JonH comes home wrote:

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Sounds like a great event and match

www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/feb/10/after-three-days-nick-kyrgios-gets-the-party-going-at-australian-open-tennis

I do like Nick K, won't apologise!

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 Me too, he can be a **** but there is usually an element of truth in what he says and he's a great player to watch

Coup Droit wrote:

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Yes, enjoyed that

(and leaves the French with a terribly thin event, short of some spectacular one-off run by the three remaining hopes, with Kiki one round behind, as well)

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 French brain...

With Tsonga/Simon/Monfils/Mannarino in their 30s now, where is the next French male star? 

I didn't realise Kiki was not playing doubles. Seen one or two mentions of it being like PHH/Mahut 2(?) years ago when PHH wanted to concentrate on singles but haven't seen anything more than that or if it's just a once off.

flamingowings wrote:

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Coup Droit wrote:

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Yes, enjoyed that

(and leaves the French with a terribly thin event, short of some spectacular one-off run by the three remaining hopes, with Kiki one round behind, as well)

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 French brain...

With Tsonga/Simon/Monfils/Mannarino in their 30s now, where is the next French male star? 

 

I didn't realise Kiki was not playing doubles. Seen one or two mentions of it being like PHH/Mahut 2(?) years ago when PHH wanted to concentrate on singles but haven't seen anything more than that or if it's just a once off.

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 Yes, absolutely. There is no real French male star. And that's the crisis at the FFT. 

Ugo Humbert is the best ranked at the moment, and a valid contender for being a top-10 player, in my view. Hugo Gaston's amazing run at the French Open was pure fluke, again just my view. Halys has been a disappointment. Lucas Pouille has fizzled. Moutet is a possible but it's hard to be convinced. Quite a lot of the youngsters in the 300s play a lot of tennis and are fully priced, so to speak - they'll get better and may well make the top-150, top-100 even possibly, but they're not 'star' material. THere's also a group of 25-26 year olds all about 110 or so, and a couple of those may break through and make top-50 but again, it's not really what the FFT are looking for. 

At the younger end, 19 year-old Harold Mayot (ex top junior) is the latest 'star-let' with huge expectations on him - I don't really know - haven't seen him play enough and, anyway, there are lots of very promising top juniors, and many do well, but not a lot make the real top level, so he may go the way of the others. 

No British mens singles tomorrow but tsitsipas v kokk and de minaur v Cuevas , plus Fognini v Caruso stand out as really exciting matches.

There are some decent talented players in the mens game, just need to add consistent performances in many cases.

JonH comes home wrote:

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Ace Ventura wrote:

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Just finished watching the Kyrgios match now, wow.

I mainly just keep an eye on the scores in the men's matches at slams until the L16/QF stage, or catch the latter stages of matches, but he is pretty much the only player I'll make an exception for, and go out of my way to watch, especially at the Australian Open. I love the drama. Did NOT see that coming in the 4th set. Amazing.

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 Wow indeed, drama. Tennis has missed that, the crowd makes a difference to the theatre. Thiem is mouth watering. Remember they had a massive spat post Adria Tour. 
i really want to see Nick win that and go on to a good run here. 

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Yep, the crowd really helped (both Kyrgios and the spectacle). I saw the match point of the Popyrin match the other day, and that looked a decent atmosphere, but this really was great. Courier said it was the best atmosphere he had heard since the restart.

It was quite funny, at one point, Humbert cupped his ears to the crowd, in jest and good fun, and nothing like Medvedev at the US Open the other year, but the match did actually kind of change not long after that incident.

Yep, looking forward to that Thiem match. I wonder if Kyrgios will get it at 7pm on his favourite court again, or if, because of the magnitude, it'll be placed on RLA as you would normally expect.

emmsie69 wrote:

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JonH comes home wrote:

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No British mens singles tomorrow but tsitsipas v Loki Alis and de minaur v Cuevas , plus Fognini v Caruso stand out as really exciting matches.

There are some decent talented players in the mens game, just need to add consistent performances in many cases.

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 Err Cam!

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 Yes, sorry, getting my days mixed up writing on a Wednesday night and losing track of Aussie time !