Game Week 21 Roundup

 

A busy FTL week with a joint ATP/WTA 500 event in Washington and two 250 events - the women competing in Memphis and the men competing in Los Cabos and once again we had some remarkable storylines.

In Washington we had two experienced US competitors taking on the best of the new crop of young players. Both finals had to be completed on the Monday after heavy rain on finals Sunday.

Taylor Fritz had already edged past two American young pretenders in the shape of Alex Michelsen and Brandon Nakashima in close three set matches.  But in the final the level of opposition was raised further with breakout Spanish star Rafa Jodar providing the opposition. Jodar had himself come back from a set down in his quarter final against Musetti and again in his semi final versus Tabilo.

But it was Fritz who was to prevail 7-6, 6-4 to cap off a satisfying week for the American who has had his fair share of fitness issues this season. 

In the woman's final, the ever reliable Jessica Pegula faced Alex Eala of the Phillipines who continues to pack stadiums wherever she plays. Pegula had only dropped one set en route to the final at the hands of Magda Frech in her opening match and the same was true of Eala who came from behind against Qinwen Zheng in the 1st round before scoring impressive wins over Fernandez, Svitolina and Osaka.

The match did commence on the Sunday as planned with Pegula taking a one set lead but when they returned on the Monday to complete the match, everything flipped.  Eala came out with purpose and drive while Pegula was surprisingly off her game. Eala came back to secure a 4-6, 6-4, 6-0 victory and became the first Filipino to win a Tour Level singles final.

The field may have been weaker in Memphis but the storyline was even more remarkable.  16 year old Kristina Liutova would no doubt have been a new name to most of us this week.  She has been performing impressively on the lower tiers of women's tennis and had earned the right this week to have a crack at a tour level event. 

She couldn't have been handed a harder draw. Top seed and compatriot Ekaterina Alexanrova has not been at her best this year but was a favourite to win this event.  But in the heat, Kristina outlasted Alexandrova who eventually had to retire when she was on the brink of defeat due to apparent heat stroke.

The rest is history, Liutova took down Maya Joint, Caty McNally and Kalieva to set up a final against another surprise package in the shape of Darja Vidmanova.  Despite losing the first set, Liutova bouced back to secure a 1-6, 6-1, 6-3 win. Liutova became the first player born in the 2010s to win a WTA Tour singles title, the youngest player to win a tour-level singles title since Coco Gauff in 2019, and the first to win a tour-level singles title on their main draw debut since Maria Timofeeva.

We had another young first time winner in Los Cabos.  Arther Gea defeated definding champ Denis Shapovalov 6-3, 6-4 in the final.

Here are the final standings for the game week.

Congrats to Dalisvolleys (Jim Ackerman) who is this weeks winner in a very close contest with Holy Tigers (Vlad)

Here is the head to head between the two teams.  

Both teams had both Washington Champs - Fritz and Eala. Vlad also had bother runner ups in Pegula and Jodar. Jim also had inspired pick with Arther Gea (Los Cabos) winner and also had Pegula. Two very strong sides who were well clear of the rest of the chasing pack in this game week.  

Monthly Standings for July

 

Here are the monthly standings for July.

Congratulations to Preston and the OG Stanimals who are top of the charts for July.   Roger That (Mikhail) take 2nd spot and Goaldies (Sagar) finished 3rd.

Here is the breakdown by game week.

Interestingly The OG Stanimals actually fell behind the leading back after a low score in Game Wee 20 but they stormed to the top of the leaderboard following a 3rd place finish in Game Week 21 when all the other contenders faltered!

The FTL Cup returns!!

 

After a length hiatus, the FTL Cup is BACK!!

 

Here is the draw for the 4th Round which will take place at the Cincinnati Masters next week.

 

After the chaos of the Canadian Masters, there are going to be some serious selection headaches for this round of fixtures!

Canadian Open Draws & Dark Horse Breakdown

I have attached the Canadian Open Draws (FTL Version) and Dark Horse Breakdown.  Please note that the Qualifying was completed earlier today (August 1st), so as a result, the 32 Qualifiers have been placed.  Currently, there are no Lucky Losers in either the Mens or Womens Draw.

 

The first day of play is August 2nd.

 

Do not forget to select your Dark Horse for both the Mens and Womens events.

 

If you want a copy, click on the link, Canadian Open Draws Once you do so, click on FILE, and scroll to MAKE A COPY, and call it whatever you want

 

Please note that the New Players Prices aren't listed as there are still 3 ongoing events from the Current Game Week.

Good Luck!  Btw both the Mens and Womens events are set to take place at the same time on Sunday, so the event specific lockout won't be in place this week.

Game Week 20 Roundup

 

Three first time winners on the tours this week.

In Kitzbuhel, Quentin Halys had a terrific week taking out 2nd seed Vacherot in the 2nd round and then beating Navone and Hanfmann to set up a final with the no 1 seed and defending champ Alexander Bublik.

Halys took the final in straight sets as Bublik was unable to defend either of the clay court titles he won in back to back weeks last year.

In Estoril it was Luca Van Assche who was the surprise package taking out no 1 seed and Andrey Rublev (who had just won Bastad the previous week).  He set up a final with the Belgian Alexander Blockx who had come through a remarkable series of three set battles against Jacquet, Burruchage and Darderi.

The final duly delivered and having lost the 1st set, it loooked like Blockx might just manage to pull off another comeback victory but Luca stood firm and took the final set 7-5.

Another youngster took the title in Prague.  Lilli Tagger is making waves on the WTA Tour and her one handed backhand is a thing of beauty. 

The quarter finals were stacked with home players. Valentova took down compatriot Bouzkova in three sets while Krejcikova (aiming for back to back titles) comfortably defeated Salkova while Tagger took out the 5th Czeck Bejlek.  

But by time we got to the final - the Czechs had all checked out.  Daria Sniger defeated Valentova and Tagger outlasted Krejcikova.   The 18 year old Austrian took the final against Ukrianian Snigur 7-6, 6-2.

We did get one home win this week in Hamburg,  Tamara Korpatsch has been playing some great tennis this season and is now the top ranked German on the WTA Tour!  It was an emotional week for her and she defeated Anna Bondar to win the title in her home city in front of the delighted fans.

Of all the winners this week Tamara was the only one to have been on the winners podium before. This was her 2nd title having won the Transylvanian Open in 2023.

Here is the global league table for the game week.  

Congrats to Melissa and Swift Team who romped to the Game Week win in the Global League finishing almost 30 points over 2nd placed Israel.

Here is her winning team

No winners in her team but a pretty strong week across her 8 strong team in a game week where many of us were really struggling to field any sort of team.   She had 2 finalists in Bondar and Bublik and another strong week from captain pick Barbora Krejcikova all contributed to an impressive total of 424 points.

In the level 2 contest, it was a lot tighter between 1st and 2nd.

Just over 2 points seperated Roger That and Keys to Victory!   But its congratulations to Mikhail who takes the level 2 honours this week.

 

Game Week 19 Roundup

 

A tricky couple of weeks for FTL.  Seemed like most of the tour were either getting married or taking a break.  For reasons best known to themselves, the ATP like to have a brief return to the clay before we move on the North American hard court swing.   So FTLers were left with the dilemma on whether to splurge out on trades on players that they may not need long term.  

There is always the danger in these game weeks that the top seeds bomb and in the case of Ruud, Bublik and Cobolli -  they did!!

Ok quick run through the finals then.

ATP Bastad   -   Two top players who delivered here.  Andrey Rublev was back to winning ways winning the title  6-4, 6-3  over the hot headed Luciano Darderi.

ATP Gstaad -   Another player back to winning ways -  Stefanos Tsitsipas won a tight three setter against the Belgian Raphael Collignon.   Don't go back to your Dad ever again Stef!

ATP Umag -  Daniel Merida took the title her against Damir Dzumhur.

WTA Athens -   Another excellent win for Barbora Krejcikova as the Czechs continue to grap all the trophies these days. Home favourite Maria Sakkari came up just short in the final.

WTA Iasi   -    This final got rolled over to the Monday due to rain,  And its a win for Egypt - as Mayar Sherif took the title following a 2nd set retiral from Paula Badosa. Good couple of weeks for Paula having won a lower tier event in Bastad the previous week. Rumours that the match was called off early on the Sunday to allow Paula to watch the world cup final are unfounded!

Here is the Global table for the game week.  

Congrats to Mark and the Starodubtsteppers who are on a rich vein of form recently after a rough first half of the season.   Mark won the monthly prize for July recently and has now followed that up with the Level 2 weekly prize for Game Week 19.    Kevin G (mtl89)  and Goaldies (Sagar) take the 2nd and 3rd spots for this week.

Lets take a look at the game week winning team.

Mark finished the week with 4 finalists with Darderi, Sakkari, Collignon and Krejcikova but in the end it was only Babs who delivered a trophy.  A solid week across the whole team with the exception of Captain Ruud and Etcheverry!

Game Week 17 Roundup

 

I'll keep this brief cos I'm playing a bit of catch up with FTL related things at the moment.

So yeah - here are your four champs from Game Week 17!  Incidentally i think these anime likenesses are getting worse!

From left to right:

ATP Eastbourne -   Zizou Bergs defeated Ugo Humbert in the final.  (They actually played again in the first round of Wimbledon - same outcome Bergs won again!)

WTA Eastbourne  - Maddie Keys loves Eastbourne. She won her third title there defeated Tatjana Maria in the final.

ATP Mallorca -  Finally a first ATP title for Alejandro Davidovich Fokina after being the nearly man on so many occasions in the past.  He defeated Ethan Quinn in the final.

WTA Bad Homburg -   Another German grass court title and another elephant trophy for a Czech champion,  Karolina Muchova won he title following a mid match retirement from Naomi Osaka. Of course the other elephant was won by Linda Noskova in Berlin the previous week.  Who knew that these two were going to contest the Wimbledon final!! 

Here is the final FTL table.  

This is a new team name to me.  "You've been Osta-spanked" .  I love it!  😆😆

Massive congrats to this weeks Global League winner Rebecca who romped the game week with a ridiculous 400 points.  

Lets take a look at the head to head with 2nd placed Sindre.

Rebecca had Eastbourne winner Keys and both Bad Homburg finalists Muchova and Osaka with a decent supporting role from Ostapenko.  Her total could have been higher if the player placement was different becaue Captain Svitolina and KP Andreeva did not really deliver. 

A decent week for Sindre too.  He had Keys as Captain as Eastbourne runner up Maria as well. He also shared in ADF's first title delight as he had him as a KP.  Most importantly for Sindre - he takes the level 2 prize for the week and also earned some valuable points in his quest to win the overall title for 2026.