$10K ITF Futures - Kolkata (Mar 14)

[jayakris]

Here is the entry list that came out just now -


Main Draw:

1 SIPAEYA, Sunil-Kumar IND 351
2 KHAN, Aqeel PAK 376
3 KANNAN, Vijay IND 514
4 UPPAL, Vishal IND 530
5 KWON, Chris USA 533
6 MONROE, Nick USA 561
7 RAMASWAMI, Ajay IND 585
8 LIU, Tai-Wei TPE 594
9 BOPANNA, Rohan IND 654
10 FASS, Adam USA 739=
11 THOMPSON, Adam NZL 766
12 HANLIN, Matthew GBR 785
13 RASTOGI, Karan IND 820
14 PATHANJALI, Ravi-Shankar IND 824
15 WIDHIYANTO, Febi INA 844
16 KANNAN, Kamala IND 851=
17 MATHEW, Jaco IND 882
18 SOMOV, Andrei RUS 886=

Alternates

19 CHANG, Kai-Lung TPE 891=
20 OGORODOV, Oleg UZB 911 3
21 EGGER, Markus AUT 937= 2
22 SINGH, Ashutosh IND 972=
23 KUTAC, Roman CZE 991= 1
24 MIOTTO, Alex GBR 1005= 2
25 JURD, Romain FRA 1044=
26 YU, Hiu-Tung HKG 1048=
27 STATHAM, Jose "Rubin" NZL 1068=
28 TIERRO, Patrick PHI 1134=
29 KILCHHOFER, Stefan SUI 1134= 3
30 SYED, Rahil IND 1160=
31 IVANOV, Dmitry UZB 1160=
32 WONG, Wing-Luen "Wayne" HKG 1168=
33 FURUKAWA, Hayato JPN 1217=
34 SHARAN, Divij IND 1217=
35 KURZ, Michael SUI 1247= 3
36 WALIA, Varun IND 1312=
37 VAN DER WERF, Ordan NED 1312= 2
38 POLASEK, Filip SVK 1357= 2
39 RADECKE, Christoph GER 1357= 1
40 GOUTHAM, Arjun IND 1357=
41 THOMSON, Clinton AUS 1357= 1
42 SAYER, Martin HKG 1357=
43 HSIEH, Wang-Cheng TPE 1357=
44 MAMEDKULIEV, Myalikkuli TKM 1479=
45 ARTA, Ketut-Nesa INA 1479=
46 LIFSHITS, Mikhail RUS 1479= 3
47 WIESLER, Andre GER 1479= 3
48 SI, Yew-Ming MAS 1479=
49 KOLKER, Andrew USA 1479= 3
50 NATHAN, Kris USA 1479=
51 SINGH, Saurabh IND 1479=
52 BIASELLA, Adriano ITA 1479=
53 LI, Ruo-Yang AUS 1479=
54 ABELE, Kevin GER 1479= 1
55 MISHRA, Shivang IND 1479=
56 BOEHNER, Daniel GER 1479= 3
57 BESZELSEN, Bastiaan NED 1479= 3
58 FILENKOV, Alexei RUS 1479= 2
59 HESSE, Sascha GER 1479= 3
60 ISHMATOV, Gafur UZB 1479=
61 BEUTEL, Joscha GER 1479= 2
62 SCHEIL, Tobias GER 1479= 5

------------

The question is, where is Vishal Punna and Vinod Sridhar?

Jay

[gvhvhg]

Somdev wont be coming to defend his title?

[Sandeep]

The other day only Jay posted a big message on how college tennis would be. And now you are asking won't somdev come to defend his title ?

[amr090]

not that great a field, i hope bofors and/or SKS dominate.

[jaydeep]

No ArunPrakash also ... I m really worrying about these guys plannings ... Arun agree not great field, but good that Rohan having chance to improve his ranking with weaker field ...

Jaydeep.

[PKBasu]

This is actually a pretty tough field -- much better than it looks on paper. There are lots of very good players like Ogorodov, whose current ranking is a very poor reflection of the glories he has achieved in the past. (The same of course applies to Rohan Bopanna). Both Chris Kwon and Nick Monroe have moved very rapidly up the rankings in the past year (from the 1000s to where they are now, although Kwon had a highest of 512 in Oct04). And of course Aqeel Khan's points come entirely from Satellites and Futures in Pakistan and India -- a large number of points acquired from very few tournaments. He showed us what he is capable of last year.

[jayakris]

By the way, this will be held at the South Club - on CLAY COURTS.

I give up. If they can do this at South Club, WHY NOT do it on grass??? .. Come on. When will we see a grasscourt event for God's sake?

Jay

[PKBasu]

Yeah, we had talked about the fact that it was on clay at the South Club. A total travesty. When I ran into Akhtar Ali in Calcutta a few months ago, I asked him about the rapid disappearance of grass courts, and he said that was the way the world was moving and there was just no demand for grass. Utter rubbish if you ask me: we don't need to swing from one extreme to another. Prepare our kids to play on clay by all means, but don't start scheduling all our pro events on the surface that our players are least familiar with. What a waste for someone like Rohan Bopanna (although probably a bit of a help for someone like Karan).

[PKBasu]

Ogodorov, incidentally, was ranked #135 as recently as September 2002. A very dangerous floater in the draw, especially on clay.

[jayakris]

PKB -- I am totally with you. How EVERY Indian tennis stalwart seems to have bought this rubbish about the world moving from grass etc, just bugs me. Sometimes I get irritated when Indians seem to enmasse buy into this kind of "easy answers" without thinking deeply. The world has of course reduced grasscourt tennis, but that does not mean we have to lose all our historic advantage on grass.

All we are asking for is at least a couple of pro ITF events, one senior grasscourt nationals, at least one junior ITF event, and a couple of junior domestic events. Our players need to just have some minimal idea of how to play on grasscourts for us to have a huge advantage, and all these stalwarts are talking like we are into some real "modern thinking" by going with the world. Not particularly complaining about Akhtar Ali, who is actually a good one. It is just everybody together in India creating this atmosphere where people are begininng to not even think of doing some grasscourt events. Ridiculous.

People also forget that playing well on grass is to a huge extent a mental thing. You need to have played on the surface a few times and been advised a bit by the several grasscourt exponents we have had, for them to remember it when they get on to a grass court, say for a Davis Cup. I am not saying that we should change all the techniques taught by the coaches to old forehand slice and all that. The kids these days are not even getting any advice on how/why grass is different - if the wards are never playing on grass, why would the coaches even spend time advising them? .. It is a lot about how to change your APPROACH to the game, not necessarily your techniques. It is pitiful that Indian players are also all beginning to think that grass is for cows, not knowing that just thinking differently is enough to beat a lot of players who think that way.

Jay

[knarayen]

All we are asking for is at least a couple of pro ITF events, one senior grasscourt nationals, at least one junior ITF event, and a couple of junior domestic events. Our players need to just have some minimal idea of how to play on grasscourts for us to have a huge advantage, and all these stalwarts are talking like we are into some real "modern thinking" by going with the world. Not particularly complaining about Akhtar Ali, who is actually a good one. It is just everybody together in India creating this atmosphere where people are begininng to not even think of doing some grasscourt events. Ridiculous.

People also forget that playing well on grass is to a huge extent a mental thing. You need to have played on the surface a few times and been advised a bit by the several grasscourt exponents we have had, for them to remember it when they get on to a grass court, say for a Davis Cup.

Jay

Yeah, time for someone to build a tennis ranch that has representation for all 3 surfaces, hard, clay and grass. Houston's Westside tennis club has them. The club is so popular, at any given time all the courts are booked. We need something like this in India. Unfortunately all the infrastructure/house builders, especially in Bangalore, are only interested in quick bucks building flats/townhomes and can't be convinced that doing something like this is very important.

Well, maybe now that Sania is achieving some success some things may change.


Cheers,
Krish

[Florian Buechting]

It's really a pity that the Indians even switch their very own home events from grass to clay. Especially in Davis Cup, it has been one of our biggest advantages that our players were used to play on the ground other countries just drive their cattle on ...

But it is so great to read the confirmation that Rohan will be back on court!

[sramu]

I understand that all the three events are in clay ! If AITA wants Indians to do well then it should be on hard court. Otherwise it is going to be dominated by Europeans like Simon Gruel etc.
I understand that Vinod has missed the entry deadline and has asked for a wild card.

[PKBasu]

Complete and utter madness that all three events are on clay. Come on AITA, get your act together!!

[jaydeep]

Even Lee asked after the Davis Cup triumph that "AITA should consider to save all these grass courts, becoz these r true (home) advantage for us in Davis Cup ties." ... Anybody up listening this???

Jaydeep.