The 2024 Davis Cup Finals return to Malaga again this year with the final 8 teams competing in a straight knock-out over the next few days. These 8 teams have qualified after having battled through the group stages and play-offs during the year. Each tie will be decided based on best of 3 matches – 2 singles matches followed by 1 doubles match. All matches are best of 3 tiebreak …
Tennis has a long and gruelling season with hardly any time for players to fit in some meaningful training blocks during the year. The men’s season lasts till the end of November, culminating with the Davis Cup finals and by the end of December, players are already travelling for the warm-up tournaments of the next season to start again. That’s how demanding the sport is. Nevertheless, the season climax is …
It’s the sporting rivalries that have transcended the sport, be it Borg-McEnroe and Evert-Navratilova in the 70s and 80s or Sampras-Agassi in the 90s or Federer-Nadal in the 2000s or Federer-Djokovic/Nadal-Djokovic in the 2010s. When I was growing up in the 2000s, I got hooked on to tennis due to a certain Swiss player and his rivalry that came soon after with a Spaniard. The early 2000s drew legions of …
If you wanted to be the best in the world at a particular shot in tennis, and you could only choose one, you would choose the ‘serve’ (formally known as ‘service’) a 100 out of 100 times*. It is one of the hardest shots in tennis, especially for a beginner, but once you master the mechanics, it is a formidable weapon to possess in your arsenal. While it looks straightforward …
Krejcikova stuns the title favourite Rybakina Elena Rybakina came into this match as the top seed remaining in the draw and the favourite to win the title, even though she had a 0-2 head-to-head against Barbora Krejcikova. The duo had played each other only on the hard courts, the last one being in 2022 at the Ostrava Open which Krejcikova won in 3 sets. The one prior to that was …
Alcaraz learning to problem-solve, match by match… The current world number 3 Carlos Alcaraz came through another stern test on Tuesday against an in-form Tommy Paul. Tommy Paul who you ask? He is ranked 13 in the world (second highest ranked American man, only 1 behind Taylor Fritz) and going into this match, had an equal head-to-head of 2-2 against the Spaniard, which only a few in the world can …
Sinner’s maturity too much for the flamboyant American It was Day 7 at the Wimbledon Championships, with only 16 players each remaining in the men’s and women’s draw. And one of the awaited matches on Court-1 was between the world number 1 and top seed, Jannik Sinner and the talented young American southpaw, Ben Shelton. ‘Big Stage’ Shelton has electrified the crowds with his booming serve (one of the fastest …
On Wednesday night, the current world number 1 from Italy – Jannik Sinner, took on his fellow countryman, the 2021 Wimbledon Men’s Singles Finalist and former Italian number 1 – Matteo Berrettini, in the 2nd round of the 2024 Wimbledon Championships. The occasion marked the first time ever in the open era that two Italian men battled on Centre Court at Wimbledon. The duo had met only once prior to …
As I look back on the past two decades of the Wimbledon Championships, one of the most staggering facts in the men’s game is the stranglehold of the big four on this trophy. Since 2003, no man not named Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic or Andy Murray had lifted that trophy right until last year in 2023, when Carlos Alcaraz finally broke that barrier in his first Wimbledon final …
In 2022, when Roger Federer announced his retirement and Rafael Nadal’s return to tennis was uncertain at best, we all could sense a deep void being formed in the tennis world. This generation of fans had savoured more than two decades of sporting brilliance from what we know as the big 4 of tennis. While Novak Djokovic was/is still dominant and had one of his best seasons in 2021 (later …
