ATP Tennis/Non-India Davis Cup

[jaydeep]

Tsitsipas leads the other pool, having beaten Nadal.

Tomorrow, they r having their match ... Sacha defeated Rafa in the first match and yesterday, Rafa produced an epic comeback from 1-5 and 30-40 (match-point) down in the third set against Medvedev to win it, 67(3) 63 76(4).

[Sin Hombre]

Rafa beat both Medvedev and Tsitsipas but his slow start in the tournament cost him a semifinal spot.

Tsitsipas comfortably beat Federer, and Thiem thrashed Zverev which meant none of the big 3 made it to the finals.

Thiem, Tsitsipas and Medvedev are now comfortably matching the big 3 in the best-of-3 format. Question for 2020 is can they do the same at the Grand Slams in best-of-5?

[sameerph]

I think next year will be the year when finally the monoply of grand slams of big 3 will be challenged. The young guns are now coming up fast and not so young ones too like Thiem.

[S_K_S]

After yesterdays final we don't need to be worried about the big 3 retiring. The future of tennis is in safe hands.

[prasen9]

But more importantly, the old ones are getting older and slower and un-fitter even if it is ever so slowly.

[PKBasu]

It does look as if Tsitsipas, Thiem and Zverev are ready to challenge the Big-Three. And we might have Murray back for a last hurrah too next year. Thiem did surprisingly well in the indoor season, on courts that weren't expected to suit him. Looking forward to the Australian Open!

[PKBasu]

They've already ruined the Davis Cup, haven't they? This year's final had just a couple of singles matches, and even those were best of 3 sets:

https://www.daviscup.com/en/news/314621.aspx

Tennis has destroyed one of the great traditions that helped spread the game around the world. Tragic!

[jayakris]

Yes, they completely killed Davis Cup. This is some other event masquerading under the glorious name of Davis Cup. Sad, indeed.

[PKBasu]

So the new Davis Cup format seems to have fallen completely flat:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/19/spor ... anada.html

Since it was played in Madrid, the Centre Court stadium was packed for Spain's matches, but the other two courts were more than 2/3rd empty. French tennis supporters (who could have easily come to Madrid) boycotted it to protest the new format. I hope many others do the same. It is an asinine idea!

Andy Murray played just one singles match, as Dan Evans and Kyle Edmund carried Britain to the SF. Interesting. Despite a title (and a victory over Wawrinka in an ATP single final) Murray doesn't seem to be 100% yet.

[jayakris]

Since it was played in Madrid, the Centre Court stadium was packed for Spain's matches, but the other two courts were more than 2/3rd empty. French tennis supporters (who could have easily come to Madrid) boycotted it to protest the new format. I hope many others do the same. It is an asinine idea!

Exactly. Absolutely asinine. I still cannot believe that the mandarins of tennis agreed with this. Nobody who cares for tennis and its traidions could have gone along.

[sanjay5goel]

Expecting anyone in today's day and time to follow tradition, or even to have any regard for it, is almost like living in a fools paradise.

For the past 300 years amongst all the so-called scientific progress of society, there is one underlying (but generally unspoken) theme, which is that the generations of yesteryears were mostly fools and only now we are discovering real knowledge scientifically.

However, what has this past 200 years of science and engineering progress has to show for it?

Remember that in the initial years when the world happiness surveys first began, countries like Bangladesh, Nepal etc were found to be the happiest. Later on, after sufficient experience I think the surveys were redesigned to ensure that 1st World countries would come out on top.

Today it would be hard to find one person who would openly accept that our grand parents generations were happier than us - living a life, although not of material affluence, were happier because the Vedic underpinnings of life made for almost anxiety free lives. The opposite can be said of the current modern society.

Krsne matir 'stu
Hare Krishna!
Your servant
Sridhara-syama dasa

[prasen9]

You have the choice. I understand choice itself brings unhappiness. But, nobody is forcing anyone to live accepting modern science. In my state, there are people who do not use electricity, drive horse-carriages on our roads (and we drive politely and carefully to not scare the horses), have double figure number of kids per couple, etc. The also abuse animals like hell in order to make money. I can easily live like my grandfather. I do not care about what people think of me or what others say. If I feel like, I go to work not ironing my clothes etc. But, I choose not to live like my grandfather. The Internet connects me to an awesome source of knowledge from all over the world. I want that. I do not know if that makes me unhappy per se. And, even if it is confirmed that my time on the Internet does make me unhappy, I would possibly still want it because I like reading and learning about a whole lot of things. I am lucky that I do not have the struggles my parents had and in whatever discussions we have had, they would have preferred my situation to theirs.

I also do not know if happiness is the be all and end all. Is happiness more desirable than lack of physical pain? If you have to work 12 hours outdoors lifting 2 ton stones and enduring physical pain during the day and are dog-tired and come home and sleep. You have no time to be unhappy. Does the happiness question really measure accurately something objective? Or is the person who works hard and blows out his knees by he is 55 happy because he thinks that that punitive labor is what is his destiny? But, if you work 8 hours in a white collar job, you come home and be unhappy because the Indian hockey team lost when ssp turned his TV on.

Also, do we take things for granted and is the happiness study being calibrated on the same things? Or does that even matter? This is a complex issue.

In general, what you said may be true. But, there are always exceptions. Maybe we will go back to cities without cars, etc. That is, tackle the excesses of our current society that creates unhappiness. But, I think throwing the baby out with the bathwater is not the right solution.

I am sorry that we will lose you because given your position, I think you are going off the internet and trying to go back to the old life. But, at the end, I will respect your choice. Bye my friend!

[suresh]

But, if you work 8 hours in a white collar job, you come home and be unhappy because the Indian hockey team lost when ssp turned his TV on.

Brilliant reference to the one and only ssp.

[prasen9]

Surinder Singh Plaha is Mr. Hockey here. Generally, I try to keep my humor self-deprecating. But, given that Surinder himself has said it umpteen number of times, I hope Mr. Plaha, sorry I mean ssp, did not mind. (Of course, I do not believe that anyone turning their TV on can cause any goals for any team.)

[S_K_S]

O ye of little faith........next you'll be telling me that the commentators curse does not exist or that moving from your seat when your team is playing well doesn't impact the game