/Cerretani will look to follow suit today.


As for next week, the main action will be US Open qualifying. However there are a couple of Tour events to allow a final tune-up for those who won't be involved in that, Winston-Salem for the Men and New Haven for the Women. British involvement is relatively sparse, indeed absent entirely from Connecticut. However Aljaz Bedene is a seed for Winston-Salem (no.12) and Kyle Edmund has reacted to his poor form in the build up to New York by making a late entry as well. Too late for the main draw and indeed too late for anything but the alternates list for qualifying. However a drop out has allowed him to play and having got in he was comfortably the highest ranked player in qulayfing making him the top seed. He is through to the final round where he will face the world no. #287. Even if he doesn't win that there is also at least one lucky loser berth in the main show already on offer. Edmund is highly likely to be involved in the proper stuff. Inglot is also playing this event in doubles, alongside Nestor.

[Jimski]

Muguruza lost really early at last year's US Open, so I imagine she could easily end up number one by the end of it if she does well there. Btw this is her third tournament since Wimbledon - she lost to Keys in Stanford QF and Svitolina in Toronto QF.

[Satchmo Distel]

New Haven's player field looks higher quality than Winston-Salem's.

[Janik]

Muguruza lost really early at last year's US Open, so I imagine she could easily end up number one by the end of it if she does well there.

Even with a win today she would need to outdo Halep in New York to end up on top. Baseline numbers, i.e. current totals minus last years US Open points, are as follows.

Halep - 5945
Muguruza - 5780
Svitolina - 5390
Pliskova - 5080
Wozniacki - 4560
Konta - 4500
Kuznetsova - 4330
Venus - 3966

[ad hoc]

Oof. 6-1 6-0. Am out of the country and haven't seen any of the match. What happened? A Halep meltdown? Or a superbly destructive performance by Muguruza?

[Janik]

Ugh, well that was a horrorshow - Muguruza wins 6-1 6-0 in 55 minutes. Let's say the mental side of Halep's game remains a work in progress.

Edit - ad hoc, initially the second, prompting the first. Muguruza was very good particularly in the opening set, Halep started OK but as it went against her she got negative and was making more and more unforced errors.