Ernests Gulbis and Federico Delbonis will battle for the Nice title on Saturday. Taking the court for the championship match in Dusseldorf, meanwhile, are Philipp Kohlschreiber and Ivo Karlovic.
(7) Federico Delbonis vs. (2) Ernests Gulbis
Gulbis will be looking to maintain a perfect record in ATP finals when he takes the court on Saturday at the Open de Nice Cote d’Azur. The 19th-ranked Latvian is 5-0 at this stage of tournament, having triumphed most recently on the indoor hard courts of Marseille earlier this season. Gulbis is through to his sixth title match following wins over Martin Klizan, Dmitry Tursunov, and Albert Montanes. After three-set victories in his first two matches of the week, Nice’s No. 2 seed blasted Montanes 6-0, 6-3 in one hour and 10 minutes on Friday. An in-form and unusually consistent Gulbis is now 26-10 for his 2014 campaign.
Up next for Gulbis is Delbonis, whom he has never faced. The 45th-ranked Argentine booked a spot in his third career ATP final by taking out Mikhail Kukushkin, Paul-Henri Mathieu, John Isner (in a third-set tiebreaker), and Gilles Simon. Delbonis finished runner-up last year in Hamburg and lifted the winner’s trophy earlier this year in Sao Paulo. Clay will obviously help the seventh seed, but Gulbis has more experience in this situation and he generally feasts on opponents who spin in their serves without much velocity.
Pick: Gulbis in 3
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(1) Philipp Kohlschreiber vs. (7) Ivo Karlovic
Kohlschreiber and Karlovic will be squaring off for the fourth time in their careers and for the first time in more than three years when they collide in the final of the Dusseldorf Open. Karlovic leads the head-to-head series 2-1, but they have never met on clay (all three of their previous encounters have come on hard courts). They most recently collided at the 2001 Doha event, with Karlovic prevailing 7-6(5), 6-7(4), 7-6(2). The last four sets between the two players have ended in tiebreakers and six of their eight total sets have required a ‘breaker.
Karlovic, who is 5-4 in ATP title matches, has enjoyed a stellar week that includes a three-set victory over Juan Monaco and a third-set tiebreaker survival at the expense of Tobias Kamke. Kohlschreiber, 4-6 in finals, has defeated Teymuraz Gabashvili, Mate Delic, and Denis Istomin. The top-seeded German played five sets on Friday, the last two against Delic after a darkness suspension and three versus Istomin. The good news for Kohlschreiber is that matches against Karlovic do not require as much energy as most other matchups. Playing at home in Germany and on clay, the world No. 29–who has been broken by Karlovic only once in 45 service games–may have a slight edge.
Pick: Kohlschreiber in 3
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you said Guibis feasts on opponents that spins their serves.Which are these players? I think on Verdasco 1-4 H2H, and Kohlschreiber 0-2 H2H
Montanes
Didn’t see the match but well done Kohlbi. In spite of the booming serve and all the aces the rest of Dr. Ivo’s game doesn’t add up to a lot and is a yawn to watch.
Peeps, does any one know which official channel is livestreaming RG? I really do not to visit dodgy sites. ATP is not streaming coz its a Slam I guess, is ITF or RG streaming?
Thanks in advance for any info you may provide…………….
rafaisthebestMay 24, 2014 at 12:17 pm
Usually, Eurosport International TV (1 & 2) shows and Eurosport Player is livestreaming all the GS tournaments except Wimbledon.
Thanks @augusta08!
Oh dear…..Eurosport Player is not available in Tunisia it says on the website……
Nothing for it RITB. Bite on the bullet and subscribe to the ITF life streaming. That way you can watch any match being covered by TV – I’m fairly sure regardless of where you are. You get better coverage than with Eurosport Player! I have an annual subscription (59.95 US dollars) and that way can watch all the Davis Cup matches as well. Only snag is, unlike the ATP site you don’t get catch up with ITP which is a bore when a tournament is in a different time zone. You can access it by going to the official site for Roland Garros.
If you prefer, you can take out individual subscriptions tournament by tournament.
#BlissikinsNoAdvertising
Thanks ed251137! Good to know I can livestream on ITF. I have subscribed for an ITF livestream before, but only for a specific Davis Cup tournament (I think that was when Rafa last played for Spain) and the quality was good. I will decide tomorrow what menu to go for, but I will subscribe nonetheless.
Cheers!
ed251137 (at 2:11 pm)
I can’t find any information that the ITF Tennis is livestreaming GS tournaments.
https://secure.daviscup.tv/buy
Day 1 OOP is out, guess who is playing on the 1st day? Fed…………
http://www.rolandgarros.com/en_FR/scores/schedule/index.html?promo=sumscores
RITB, you can download these Apps – Film on TV and VPN (virtual personal network) which will give you access to world wide TV programmes. Not SKY or Eurosport but American networks etc. I used to use them when I was in Dubai to watch live British programmes. You may be able to find a country where you can access the tennis. The TV channels are listed on the RG Website.
Thanks @nadline10
RITB and Augusta
I hope I haven’t given you bum info. I could swear I was watching both the USO and AO via the ITF streaming site which as I recall I signed up for each time via the official tournament sites. I suppose my memory could be playing tricks 🙁
I took out the annual subscription in January which I was under the impression gave me coverage of all the GSs as well as DC. I will be right p***** off if this is not the case.
I will check out the RG site on Monday when it will be fully active. There’s certainly no info at the moment.
Don’t worry ed251137, stuff happens……….
Yep, let’s wait until RG proper starts, sure they will give streaming info on the site. I watched the AO 2014 on the official Australian Open website, for free! Hope all the Slams copy the AO, really cool…..
Nadline: mentioned a site she has used which accesses Free To Air programmes world-wide. I use a similar site which happens to include a tennis channel screening classics from Wimbledon (scroll down till you see Sports, click on that and the tennis is the first one on the list). Good for a rainy afternoon when there’s nothing on the tele.
http://www.filmon.com/tv/live