GAME WEEK 29 - FINAL RESULTS

 So its time to review Game Week 29.

Now hang on......this is the one where Ons Jabeur beat Shnaider in Ningbo right...?  and the one where Kudermetova beat Pegula in Tokyo 🤔....?  (ok those events seem like a life time ago 😂)

And..its also the Game Week where Mannarino won in Astana (i think that event might have passed me by) and of course it was all finished up with Sinner defeating Medvedev in Beijing.  (Nothing to do with the women's in Beijing though - that has a game week of it's own!!)    

Right we are on the right page. Here are your winners!

Lets start with Tokyo.  This one came out of the blue a little. Since defeating Kanepi in the 1st Round at Wimbledon, VK had only won 2 out of the next 8 matches so it was quite the surprise when she took out Iga in the Quarter Finals and then followed that up with a semi final win over compatriot Pavs and then a resounding win over J-Peg in the final.   Well done Veronika.

It was also great to see good Ons back to winning ways in the Ningbo event. It wasn't plain sailing as she needed to go the distance to see off veteran Vera in the quarters and Nadia Podoroska in the semi finals. Her opponent in the final was Diana Shnaider who has had an excellent break out year and had seen off Kvitova in the Quarter Finals. Ons coasted to a 6-2, 6-1 win to take the title.

Mannarino is providing to be a late bloomer and has played some excellent tennis this year. He has been in three finals in his 35th year and has doubled his tally to 4 ATP titles with victory in Newport and now in Astana.  He defeat Sebastian Korda in three sets in the Astana Open final.

And finally we come to Jannik Sinner who is asserting himself as one of the most exciting young talents in the men's game. It was a awkward start for him as he had to overcome some physical issues to defeat Evans in Round 1 but he battled on through to the semi finals where he put in an impressive performance against Alcaraz to take a 4-3 lead in their H2H. 

The final perhaps may have seemed more daunting for him as he had to play a man who had beaten him in their 6 meetings to date, Daniil Medvedev.  Sinner took control of both tie breaks, however, to score his first win over the Russian.

And so to the FTL Roundup and it doesn't get much closer than it did this week between San Diego Allstars (Mike)  and  Wonders of Igland (Iga).  I mean 0.2 points between them in the end - that's just crazy.

Lets take a look at the head to head to get some more context behind these scores!  The first thing that jumps out is the value of having great ERs as Mike needed them both. Rybakina was in a huff about not getting a bye and Fritz was still drunk on Laver Cup champagne so Mike needed his ERs to come in and do the business and boy did they.  The special K's of Korda and Kudermetova both reached the final with VK prevailing in Tokyo.  Having Sinner as a KP also gave Mike an important edge.

So ultimately Mike had three champions in his team and three runners up across the 4 competitions. That's quite the team.  Meanwhile Emi also had three champs in Mannarino, Jabeur and Sinner and 2 runners up.  

Congrats to both Mike and Emi on an incredible week but its Mike that takes the glory this time round by the smallest of margins.  Henman United, Mirzini Sinovi and The Right Struff make up the top 5 in a pretty high scoring week, all things considered.