GAME WEEK 5 RESULTS

ATP 

Rio de Janeiro      Sebastian Baez beat Alexandre Muller   6-2, 6-3

Doha                    Andrey Rublev beat Jack Draper   7-5, 5-7, 6-1

WTA

Dubai                    Mirra Andreeva beat Clara Tauson   7-6, 6-1

Rio de Janeiro

All eyes were on Joao Fonseca as the youngster took part in his home event fresh from winning the title in Buenos Aires the previous week.  But these are all new experiences for Fonseca and it was perhaps understandable that the pressure of playing at home got to him as he put in a below par performance in his defeat to Alexandre Muller.   Surprisingly Muller would go on to reach the final.

If there is one man who can be relied upon to rack up a substantial number of points on the South American clay, that man is Sebastian Baez and once again he delivered.  He required three sets to beat Navone and another three sets to beat Comesana who pulled off the shock of the week when he ousted Zverev in the quarter final. 

Baez retained the title he won in 2024 with a straightforward straight sets win against Frenchman Muller.

Doha

Its always great to see Andrey Rublev win a title given the mental torture he seems to have to go through on court and he certainly had to work for the Doha title.  After solid wins over Bublik and Borges he had to come through a couple of epics to see off a couple of form players in  De Minaur and Auger Aliassime.   On the other side of the draw, Draper was pulling off similar heroics coming from a set behind to beat both Berrettini and Lehecka.

It was no surprise then that Rublev and Draper traded the opening two sets in the final but Rublev broke clear in the third set to clinch the title.

WTA Dubai

It almost feels like a changing of the guard in the WTA at the moment.  Once again most of the top seeds were knocked out earlier than expected.  Sabalenka lost in the third round to Clara Tauson.  Swiatek lost in the quarter final to Andreeva and it was ultimately these two young ladies who would go on to reach the final.  Tauson followed up her win over Aryna with wins over the Czech duo of Noskova and Muchova and Andreeva took out Rybakina in the semi final.

After a tough opening set it was evident that Tauson was feeling the effects of a long hard week and Mirra cruised to a 7-6, 6-1 win to clinch her first 1000 title - no doubt the first of many!

Here is the FTL Leaderboard for Game Week 5 (Global League)

Impressive to see 6 teams clear 500 points in this game week.  Congrats to Sonja and her team AceCream who were the Game Week 5 winners with an impressive total of 553.798.  Dom Bond and Match Point Winners finished 2nd  and David Josselsohn (DJ_2025) came 2nd in the level 2 league.

Lets take a look at the head to head between Sonja and David in level 2.

Both Sonja and David had terrific teams for this game week.   Sonja had Dubai winner Andreeva and both Doha finalists in Rublev and Draper.  David had both Dubai finalists - Andreeva and Tauson and a solid DH in Noskova.   The key difference between the two sides was player placement however. Sonja had a terrific captain in Draper while Zverev did not bring home the anticipated result for DJ_2025.  Sonja also had Andreeva in a KP position ahead of Rybakina which proved to be an inspired choice.

Congrats to both on a great week.

INDIAN WELLS DRAWS AND DARK HORSE BREAKDOWN

I have attached The Indian Wells Main Draw (FTL Version) and the Dark Horse Breakdown.  Plz note that the Qualifying for both the mens and womens events are still on-going.  Once they are finalized, I will update.

 

Do not forget to select your Dark Horse for the WTA event in Dubai!

 

If you want a copy, click on the link, INDIAN WELLS DRAW  Once you do so, click on FILE, and scroll to MAKE A COPY, and call it whatever you want

Good Luck :)

OVERALL LEADERBOARD (After GW6) - NO, NOT AGAIN!!!!

Normally after 5 or 6 weeks, the last thing that most managers look at is the Overall Leaderboard because lets be serious, we're just starting and there's a tonne of time left, BUT I hate to tell everyone this Alexei, Panthers4Life, has taken the lead!!!  

 

For those that don't remember, 3 years ago Alexei took an early lead and did nothing but continue to build on it.  I've never seen a season where everyone felt helpless and were left trying to make crazy decisions to try to pick up ground.   Alexei never looked back as he won the overall by 600+ points and there were only 11 other managers that were within 1000 points!  

 

Could this happen again? If Alexei takes a huge lead like he did before, will managers play it differently and hope that maybe just maybe he'll have a bad week or 2 and will come back to the field?!?!? 

Like I say, it is early, but for those of us that are off to a real poor start, we're wondering if there's a 5 or 600 point bonus that we can claim to put us back into a better position lol. Maybe just maybe the Sunshine Double is where things turn around!!

 

Good Luck Everyone - Don't forget to select your Dark Horses!

 

GAMEWEEK 6 RESULTS

I'd like to offer a huge kuddos to our event winners this week - Tomas Machac, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Laslo Djere, Jessica Pegula and Emma Navarro.

 

Up until the middle of last year, the first thing many of us thought of when we saw or discussed Tomas Machac was how on earth is his career high ranking outside the top 50!?!?!  You watched him play, and it was truly hard to figure.  Since then, he seemed to turn the corner - he made the 4th round at the US Open, and beat both Alcaraz and Djokovic in the past 6-8 months.  The title in Acapulco was his first on the ATP Tour, and with it, helps him achieve a new career high ranking - 20!!!  I'd like to tell you that he had some epic run to the title this week, but thanks to a bad case of food poisoning, our top 4 seeds were all vanquished before the end of the 2nd round!  He ended up with 5 victories over top 100 players (Mensik, Altmaier, Tien, Nakashima and Davidovich Fokina), but it probably ends up being a far tougher task without all of the health issues!

 

Stefanos Tsitsipas' victory in Dubai is its own crazy little story.  Stefanos has been a horrifying watch on anything other than a clay court for a couple of years now.  Even when you see him in his pressers, you can't help but wonder if he needs to take an extended time away from the court.  He's been talking about how his level has been the same over the past few years, but he's not seeing the same results.  Meanwhile, anyone that's watched him play, knows that it couldn't be further from the truth - every opponent has targeted his backhand for quite some time, as you seem to either get a short ball or a mishit shank.  Stefanos started the week with a blacked out racquet and was crushing the ball cleanly off both wings, which left many of us wondering, where on earth did this come from.  Hell, I'm sure his opponents were thinking the same thing!!!  Hell in his victory over Griekspoor, his backhand received a score of 9.6!!!  His victories over some extremely talented players (Sonego, Khachanov, Berrettini, Griekspoor and FAA) are not only important for his ranking (he's now back in the top 10), but his confidence as well.  It will be real interesting to see if this is just a fluke, or if this type of level is something that we could see moving forward!!  He's never fared very well during the Sunshine Double, soo lets see!

 

Laslo Djere is a fun story as well.  He finished the 2025 season ranked outside the top 110, but came into the event in Santiago with some confidence as he played incredibly well in Buenos Aires (losing in 3 sets to the young phenom - Joao Fonseca) just a couple of weeks prior.   On his way to the title, he beat Pedro Martinez, a young up n comer, Jaime Faria, Francisco Cerundolo and the defending champion Sebastian Baez!!  As a result, Laslo finished the South American swing with a 9-1 record and his ranking has jumped more than 40 spots (back inside the top 75!).  Laslo also joins a very select group of Serbs that have won 150 ATP Tour level matches in their career!  Anyone care to tell me who he joined (other than Djokovic lol)?

 

Jessica Pegula hasn't looked quite right all season, but that didn't seem to matter this week lol.   I'm sure that she felt the weight of expectations (her playing didn't allow Keys to play, so I'm sure it was magnified) as she played in front of the home crowd in Austin (and a certain celebrity - ALRIGHT ALRIGHT ALRIGHT), but I'm not sure there was a single opponent that she faced that could make her question herself or make her feel rushed like what happened in her losses (Keys, Alexandrova, Noskova) earlier this year.  She played one poor set all week (against Tomljanovic), but otherwise the rest of her sets and matches were rather straightforward.  Curious to see how she fares in the Sunshine Double this week, especially considering the speed of the courts in Indian Wells is supposed to be increased!

 

Emma Navarro's victory in Merida was nothing short of dominant - she lost a total of 15 games all week!!  I'd like to tell you that she played the who's who on her way to the title, but I can't - She was the sole seed that made the Semi's!  When the draw came out, most of us were expecting a final with her and Paula Badosa, but Paula wrenched her lower back in the QF, and was forced to retire mid-match against Daria Saville.  I'm sure Emma will take some confidence from this result, but I don't know how much confidence you can take when you only beat 1 player ranked inside the top 75 (Avanesyan).  It does help her achieve a career high ranking tho :) - 8th!  I'm real curious to see how she fares in the Sunshine Double.

 

In terms of FTL, there were alot of managers (myself included) that were left scratching our heads and wondering what on earth just happened.  If you didn't have the 2 top seeded American Women, virtually all of your faves either lost early or withdrew due to injury or illness!

 

The only good thing about this type of week is that IF you somehow came through the week unscaved, you were able to gain massive amounts of ground on everyone else.  This is a ridiculous example, but here's how the winner fared against myself lol (keep in mind, I normally finish the season ranked inside the top 10) - he beat me by nearly 370 points!!!  If you can't laugh, I don't know what else to tell you!

 Lets give a massive kuddos to our GW Victor - Israel, as he accumulated an incredible 461.96 points!!  He had the winner of Austin (Pegula) as his Captain, the winner of Acapulco (Machac) as his KP and the finalist in Dubai FAA).  Its a little bit better than my 6 Round 1 losses and my Round 2 withdrawal LMFAO.

 

I'd also like to give a kuddos to our Option 2 winner (Coco Jumbo) who managed to be within 5 points of our victor!