Asian Challengers - April 2018

[Sin Hombre]

9th april
Taipei, Taiwan (IS) $150´000+H

16th april (Monte Carlo)
Nanchang, PR China (ICL) $50´000+H

23rd april (Barcelona, Budapest)
Anning, PR China (CL) $150´000+H

30th april (Estoril, Munich, Istanbul)
Seoul, Korea (H) $100´000+H

Bit strange from indoor hard to indoor clay to outdoor clay to outdoor hard so not sure if our big guns will do the entire stretch. Korea has a couple more challengers on hard courts in May.


Taipei has a full Indian contingent though outside of Sumit

107 Bhambri, Yuki (IND)
136 Ramanathan, Ramkumar (IND)
246 Gunneswaran, Prajnesh (IND)
267 Myneni, Saketh (IND)

[Rajiv]

Taipei , Nanchang , Anning all of them are after the DC , so this Indian line up will more or less be the same and would figure in all 3 of them
Challengers in China are on Red Clay so an ideal preparation for the Clay Court season.

[sameerph]

Taipei has a full Indian contingent though outside of Sumit

Sumit has signed up for $50+H Barletta Challenger in Italy and is 1 out from main draw. So, his team seems to have decided that playing in Europe on clay is the best way for him to tune up for French open qualies.

Taipei , Nanchang , Anning all of them are after the DC , so this Indian line up will more or less be the same and would figure in all 3 of them
Challengers in China are on Red Clay so an ideal preparation for the Clay Court season.

Lets see. Yuki with his current ranking can make qualies draw cut at ATP tournaments in Monte Carlo,Barcelona,Budapest etc. But, Yuki does not have too much success on clay in his career so far. So, it would be safer to play those Chinese challengers on clay, I think.

Also RamK last year preferred to go over to US after the Taipei challenger for 3 challengers on green clay at Sarasota, Tallahassee and Savannah and made the final at Tallahasse. So, lets see if he follows the same course this year.

[Rajiv]

As expected after Taipei ,Ram & Prajnesh would be at the Chinese Challenger in Nanchang.

Not a very strong field at Nanchang , and the list is headed by the usual Challenger suspects Evegny Donskoy and Jordan Thomson. Ram is 4th on the list.

[sameerph]

So, looks like RamK has decided to continue with Asian challengers this time instead of going back to US as he did last year.

It will be interesting to see if Yuki now pulls out of Taiwan challenger too. It will be tempting to play that if he is reasonably fit as that is the last week which counts for French open main draw entry. But, there may be criticism if he plays Taiwan challenger in the week immediately following the davis cup after skipping davis cup. Lets see.

[PKBasu]

I hope Yuki plays in Taipei despite the optics regarding Davis Cup. He has a small injury/niggle, but surely that shouldn't prevent him from playing the following week. In order to play Davis Cup, he has to travel and practice an extra week (rather than recuperating), so I hope AITA and the Indian media respect his professional decision.

[Omkara]

It happened to Leander once. He reached the semis of Chennai open the week after creating some controversy

[sameerph]

True,PKB. Also the prize money difference between French open main draw and qualifying appearance is huge now. As per revised increase prize money details for French open, the first round main draw loser will get around US$50K while for qualifying Yuki got only US$6K last year. So, as I said the temptation will be big for Yuki to play at Taiwan, win at least a couple of rounds and cement his place for French open main draw.

[PKBasu]

Assuring a main draw appearance in a Slam (especially on his worst surface) is its own reward. But the money angle is all the more attractive. He needs to focus like a laser beam on getting in, and playing in one of his happiest hunting grounds (Taiwan) would be the ideal way to secure it, even if he isn’t fully fit.

[Rajiv]

Yuki's name still appears on the Taiwan list , As of now he doesn't seem to have withdrawn from Taipei.

[sameerph]

Probably they have not updated the list in menstenniforums. But, hope that he changes his decision and plays next week.

He has not entered the 2 Chinese challengers on clay thereafter but both RamK and Prajnesh are there in the entry lists there. Sumit is in the entry list for Italian challengers next week and then another one after 1 week break.

[Rajiv]

Yuki still hasn't withdrawn from Taipei.
As per the ATP rules in one year a player can withdraw for a maximum of three tournaments even few hours before the tournament inspite of the withdrawal deadline having passed by providing a medical cert. So probably Yuki may make the final call after the DC is over

[sameerph]

Rajeev, do you have access to ATP player zone as Jay had a few years back ? How are you aware that Yuki has still not withdrawn from Taiwan entry list.

I think he has to take a call by today evening (before the qualifying draw comes out) if he has not taken it so far.

[Rajiv]

Rajeev, do you have access to ATP player zone as Jay had a few years back ? How are you aware that Yuki has still not withdrawn from Taiwan entry list.

I think he has to take a call by today evening (before the qualifying draw comes out) if he has not taken it so far.

Sameer at Teenisteen & MTF his name still appears , probably as you said they could be late in updating . So as I said earlier even if he doesn't withdraw by today evening deadline , he still has an option to back out even few hours before the start of the tournament.

[bujilover]

Vishnu is back after his paternity leave and joins Sasi Mukund, Balaji for Taipei Q.

At $150K+H Taipei CH

QR1
[6] Sasi Kumar Mukund (520) vs Wei-De Lin (TPE,1399)
Vishnu Vardhan (677) vs [5] Shiuchi Sekiguchi (JPN,456)
Sriram Balaji (631) vs Ray Ho (TPE, UNR) - Current #26 junior

Top seed in Q is Brdyan Klein (347). Not sure about the MD withdrawals. Yuki's Instagram has no updates since his training with RP Singh (Cricketer) a few days ago.