Today’s Men’s News (09/30)

Written by: Staff on 30th September 2012

Today's Men's News (09/30)

epa03414470 Gilles Simon of France returns the ball to Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia during their semi final match at the Thailand Open tennis tournament in Bangkok, Thailand, 29 September 2012. EPA/PONGMANAT TASIRI |

Bangkok

Singles – Final: (2) R Gasquet def. (4) G Simon 6-2 6-1

Gilles Simon broke to open this match. Then — it was over. Nothing to write about after that.

Truly nothing. These two faced off in a final — and it had no ranking effect. Gasquet was #14 coming in, and we show him staying right there! He’s a much stronger #14, but still just #14. He does help his situation in the ATP Race, but he’s too far back to have any real hope — he will surely have to win one of the Masters, and even that won’t suffice by itself. At least he earns his first title in more than two years.

Gilles Simon managed to rise a little bit — from #19 to #18, assuming we did everything right. But he is 0-6 against countryman and friend Gasquet. Definitely something he needs to work on….

Doubles – Final: (WC) Lu/Udomchoke def. (4) Butorac/Hanley 6-3 6-4

This definitely gets the “out of the blue” award. Lu Yen-Hsun has a few doubles finals in his past, but the last at Chennai 2010. Danai Udomchoke has a career with almost no big rewards. But here they have a title. There isn’t much to say except to quote Udomchoke: “I was at my happiest moment during match point because I’ve always dreamed of holding a Thailand Open trophy in the ten years I’ve played the tournament. I feel very proud of having done it today.”

Kuala Lumpur

Singles – Final: (2) J Monaco def, (7) J Benneteau 7-5 4-6 6-3

If only Juan Monaco could do this at the big ones.

There were a lot of big numbers floating around in this match for Monaco. It was a three hour final. And his fourth title of the season. The problem is, three of those titles (Vina del Mar, Houston, and now Kuala Lumpur) are 250 point events, and the fourth (Hamburg) is a 500. Plus, of course, three of them were on clay. But it’s the small size of the events, not the surface, that hurts. Even though Monaco has four titles, he is still only #10 — and a rather weak #10, about 400 points behind #9 Janko Tipsarevic. Monaco is having a career year — but he has almost no chance to qualify for London. Unless he can translate these results to something bigger, anyway.

Julien Benneteau would have been Top Thirty had he won this. As it is, we show him at #32/#33. And, of course, the loss means that the French did not sweep the day’s finals.

Doubles – Final: (3) Peya/Soares def. Fleming/Hutchins 5-7 7-5 10-7 (Match TB)

No doubt both winners were thinking, “About time.” This is the first title for Alexander Peya since Auckland (with Marach); Bruno Soares wins his first since Sao Paulo (with Butorac). This is their fourth tournament together, and both talked about how they’re getting better at working as a team. Peya noted, “We are starting to click more as a team, also on our off days as we work on our games”; Soares declared, “This week was special, because we felt we were playing better with each match.” They have about another month to see how much more they can improve.