Congrats to our 5 winners this week. An entertaining week of tennis which certainly shakes things up a little with regard to the WTA and ATP Tour finals race.
Lets start with the woman first. The race to Riyadh took a significant turn in this game week. With 6 players already qualified, the battle for the two remaining spots was between Mirra Andreeva, Jasmine Paolini and Elena Rybakina.
Mirra has been on a poor run of form of late since her defeat to Taylor Townsend at the US Open. There was a surprise loss to Sonay Kartal in Beijing followed by a loss to Laura Siegemund in her opening match in Wuhan. It was the same story unfortunately in Ningbo as she lost surprisingly to the resurgent Lin Zhu, a player she had beaten comfortably a few weeks earlier.
That left the door open wide to Paolini and Rybakina and they grabbed the opportunity with both hands. Paolini followed up her great run to the semi finals in Wuhan by reaching the semi finals again thanks to wins over Kudermetova and a battling win over Bencic.
Her opponent? Elena Rybakina who followed up a tough win over Yastremska with a comfortable win over Tomljanovic. By this stage Paolini had already passed Andreeva in the race but Rybakina still had a lot of work to do and realistically had to win the title in Ningbo. She did just that, beating Paolini comfortably and overcoming Alexandrova in the final despite losing the 1st set.
Andreeva was not scheduled to play the following week but with her place at the Tour Finals in jeopardy, would she change her mind and take a late wild card? Apparently not.... So Paolini was now officially qualified for the Tour Finals and qualification is now entirely in Rybakina's hands. Two wins in Tokyo will be enough to get her there.
One woman who stands in her way, quite neatly for the purposes of this blog, is a certain Leylah Fernandez who will be Rybakina's 2nd Round opponent in Tokyo. Leylah was the champ at the end of an entertaining week at the 250 event in Osaka last week.
The favourite for the title had been Naomi Osaka playing in her home city and the city that bears her name. Frustratingly for Naomi she picked up an injury right at the end of a battling 2nd Round win over Suzanne Lamens and ended up spending her birthday in the hospital before withdrawing from her quarter final with the Romanian Jacqueline Cristian.
One player making waves this week was Teresa Valentova, the 17 year old Czech, who is attracting a lot of attention this year. Valentova trounced both Eala and Mertens before showing she had battling qualities too, coming from behind to beat Danilovic and Cristian to reach the semi final.
Fernandez dropped just one set en route to the final (to Sorana Cirstea in the semi final) and she looked on course to romp to the title winning the first set 6-0 against her less experienced opponent. But Valentova showed her fighting qualities once again bouncing back to win the 2nd set before Leylah saw the match out in a 6-3 third set winning her 5th WTA title and 2nd of this year.
Next up Brussels. Felix Auger Aliassime os having a phenomenal end to the season and has put himself right back in the chase for the ATP Finals. A run to the semi final at the US Open set him firmly back on track in the rankings and he followed that up with a run to the quarter finals in Shanghai beating race rival Musetti in the process.
With Musetti falling in the Quarter Final to Mpetshi Perricard, the opportunity presented itself for Felix to make up even more points in the race. He nearly stumbled in his opening 2nd Round match to Dzumhur but made no mistake against qualifier Spizzirri or wild card Collignon in the semi final.
That set up a final with Jiri Lehecka and it turned into a heck of a battle. But after two shared tie breaks, Felix proved too strong in the 3rd set and managed to further close the gap on Musetti in the race. With big points on offer in Basel and Paris, FAA has every chance.
Two other players who we are used to seeing at tour finals are Daniil Medvedev and Casper Ruud. It hasn't been the best of seasons for either of them but both have had a bit of a resurgence in form of late and are not entirely out of the running for a place at the Tour Finals or at the very least an alternate spot.
Casper featured in Stockholm where his main rival would be a familiar foe in fellow Scandinavian Holger Rune. Tragedy struck for Holger in the semi finals as he picked up an awful injury while a set up to Ugo Humbert in the semi finals and that unfortunately has ended not only his chances of reaching the tour finals but his entire season.
Ruud had been on fine form all week defeating Cilic, Korda and Shapovalov en route to the final with Humbert and Casper was awesome in the final raising his game to a level that Humbert could just not compete with. The Norwegian triumphed 6-2, 6-3 moving himself up to 11th in the race rankings (effectively 10th with Draper out for the season)
And in Almaty, Daniil Medvedev finally got back to the winners stage after a long hiatus. The signs have been there in recent weeks as Medvedev's level has definitely improved as he navigates the tennis world with new coach Thomas Johansson. Semi final runs in Beijing and Shanghai showed that Medvedev was on the right track despite frustrating defeats at both these events.
In Almaty he got the win his recent play deserved. He had to work hard for it, coming from behind to beat James Duckworth in the semi final and another three setter was required in what turned out to be a thrilling final against the talented Frenchman Corentin Moutet. This run may have come to late to restore Medvedev back to the top 10 but if he still has some running in those legs, the points are still available to him to stage an unlikely bit to restore his place at the top table. Medvedev is currently 13th now but effectively 11th with Rune and Draper out!
Here is the Global League Table for the week
Congratulations to our game week winner - Return of the Champion (Kazz)
Kazz dominated the game week for the most part but Ultimate Zverev Hater and Surprise Surprise mounted a significant challenge in the latter stages.
Here is the game week winning team.
This was a terrific game week team with some key differentials which gave them a decent advantage over the best of the rest. Crucially Kaz had Ningbo winner Rybakina as Captain, Osaka winner Leylah Fernandez as a key player and Brussels runner up Lehecka as a key player. Perfect player placement.
But the whole team weighed in with valuable points by winning two or three matches. Picks like GMP, Humbert and Shnaider were more unusual picks that more than played their part.
The battle for the level 2 prize was between Ultimate Zverev Hater and Surprise Surprise.
Here is the head to head between the two teams.
Congrats to these two teams on a great game week. Ultimate Zverev Hater backed Medvedev as their captain and that proved to be an inspired choice. They also had the two Brussels finalists as KPs and the two Ningbo finalists as team players. A pretty solid team with only Musetti under performing.
Player placement might have cost Surprise Surprise a few points. Brussels champ FAA and Osaka champ Fernandez were team players while kps Humbert and Michelsen didn't score as highly. But a team of 8 with 3 champions and two runners up is a pretty amazing week by any standards.
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