North American ATP tournaments Feb-March 2018

[PKBasu]

Prof and I agree that the worst aspect of Yuki’s game is the service game immediately following a break of serve. In the tiebreak, he played two atrocious points when serving from 1-2 down. On both Sock’s service points, Yuki tried to do too much early in the point and wasted his good service returns. Then he tanked his service points to go 1-4 down, and that is too big a hole to pull out of.

In the first set, the game in which he was broken was a poor service game of the sort we’ve seen from him often in Challengers. Against one of the top-20 players that sort of service break is fatal. I think Yuki put too much pressure on himself today, and didn’t play remotely as well as against Pouille at IW (although I didn’t see that match); the serving in particular was much better against Pouille. Today, Sock was certainly not playing like the world #11, so Yuki had a big opportunity. But Yuki himself was well below his best.

The good news is that Yuki’s groundstrokes and service return are top-30 quality or better. But his service is still not worthy of even the typical top-150 player. If he can’t do anything about service velocity in the short term, he at least needs to work on consistency. And specifically needs to know how to consolidate a service break with a quality service game of his own. He was instead broken to love today, and that often happens at the Challenger level too. Unpardonable! (But fixable too).

[Rajiv]

Not the result all if us wanted,but nothing to be ashamed off and everything to be proud off.What an eventful Masters event these 2 have been for Yuki, he certainly has shown what a remarkable improved player he is now.

Now the attention switches to the DC and the following challengers to cement his rightfull place in Top 100

[jai_in_canada]

......If Yuki can religiously manage to hold his serve, he has a reasonable chance in my opinion.

You're right! All religions stress the importance of service!!!

@kishash was spot on ahead of the match with the key to tennis Nirvana for Bhambri against Sock - serve with love (games)!!! It ain't a break until you hold your own serve. Nevertheless, great couple of weeks for Yuki. I wish for him to stay healthy and fit - everything good will follow.

[prasen9]

In any game, for any player, if you manage to hold your service games, you have a reasonably chance.

[sameerph]

Sad that Yuki could not repeat his his earlier wins against Sock. I watched the recording of the match now. In the first set Sock was clearly the better player but in the second set Yuki had many chances to get back in the match which he squandered. It looked like might be getting a bit tired too after a lot of matches in last 3 weeks.

Anyway, excellent 3 weeks for Yuki at IW and Miami. He got 102 points from these 3 weeks which more than compensated for his 77 points from 3 China challengers. Of course, the confidence that he gets from this showing goes much more than the addition of 25 points to his tally and increase his ranking of about 5 or so spots. If he plays like this he can quickly go up the rankings when he has lower points to defend in next few months.

Yuki now has earned US$136K already in 3 months this year as compared $140K which he got in the whole of the year. This will be great boost for him and he should not have too much financial constraints now to travel to the tournaments which he wants to and also invest in better coaching as may be needed.

[jaydeep]

Rohan-Edouard lost in straight sets against American pair ... This pairing is still struggling, hoping for a better clay court season.

[R2] Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Edouard Roger-Vasselin (FRA) l Steve Johnson (USA)/ Sam Querrey (USA) 67(5) 26

[prasen9]

[sameerph]

I am moving this to another thread which was opened for US challengers for 2018.