In Delray Beach, Marseille, and Rio de Janeiro, it has been a week marked by seeds and other favorites getting ousted early–not exactly an uncommon occurrence throughout the month of February, when many players are already looking ahead to Indian Wells and Miami.
The Delray Beach Open has held to form more than other two tournaments, with Frances Tiafoe’s quick exit being the only real surface. Tiafoe, the defending champion, lost from a set and break up against Daniel Evans (3-6, 7-6(1), 7-5) on Day 1. At the Open 13, only three seeds reached the quarterfinals and neither No. 2 seed Borna Coric nor third-seeded Denis Shapovalov won a single match. Even more carnage came at the Rio Open, where every seed is gone and only No. 5 Joao Sousa advanced to round two–where he promptly lost to qualifier Casper Ruud.
As for Delray, five of the eight seeds are through to the quarters. That includes top seed and world No. 4 Juan Martin Del Potro, whose comeback from his latest injury (knee) is off to a fine start even though he remains less than 100 percent. Del Potro opened with a win over Yoshihito Nishioka before taking down New York champion Reilly Opelka 6-4, 6-4 on Thursday night.
“He has a big bang, big serve, big forehands,” Del Potro said of Opelka. “He already won a title in New York and could be a dangerous player…. [The doctors] told me, ‘If you want to play, just go and play.’ The knee is going to keep hurting for a few more weeks. I’m trying to deal with this pain.”
“The guy’s a great player,” Opelka assured. “The sport needs him around…. I’m pretty tired, to be honest. My body is definitely telling me to take a break. I need some recovery.”
Next up for the Argentine on Friday is Mackenzie McDonald, while No. 2 seed John Isner faces Adrian Mannarino.
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he sounds questionable to play on Friday
I think it’s normal to feel the pain in his knee given that he hasn’t been playing competitive tennis all this while. He seems to be playing ok in his match; I think he has a good chance of winning here.
He has plenty of points to defend during IW/Miami; hopefully he can defend most of them. I really want to see Delpo and Stan doing well again and be in the mix at the slams. When healthy, they’re in a different league from the next gen promising young stars.
A fit and healthy Stan would fare better than say a Medvedev or a Pouille, vs Djoko at the AO. A healthy Delpo would not be so clueless against Rafa at the AO, unlike Tsitsipas.
Delpo’s draw at Delray doesn’t look tough until maybe the final, so I think if he can play his normal game, he can reach the final at least if not winning it.
Nice to see Delpo is skipping Acapulco. Would hate to see him push himself here, although I did pick him to win Del Ray. I wasn’t aware that he was hurting. I would like him to win a GS again. But it’s a big request.
Ugo Humbert is a revelation to me in the Marseille quarterfinals 😀 He reminds me a lot of Herbert.
Humbert and Herbert…great doubles name
Barely got 9 points total in the Marseille bracket. Hate it when I miss making it into double digits lol…And Rio de Janeiro – that bracket sucked too. If you don’t don’t follow tennis closely, the brackets are just bad guessing – too many new names in both WTA and ATP.
Too many matches to keep up with in February.Ridiculous scheduling.. But Im looking forward to IW/Miami , best part of the year IMO .Just wish I had more time
upsets left, right and centre.
Ricky! You jinxed Delpo!
Delpo deserves another Slam