Scouting Report: Wawrinka On The Offensive In Geneva

May152016

An executive summary of what every fan should know about the coming week on the ATP World Tour

Road to Roland Garros Ends: The final two clay court tournaments before Roland Garros get underway on Sunday in Nice and Geneva. Between both tournaments 10 of the Top 30 in the Emirates ATP Rankings are in action. This will be the culmination of 12 clay court tournaments over seven weeks leading into the second Grand Slam tournament of the season.

Open De Nice Cote D’Azur (Nice): The seventh edition of the Open De Nice Cote D’Azur is held at the prestigious Nice Lawn Tennis Club, featuring five of the Top 30 players in the Emirates ATP Rankings. Nice is one of five ATP World Tour tournament held in France, along with Marseille, Metz, Montpellier and Paris-Bercy.

Leading the way is Austrian Dominic Thiem, who is the top seed followed by Gilles Simon, Kevin Anderson, Benoit Paire and Joao Sousa. The other seeds are Fabio Fognini, Andreas Seppi and Alexander Zverev.

Thiem Top Seed/Reigning Champion: Reigning champion Dominic Thiem is the top seed in an ATP World Tour tournament for the second time in his career (‘15 Kitzbuehel – won). The 22-year-old Austrian is putting together a career-best season with two titles (Buenos Aires, Acapulco), a runner-up (Munich) and two semi-finals. He enters Nice with a 32-10 match record, second-most wins behind Novak Djokovic. Last year he came into Nice ranked No. 42 and dropped only one set en route to his maiden ATP World Tour title (d. L. Mayer).

Next Generation Stars: There are four teenagers of the Next Generation group making their Nice debut: Alexander Zverev, Taylor Fritz, Hyeon Chung and Quentin Halys (WC).

Frenchmen Lead the Way: There are a tournament-high five Frenchmen in the main draw, leading with No. 2 seed Gilles Simon and No. 4 Benoit Paire. Simon is 5-3 in Nice, reaching the semi-finals in 2012 and 1014 and quarter-finals in 2013. Paire is looking for his first main draw win (0-3).

Baker is Back: Brian Baker, who reached his first career ATP World Tour final in Nice in 2012 (l. to Almagro) as a qualifier, is playing here for the first time since then. He was ranked No. 216 at the time and later that year in October he reached a career-high No. 52. The 31-year-old American is playing on a protected Emirates ATP Ranking of No. 56. This is his third ATP World Tour tournament of the season. He lost in the first round at the Australian Open and ATP Masters 1000 Miami. He also reached the second round at two Challengers on clay.

Turnaround on Clay: Jiri Vesely struggled with a 1-7 hard court record but since switching to clay last month, the Czech left-hander has compiled a 9-3 record with a semi-final in Marrakech and quarter-finals in Istanbul. He also beat No. 1 Djokovic at Monte-Carlo.

Banque Eric Sturdza Geneva Open (Geneva): The Geneva Open is being held for the second straight year time at the Tennis Club de Geneve at the Parc des Faux-Vives, the oldest and largest tennis club in Switzerland. Last year the tournament returned to the ATP World Tour for the first time since 1991.The tournament, which relocated from Duesseldorf. With the addition of Geneva, there are three Swiss tournaments on the ATP World Tour calendar (Gstaad, Basel). Leading the way in the field as the top two seeds are Stan Wawrinka and David Ferrer, a wild card entry. The others are another wild card: Marin Cilic, John Isner, Philipp Kohlschreiber, Federico Delbonis, Steve Johnson and Sam Querrey.

Stan the Man: This is the second straight year Wawrinka is the top seed in Geneva and the 15^th overall time in his career (third of the season). He’s won three of his last six titles as the top seed in 2015-16. He has five career titles as the top seed.

Bellucci Reigning Champion: Brazilian Thomaz Bellucci returns as reigning champion. Last year Bellucci defeated Joao Sousa 76 64 in the final to capture his fourth career ATP World Tour title, third on Swiss soil (2009, ’12 Gstaad). Bellucci is coming off a third-round showing ATP Masters 1000 Rome where he lost in three sets to Djokovic. Bellucci’s best result of the year is a finalist in Quito (l. to Estrella Burgos).

Cilic, Isner Return to Action: Marin CIlic and John Isner are playing in their first European clay court tournament of the season after being sidelined with knee injuries. In fact, this is Cilic’s first clay court event of the season and his last tournament came at ATP Masters 1000 Miami in March. Isner’s last tournament came in Houston (SF) last month. The top American is two match wins away from 300 in his career (298-184).

Ferrer Top 10 Streak Ends: Ferrer’s streak of 291 consecutive weeks in the Top 10 Emirates ATP Rankings came to an end (May 16) after his third-round exit in Rome (l. to Pouille). The last time Ferrer was not in the Top 10 was Oct. 4, 2010 at No. 11.

Janko Continues Comeback: Former World No. 8 Janko Tipsarevic is playing in his first ATP World Tour tournament of the season and first at this level since last year’s US Open. His only activity this year were at the Ostrava and Heilbronn Challengers. Tipsarevic returned to action last April in Houston after being sidelined nearly 18 months from the end of 2013 and all of 2014 due to a persistent foot injury.

In Case You Missed It

Birthday boy Andy Murray topped Novak Djokovic in the Rome final. Read

Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan overcame Vasek Pospisil and Jack Sock to claim the Rome doubles title. Read

A decade ago, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer played a match to remember in Rome. Read

Novak Djokovic ran into an unusual problem during his semi-final win in Rome. Read

#NextGen star Karen Khachanov is using the ATP Challengers Tour as a stepping stone. Read

Birthdays

16 May – Grigor Dimitrov (25)

18 May – Kevin Anderson (30), Tatsumo Ito (28)

22 May – Novak Djokovic (29)

Milestones

Geneva Singles