Bet-at-Home Open

[VMoe86]

Still not a topic for this tournament? The TE community on ITST is going downhill, that's for sure.

Tonight I played my first round match against San99: VMoe86 (Almagro) beats San99 (Murray), 6-4, 6-1.

It was a beautiful clay court match from my side and San99 tried to mix it up with some net play, but with the higher bounce on clay and the spin from Almagro he made quite a few errors.

I was defending well and I was returning even better -- not a single ace for him and he was serving an average first serve speed of 120mph, at 78% first serve in.

Thus I could create more break chances, but he was mentally tough in the first set: I was up an early break and two times in a row I had him on 15-40, great chances to go up a double break. He toughed it out and when I served for the first set, he got his first break point, which I could save, phew.

Second set he was more impatient, especially after he did not take that second and last break chance he had.

San99 also needs to improve on his return of serve. I did serve quite well with Almagro regarding placement, but I mainly used b1 serves and don't think that I would have hit around 9 aces against a better returner.

It was a good match, nice rallies and variety!

[C4iLL]

A stop for the rising star San

[C4iLL]

Just defeated by Elias 6-3 6-4. A normal match where I think we both didn't play at our best level, but that was fun however

He broke me twice, I had a couple of occasions to come back, but he dominated the match and deserved the win by far. I had no real solution with Fed on clay against his Ferrer

[eliomelma]

Mmm... C4ill, i was waiting for a great battle, maybe Federer on clay not is on favourite surface, but you lost against the great Elias

[Elias]

Just defeated by Elias 6-3 6-4. A normal match where I think we both didn't play at our best level, but that was fun however

He broke me twice, I had a couple of occasions to come back, but he dominated the match and deserved the win by far. I had no real solution with Fed on clay against his Ferrer

Yep, fun match, i agree both of us not at our best, C4ill last match was his QF @ wimbledon and he didnt played much in the meantime, therefore he did several positioning erros especially from high spins on the backhand side. He still showed a good net presence and play so it was difficult to break.

[VMoe86]

And my journey in a tournament ends once again at the hands of kyuuji: kyuuji (Verdasco) defeats VMoe86 (Almagor) 6-2, 6-2.

Unfortunately my game froze directly after the match or something with my keyboard was wrong, simply could not type anything, so I use this post to congratulate kyuuji for this win, well played! I think I made him work hard, even though the scoreline makes it look a bit one-sided. I had some chances, did not take them (or he was too good in these situations, for example my first two break points and he hits an ace and then a perfect 1-2-punch).

We had quite a few long rallies and in the beginning kyuuji was more impatient than me and thus he made errors -- here I had my chances. Then he started to be more patient himself and I made more errors, but he was also more aggressive in the key moments. I was too safe with my aiming most of the time for a period, but I had some very good patches of play. For example when I was down 0-4 in the second set I was playing really well, hitting great winners. But kyuuji kept his cool, mixed it up a bit and then held for 5-2.

I was able to save two match points (the second one was amazing, although it ended on an error by kyuuji), but in the end the better player has won (what a great mover he is, unbelievable). I am happy with my level of play, though. I am going in the right direction.

[eliomelma]

Great match Fox vs Polca 7-6 7-6 . Hope that you post the stats!

[polca456321]

I didn't screen the stats because I thought he would, and I can't understand why there isn't anything in my "Demos" file. However I set autorecord 1 in tennis.ini AND ITST.ini... Really sorry for the replay, I don't think he has it

But to resume the match, it was a serve battle He scored many many aces, and even if he was very good at returning, I had many free points thanks to my first ball. In the two tie-breaks his aces gave him the victory, but the match was still fun, there were some rallies (I think to one especially) which needed a good tactic.

Congrats to my opponent TWM-Fox

[Elias]

For people who may not already know about it, it's very straightforward taking screenshots at any time in Tennis Elbow, using the F11 key.

just bring the match stats screens and hit F11.

The screenshots are saved in TE root folder as .bmp files.

[Elias]

But to resume the match, it was a serve battle He scored many many aces, and even if he was very good at returning, I had many free points thanks to my first ball. In the two tie-breaks his aces gave him the victory, but the match was still fun, there were some rallies (I think to one especially) which needed a good tactic.

Congrats to my opponent TWM-Fox

btw, never thought that Soderling serve could do better than Raonic's one against such a good returner, especially on clay vs grass, i should definitely try Robin

Though if i remember well you already served very well with Gasquet @newport

Congrats Polca that's a nice result besides the defeat

[polca456321]

Yes, Soderling has a great serve if you know how to do it, I mean the animation can disturb at beginning, but with practice you can hit 215 km/h on lines often.

And yes you remember well, you told me I was serving bombs when you played me with Gasquet As I'm not a strong player during rallies, at least I have serves

And thanks for congrats but my opponent deserved it also, he played well in the two tie-breaks

BTW my replay problem is fixed, I just downloaded the game once again, and it seems to work now

[polca456321]

For those who'd like to have our match stats, I put them from the log

TWM-Fox vs Polca456321

50/71 = 70% 1st serve 53/78 = 68%
30 Aces 12
0 Double faults 0
210 km/h Fastest serve 222 km/h
187 km/k Avr 1st serve speed 199 km/h
136 km/h Avr 2nd serve speed 135 km/h
26 Winners 43
14 Errors 24
2/4 = 50% Net approaches 1/3 = 33%
0/1 = 0% Break point conversions 0/0 = 0%
80 Total points won 69
30/65 = 46% Short rallies won 35/65 = 54%
9/21 = 43% Medium rallies won 12/21 = 57%
6/10 = 60% Long rallies won 4/10 = 40%
0 Set points saved 2
0 Match points saved 2
47/50 = 94% Points won on 1st serve 43/53 = 81%
11/21 = 52% Points won on 2nd serve 13/25 = 52%
22/78 = 28 % Return points won 13/71 = 18%
3 Return winners 3
0/1 = 0% Breaks / Games with break point 0/0 = 0%

[VMoe86]

Thanks for the stats, good result for you. Two sets on clay, 42 aces. The rematch will take place soon at the Farmers classic, hopefully then with a .dmo file.

[Elias]

Elias (Ferrer) vs. Kyuuji (Verdasco) 6-3 4-6 6-3

Well, i'm pretty surprised to win this match to be honest as i couldn't score a game in our last match-up @ wimbledon, i just started the match hoping to lose on a decent score . I guess Kyuuji was'nt probably in great form today, and as he told me clay isn't his thing. About the match unfortunately there is no pertinent stat scoreboard to show because my computer crashed @ 6-3 3-3 and we had to restart hosting (with stamina reset, damn )

About the match itself it was a stamina game mostly. I aimed to flood verdasco backhand with high top spins all the way and still Kyuuji used to hit some accels a bit too much and deplete his stamina faster than i did in the first set, so he did some errors then or i could push with accels with more safety by the end of those points, especially on the opposite side of the court after mesmerizing my opponent on the backhand side.

Ferrer has great moving potential and a 10% higher stamina pool than Verdasco, i guess this helped. When i got more impatient in the second set i finally lost my serve and the set at 4-5, so i started again to grind in the third set, and that was it. Kyuuji also tried some drop shots to shorten the rallies but most of the time i could reach them.

as i had a crash there is no complete replay available (couldn't find the .dmo for the first part), so i will post only the second part 4-6 6-3, wich starts at 3-3 40-30 in the second set (free points played to reach this score).

[C4iLL]

Impressive victory, second defeat of Kyuji I think here.
It was so difficult to score a winner against you at first round, it doesn't surprise me a lot !