No, not a friendly match with Roger Federer (hahahahahahahaha, I’m very funny), but the ATP draw challenge.

You basically have to predict the outcome of every single match correctly in a main draw or be the person who guesses the outcome correctly most often over the period of a year to win an all expenses paid trip to the tour finals in London at the end of the year.

It’s a bit of fun and who knows, ya might be lucky Give it a go here!!!

Proud

They face Israel this weekend but are understandably conscience of that is happening back in their home country where an Earthquake killed upwards of 700 people and left thousands more homeless. Gonzales and his team are at least trying to help improve the situation and have a positive attitude ahead of this weekends clash.

“We will play to try to win to create some happiness for our country, for our people, in these difficult times.”

Good luck to them and hopefully they can create the happiness they seek.

Gulbis

College has gotten very busy lately and I just don’t have the time to update as much as I used to so I’m gonna try my best to type my posts on my lunchbreak from now on!

Dubai was a real shame for a second year in a row. It’s not that there wasn’t some quality players, there certainly was, but when you don’t see either Federer or Nadal in the lineup, I automatically think its a small tour even that doesn’t get much recognition. In Dubai, however, it definitely isn’t the case. The amount of money Dubai has invested into that tournament is incredible. Under the table appearance fee’s, ridiculously luxurious facilities and an overall glamorous feeling to the whole week are all the order of the day in Dubai and its no wonder it’s one of the favourite stops on the tour.

Djokovic defended his title this week but didn’t look overly impressive. Still, he cements his place as world number 2 and got the job done. It’s good to see Youzhny doing well again his game kinf of slipped the last couple of years and I wondered if he would ever climb back up the rankings.

Biggest surprise of the week has to be Ernest Gulbis not losing a set on the way to the title in Delray Beach. Immensely talented, he just looked like he wasn’t interest the last 18 months. Losing silly matches and putting in awful performances for weeks on end. Hopefully this is the start of something great because he is more than capable of getting inside the top 10 of the rankings.

Other notables

• Ferrero was one win away from 3 consecutive titles but it wasn’t to be. Outstanding how well he has done over the years.
• Bryans win their 58th careen titles as a team and have over 600 career match wins….says it all really.
• Kleybanova and Venus grab some singles titles.
• Federer should be good to go in Indian Wells after taking a chest infection back from Ethiopia (presumably)

Youzhny

Yesterdays tennis was disappointing enough to be honest. Youzhny was a walkover in the third round and Baghdatis retired against Hewitt which was a highly anticipating meeting. Shame.

Today looks much brighter as loads of exciting matches take to the court.

• Roddick v. Gonzalez
• Cilic v. Del Potro (who is making a habit out of silly drawn out matches this week)
• Kuznetsova v. Petrova (losing an asthonishing 1 game against Clijsters in the last round)
• Nadal v. Karlovic (could be exciting or really boring)

And if any of you have an iPhone or iPod touch, I highly recommend the official Australian open app. It features live scoring, radio, option to submit questions to the presenters, maps and loads more. Fantastic app. Download it here.

Check out the link here, its decent enough quality

http://channelsurfing.net/watch-austrailian-open-4.html

A logo he will never forget

It really is becoming a dream run for Louk this last few weeks as his hard tennis training is starting to pay off. Louk beat Yen-Hsun Lu in the first round just moments ago in four sets 6-4 3-6 6-2 6-1  . Unfortunately the match wasn’t televised but from looking at the stats, it looked like Louk certainly was playing some good tennis.

I would call this the win of his career so far in terms of player ranking (101) and the scale of the victory. Not only will he gain ranking points, he will also pocket at least 31000 Australian dollars for the victory, a sum of money that will certainly go a long way.

Louk next faces John Isner of the USA. He is seeded 33rd and has a huge serve but can be a bit patchy on both wings at times. Hopefully Louk can do well against him.

Well done Louk!

Kirilenko

Big Winners

• Andy Murray beat Kevin Anderson
• Rafael Nadal beat Peter Luczak
• Andy Roddick beat Theimo de Bakker
• Juan Martin del Potro beat Michael Russel (4 sets)

Big Losers

• Maria Sharapova lost to Russian Maria Kirilenko
• Radek Stepanek lost to Karlovic in 5 silly sets.
• Mardy Fish also lost, although it’s hardley an upset.

Matches to look forward to later on

• Federer v Andreev
• Sorensen v Yen-Hsun Lu (this match was supposed to be on yesterday but was postponed to first match on court 14 today, live scoring is at the top right of this page and via this link)
• Safarova v Venus
• Youzhny v Gasquet

Live scores at the top right of this page

Louk

An Irish player has qualified for the Australian Open main draw!!! Louk Sorensen qualified for the main draw by beating New Zealand player Daniel King in straight sets.

He is the first Irish player in over two decades to get into a Grand Slam main draw. He plays Yen-Hsun Lu from Chinese Taipei in the first round whom is currently ranked 101.

Good look to Louk in the first round and I’d love to see him do well and maybe inspire many people.

Melbourne Park

“The wonderful world of tennis” is a phrase I’ve seen used in the 2005 Australian Open, when I first started watching tennis properly and also the inspiration behind my domain name!

Well its the official start to the grand slam calendar and where better to start it than in Australia! I always thought it was a little strange how soon in the year the AO started, but players don’t really seem to be complaining and most will have played a couple of warm up tournaments prior. Melbourne is always a popular destination on the calendar with all the players as it offers so much more than just tennis. Famous for insane temperatures on court and epic night matches often lasting well into the morning, it should be a fantastic two weeks, filled with great encounters.

Take a look at this video from a charity exhibition some of the players put on to help Haiti earthquake victims. Its really entertaining and a great way to help raise money.