Breaking Serve And Breaking Rackets: A Tennis Blog

The Davidooff Swiss Indoors Basel event in Basel, Switzerland is a ATP 500 event.  Which is a tournament that is slightly more prestigious and worth more points than a common tour event which is normally a 250 event, but not as big as a Masters Series event which is normally worth 1000 ranking points to the winner.

Some key players who will be in Basel are the #1 seed Roger Federer, James Blake, Fernando Gonzalez, Novak Djokovic, Marin Cilic, Radek Stepanek, Stanislas Wawrinka, and Phillipp Kohlschreiber.

I will make a prediction that has about 1% chance of being right.  Federer over Djokovic in the final.

The Valencia Open 500 in Valencia, Spain is actually owned by two players who are playing this week.  Friends and fellow Spaniards David Ferrer, and Juan Carlos Ferrero are co-owners of this event. 

Valencia features the return of Andy Murray to action.  Also in the field are Nikolay Davydenko, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Fernando Verdasco, Gilles Simon, Gael Monfils, as well as the above mentioned Ferrer and Ferrero.

Ferrer and Ferrero won't even get close enough to sniff the finals.  I like Verdasco to beat Davydenko in the final.

Some of the women who did not qualify for the year end WTA Sony Ericsson championships are playing in the Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions.  Its an event featuring players who won tournaments throughout the season.  The first round is 4 groups of 3 that features a round robin format.  The winners of each group advance to the final 4 and the semifinals and final are single elimination.

The field is filled with basically jobbers who got lucky and won a tournament somehow.  Players involved are Marion Bartoli, Shahar Peer, Magdalena Rybarikova, Yanina Wickmayer, Anabel Medina Garrigues, Kimiko Date-Krumm, Samantha Stosur, Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez, Agnes Szavay, Sabine Lisicki, Melinda Czink (whoa a Dow Tennis classic in Midland alumnus), and Arevane Rezai....Basically a bunch of players who strike fear in none of the top players. Good for them though to make it this far.

I like Samantha Stosur to come out the winner of this.  But you could pick anyone of these ladies and you couldn't go wrong.. well with the exception of Kimiko Date-Krumm.  The #101 ranked player has no shot.