ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament, Brasil Open, SAP Open

ABN AMRO Tennis Tournament

With out any of the other top 4 in the tournament the path was safe for Roger Federer to win his 71st title and has extended his streak of winning one ATP tournament a year to 12 years. Roger Federer defeated Juan Martin Del Potro 6-1 6-4 in the final. The doubles winners were Llodra and Zimonjic.

Roger Federer and Juan Martin Del Potro

seedings for this tournament:

Brasil Open

Nicolas Almagro

Proving he deserved his world number 11 ranking Nicolas Almagro won the Brasil title, all 11 of his titles have come on clay courts and this is the third time he has won here! The Spaniard beat Filippo Volandri 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, Volandri reached his first ATP world tour final in six years! The doubles was won by the top seeds Butorac and Soares.

Seedings:

SAP Open 

It seems one of the 'Future Winners' from 'Future Winners Friday' has won another tournament quicker than expected! Milos Raonic, the defending champion, won in San Jose, ahead of the number 1 and 2 seeds Gael Monfils and Andy Roddick. To read my profile on Milos Raonic click here. He defeated Denis Istomin 7-6(3), 6-2. Another  from my 'Future Winners Friday' feature did very well, Ryan Harrison reached the semi-finals, losing to Milos Raonic, Harrison was not seeded to read his profile check here.

 Doubles was won by Knowles and Malisse.

The seeds:

Ah I have now caught up with the tournaments starting on 13/02/12 and I will post the results of the tournament starting 20/02/12 before the results of the tournaments starting 27/02/12 on Sunday, meaning I will have caught up!

The tournament to look out for is definitely the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championship!

WTA Wednesday

It's not everyday that the women of tennis get to be glammed up but the Academy Awards provided three of the biggest fashionistas on court with an opportunity to do just that.

Maria Sharapova, Serena Williams and Venus Williams all made appearances at the Vanity Fair Oscars party and I must say they all looked pretty good!

Serena and Venus obviously felt the more colourful the better! It's lovely to see Venus again and of course Serena who has been expressing doubt over her future as a player claiming she isn't enjoying it as much.

While the Williams' sisters dominance of the game is beginning to dwindle, Maria Sharapova seems to be near reaching the best form of her career, we will all be watching to see if she can get her hands on another Grand Slam! She looks Wimbledon ready here and certainly very radiant.

Murray Watch Monday

Andy Murray is in Dubai at the moment, preparing for his next tournament, the Dubai duty free championship. Whilst there he climbed the world tallest building, the Buri Khalifi. 

 'The view was unbelievable,' the Scot said. 'It's a long way and my ears popped on the way up. It started on something like the 20th floor and there's still six times as much to go. We stopped at the 124th floor. It was really high.'

He is confident he can build on his performance at the Australian Open where he was edged out by world No 1 Novak Djokovic.

He said he preferred being in Miami practising on outdoor courts as to avoid the transaction from indoor to outdoor, Murray is much more happier than he was this time last year and preparing for the coming year.

 

Murray said he played well and improved a lot of things whilst in Australia, 'It wasn't like after I lost to Novak last year, when I was thinking, "What could I have done better? Are there things that I should change in my game?"'.

 

 'I think there's no real big difference on hard courts,' he said. 'On the clay I definitely think I still need to improve a lot. On grass I just need a little bit of consistency.

 

Murray said it was taking time to adjust to the conditions. 'It's so fast here,' he said. 'For me the conditions are some of the quickest that we play in during the year. Here and Indian Wells are similar, though I think the courts are bit slower in Indian Wells. It's taken a few days to get used to the speed, but if I adjust well I think the courts should be good for me.'

P.s. I was ill from Friday and completly forgot to do a Future Winners Friday, and I will be updating the winners of the last few tournaments over the week.

WTA Wednesday

This week I wanted to mention the rise of German tennis, particularly in the woman's! 4 women from Germany are now in the top 20 this is the first time since July 17 1988! 

These women are:

10) Andrea Petkovic

13) Sabine Lisicki

19) Julia Goerges

20) Angelique Kerber

Kerber was not even in the top 100 last August and has risen high extremely quickly!

These players will hopefully help to revive the state of tennis in Germany and trigger a response from other nations to beat these young, talented Germans. Many seem to believe women's tennis is no longer anything to be excited about but I believe when one nation can produce such talent, all competing to be the number one in their country (and in the world of course) it proves that the game is still competitive and has a lot to offer!

News Bite

Abit of news about what the top 2 players have been up to in their time off!

Rafael Nadal has been continuing his modelling career on the side and recently posed for an issue of Sports Illustrated called 'Bar and the boys' along with Bar Refaeli.

 Check here if you want to see the rest!

Novak Djokovic has been awarded the highest Serbian honour, president Boris Tadic has decorated him with the Karadjordjeva Star Medal, the highest Honor in the country. Tadic said Djokovic deserves the medal for "special merits in representing Serbia."

Djokovic has also been busy winning another award, the Laureus sportsman of the year. Djokovic talking about his win: