Nishikori Talks First Match Back At Madrid 2017
Nishikori Talks First Match Back At Madrid 2017
May102017
Maria Sharapova will feature alongside eight of the world’s top 10 if she accepts a wildcard for next month’s Aegon Classic in Birmingham.
Britain’s Johanna Konta will play, along with Garbine Muguruza, Karolina Pliskova and Angelique Kerber, who will return to world number one on Monday.
BBC Sport understands Sharapova will be offered a wildcard for Birmingham.
The Russian, who returned from a 15-month doping ban last month, lost to Eugenie Bouchard in Madrid on Monday.
Her involvement in Spain, courtesy of another wildcard, ended in the second round courtesy of a 7-5 2-6 6-4 defeat to the Canadian, who had been critical of the Russian, calling her a “cheat” and saying she should never have been allowed to play again.
She also received a wildcard for Stuttgart in April, where she reached the last four.
The line-up for Birmingham is the strongest ever seen at the grass-court event.
Of the current top 10, only Svetlana Kuznetsova and Serena Williams, who recently announced her pregnancy, are missing.
The event runs from 17-25 June and is one of three tournaments – along with the Aegon Open in Nottingham and the Aegon International in Eastbourne – in the lead up to Wimbledon in July.
Sharapova, who has not played a Wimbledon warm-up event since she reached the final in Birmingham in 2010, remains some way adrift of direct entry into the Wimbledon main draw.
She will need to reach the semi-finals in Rome next week to make sure. A first-round defeat could cost her a place in qualifying unless the All England Club offers her a wildcard.
Rafael Nadal has been the star of the clay court swing so far in 2017 and is a fair favourite to pick up yet another Roland…
Novak Djokovic will once more look to kick-start his season on Tuesday, playing Nicolas Almagro in his opener in Madrid.…
View FedEx ATP Head2Head for the following match-ups Wednesday at the Mutua Madrid Open & vote for who you think will win!
Djokovic v Almagro | Nadal v Fognini | Tsonga v Ferrer | Cilic vs Zverev
View Wednesday schedule and check back later for preview notes.
Nick Kyrgios and Jack Sock advanced to the quarter-finals of the Mutua Madrid Open on Tuesday, joining forces to beat fifth seeds Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram 6-4, 6-4. Kyrgios/Sock dropped only eight points on serve during the 60-minute win.
Klaasen and Ram have picked up titles this year at the Delray Beach Open and the BNP Paribas Open. Elsewhere, Fabrice Martin and Daniel Nestor accounted for last month’s Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters champions Rohan Bopanna and Pablo Cuevas 6-3, 6-2 in 54 minutes.
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Top seeds Henri Kontinen and John Peers also moved into the quarter-finals, prevailing against Oliver Marach and Mate Pavic 4-6, 6-4, 14-12. Lucky losers Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah won their fifth consecutive match by beating Spanish wild cards David Marrero and Tommy Robredo 6-3, 6-2. Cabal/Farah took home the BMW Open by FWU doubles title last week.
Two-time champion Andy Murray returned to the clay with ease on Tuesday, gaining a routine 6-4, 6-3 win against Romanian qualifier Marius Copil on the Manolo Santana Centre Court at the Mutua Madrid Open. The top-seeded Murray improved to 11-0 in his opening matches in the Spanish capital, dating back to his debut in 2006.
The Scot will meet #NextGenATP Croatian Borna Coric or French qualifier Pierre-Hugues Herbert.
“When I started to control the points more towards the end of the first set and second set, I was hitting the ball pretty clean, creating a few chances. I didn’t give him any opportunities,” Murray said. “It was good for the first match.”
Murray is looking to kick-start his 2017 campaign in Madrid, as he did a year ago. Last year, he arrived in the Spanish metropolis with a 13-4 record and no titles. But Murray went on to reach the Madrid final (l. to Djojkovic) and finish the season on a 65-5 run and with an ATP World Tour-best nine titles.
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This season, Murray is now 16-5 and has one title to his name, his 45th tour-level crown at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships in February. But the World No. 1 hasn’t reached another final since his Dubai triumph (d. Verdasco).
Against Copil, Murray was as solid as ever. He broke in the 10th game to take the opening set when Copil netted a backhand slice. Murray earned his second break to lead 4-2 in the second set and served out the match to advance in 84 minutes.
“I still think there’s a ways to go. I don’t think I’m playing perfectly just now. I think there’s just things I can definitely do better. But the most positive thing about tonight was that I feel like I can serve a little bit better than I did today,” said Murray, who faced no break points.
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American Ryan Harrison earned his first win against Aussie Bernard Tomic 7-5, 4-6, 6-2 to set-up a second-round meeting against 16th seed Nick Kyrgios. Harrison had been 0-2 against Tomic in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series.
The 25-year-old Harrison, who reached the Estoril quarter-finals last week (l. to Ferrer), hit 15 aces and broke four times to move on in one hour and 50 minutes.
Former Top 50 player Bernard Mitton of South Africa passed away last Friday. He was 62.
The 6’2” right-hander, who was born in Vryburg, South Africa, but had been living in Newport Beach, California, won two ATP World Tour singles titles and nine doubles crowns during his career, which started in 1973, only five years after the beginning of the Open Era (April 1968), and ended in 1984.
Mitton’s final tour-level match was against then-World No. 5 Jimmy Arias of the U.S. at 1984 Wimbledon. South Africa native and former World No. 7 Johan Kriek said Mitton led a generation of South African players.
“Bernie was a very talented, smart and funny guy. He was the elder statesman of South African tennis, travelling to Europe to progress his career. When Ian Cunningham, a top coach in Johannesburg and Pretoria, moved from South Africa to Austria, we all followed at different stages and trained together. Bernie was first there in 1974 and I arrived in 1978, a young buck, who learned a lot from Bernie. As a guy from South Africa who was a tennis pro, I thought maybe I could do that,” Kriek said.
Mitton won his first title on the grass at Newport in 1978 and at San Jose a year later. He’d reach three more finals in the late ’70s and early ’80s in San Jose, Adelaide and Johannesburg. Mitton, who reached No. 48 in the Emirates ATP Rankings, also recorded wins against all-time greats John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors, John Newcombe and Arthur Ashe.
Mitton even helped Ashe beat Connors during the 1975 Wimbledon final. Mitton had prevailed against Connors 7-6, 6-1 in the semi-finals of a small pre-Wimbledon grass-court tournament in Chichester in June 1975. The South African slow-balled Connors in the way that Ashe would against Connors in the 1975 Wimbledon final weeks later. Ashe, always one to do his research, sought out Mitton before the Wimbledon final for help.
Kriek said of Mitton: “He was always a funny guy and he didn’t take life too seriously. He beat John Newcombe at Wimbledon in 1976 and was a set and a break up against Bjorn Borg at the US Open [in 1978]… He was mentally strong and had one of the fastest swinging forehands with a wooden racquet.”
In doubles, Mitton teamed with six different players, including Tim Gullikson, Butch Walts and Raymond Moore, to win his nine titles.
After his playing career finished, Mitton later coached in Newport Beach, Rancho San Clemente and Irvine, California.
“He helped so many tennis players from South Africa and was a great coach in California for many years,” Kriek said. “He will be greatly missed.”
