V2 Youngster Watch

First topic message reminder :

There has been a lot of talk analysing the future prospects of the tennis world on 606v2. There has indeed been a scepticism, and the reality is that in the top tier of the men's game there is no player below the age of 22 challenging for Grand Slam tournaments or any major titles.

Nevertheless, as we have seen in the past, young players can enjoy rapid progress and success, even when it is not expected. They can mature very quickly and rise seemingly out of the blue, as we have seen in the past!

Anyway enough of the deep analysis and speculation, this thread will just be monitoring the progress of the younger players in the Top 50 or so (Blue Group). I know that in Grand Slams there is a lot of exposure of the results, but the reporting on the smaller 250 tournaments is much more limited, so I will be keeping a log on the progress of certain young players, updating their performance every week. This is not my TWS Series 2, it is something a bit different

Nominated Players:
Blue Group:
Milos Raonic
Bernard Tomic
David Goffin
Ryan Harrison
Grigor Dimitrov
Jerzy Janowicz

Red Group:
Cedrik Marcel Stebe
Jack Sock
James Duckworth
Andrey Kuznetsov
Yuki Bhambri

Green Group:
Oliver Golding (18)
Philip Peliwo (18)
Kimmer Coppejans (18)
Luke Saville (18)
Dominic Thiem (19)

Amritia's 'ones to watch out for in 2013':
-Jerzy Janowicz
-Milos Raonic
-Bernard Tomic

Blue Group Progress Updates-
Week One:
Tomic:
Bangkok:
R1- Beat Garcia Lopez
R2- Beat Sela
QF- Lost to Gasquet

Dimitrov:
Bangkok:
R1- Beat Yang
R2- Lost to Gasquet

Raonic:
Bangkok:
R1- BYE
R2- Beat Karlovic
QF- Lost to Niemenen

Harrison:
Not playing ATP tour level tournament this week.

Goffin:
Not playing ATP tour level tournament this week.


Week Two:
Tomic:
Tokyo:
R1- Lost to Tursanov

Dimitrov:
Tokyo:
R1- Lost to Monaco

Raonic:
Tokyo:
R1- Beat Stepanek
R2- Beat Triocki
QF- Beat Tipsarevic
SF- Beat Murray
F- Lost to Nishikori
Harrison:
Beijing:
R1- Lost to F.Lopez

Goffin:
Not playing ATP tour level tournament this week.

So disappointment for all the youngsters here, especially Raonic who I fancied could beat Niemenen.
Dimitrov and Tomic came both close to beating Gasquet, but just couldn't seal the win.

Goffin makes final of Orleans Challenger. It's a big challenger too - 125 pts for winner.
Should he win he'll be near #45 ranking.
Come on Goffin...

Who does he play?

lydian wrote:Goffin makes final of Orleans Challenger. It's a big challenger too - 125 pts for winner.
Should he win he'll be near #45 ranking.
Come on Goffin...

Good to see you here Lydian
Goffin doing well in Orleans, good to see

The Special Juan wrote:Who does he play?

Goffin plays Bemelmans tomorrow:
http://www.opendorleans.com/media/programme/2012/op_30.9.pdf

Rubens Bemelmans so should be favourite to win.
All top 8 seeds were in top 80 so it's high standard for a challenger.
Fingers crossed he wins, if h can then he'll get main entry into most tournaments herewith. Sometimes though if they've dropped out in a couple of first rounds on ATP tour they enter challengers to groove their game.

Thanks IMBL...been busy with work last few days so noble to get on here.

PS...I said watch out for Goffin...he's top 50 now - if he wins tomorrow he'll be up to around #47

Hopefully he'll overtake Tomic soon, and be 2nd highest ranked 21 and under after Raonic.

lydian wrote:Rubens Bemelmans so should be favourite to win.
All top 8 seeds were in top 80 so it's high standard for a challenger.
Fingers crossed he wins, if h can then he'll get main entry into most tournaments herewith. Sometimes though if they've dropped out in a couple of first rounds on ATP tour they enter challengers to groove their game.

He'll be inside the Top 50 if he wins.

Yep, just edited my last post to detail that.

What's impressive about Goffin (pronounced in that french way "Go-Fan") is his mental strength - this has been noted by other pros - and ability to take the ball very early. This is why he stands out to me as the best new mercurial talent. I wouldn't describe Tomic, Harrison and Raonic in quite the same way but of course they're doing we'll too in other ways.

Today, I watched some of the Goffin match online, he saved 5/6 BPs. The match was indoors and the other guy was serving out of a tree at 6'4 with 15 aces in 2 sets...so it speaks to his ability to take the ball early and play in fast conditions. This lad definitely has talent in abundance...he just needs to get stronger, quite abit stronger as he has a slight frame.

No easy task for Goffan then, but I think he will win that match. Bemmelmans is a good player but if Goffan wants to reach the top he needs to be winning these matches at his age.

Agreed TSJ, if Goffin is making a push to the top he needs to win this and move beyond the Challenger tour.

Goffin wins Orleans Challenger, winning 125pts (similar to getting to final of an ATP 250) and so moves up to #48 ranking

He's only 85pts away from Tomic now, and as not touring the Far East his next event is ATP Stockholm.

Goffin Good result from him here.

Monaco is just coming off winning the ATP event in KL, beating serial runner-up Benneteau in the final.

I can't believe Monaco is now a top 10 player when Nadal and Federer destroy him in matches. Just shows the gap between the very top and #10.

Re: the youngsters, Goffin is now listed to have moved up to #38 ranking according to live-tennis.eu. This isnt confirmed by ATP Tour yet though. If true that means he's now 2nd highest ranking 21 and under player after Raonic.

Goffin headlines at the ATP Challnger in Mons this week. Again for a Challenger it's a strong field with all top 8 seeds being within the Top 80 players. With this being indoors Goffin has been handed a beast of a draw though, likely feeling annoyed to have been drawn to face fast court specialist Michael Llodra in Round 1

The draw for Mons is here: http://www.atpworldtour.com/posting/2012/3350/mds.pdf
The winner gets 125 points.

On other fronts Andrey Kuznetsov is marching up the rankings. The 21 year old has won 3 straight Challengers and moved from 222 to 72 ranking this year. Again, live-tennis.eu differs and says he's up to 61 so we'll need to see th official ATP rankings which arent accessible yet. So he could be another 21 and under to watch...not sure if he's playing again this week.

lydian wrote:

Goffin headlines at the ATP Challnger in Mons this week.
The draw for Mons is here: http://www.atpworldtour.com/posting/2012/3350/mds.pdf
The winner gets 125 points.

I'm thinking, why does he play challengers? Tomic is playing Bangkok this week, and I think Goffin's as good as Tomic if not better atm. Why not enter higher level events?

lydian wrote:
On other fronts Andrey Kuznetsov is marching up the rankings. The 21 year old has won 3 straight Challengers and moved from 222 to 72 ranking this year.

He's in my 'red league'! lol
No, I totally agree with you, we have to keep a watch out on him, he's risen well this year.

I think he just wants to get a few matches under his belt, after Wimb his run hasn't been that great. Even though he's 21 he's not been on tour long as was 'shielded' by the Belgian TA for a long time...he's a bit of a late developer. I suspect thy entry to manage his development without exposing him to the big events too much to affect his confidence. But I agree he could give those events a go...hopefully he will go to Shanghai after all he can qualify by right now. But make no mistake he's got some talent...pushing Federer on clay, winning indoor titles and 3rd round at Wimb, this is an all court player which bodes well for the future. But he needs to toughen up. Speaking of tough, he's got a tough 1st round match at Mons.

When's his match against Llodra?

Think it's Weds. He plays doubles tomorrow.

Tomic lost 1st round in Tokyo versus Tursunov! Bad, bad loss.
So he gets hardly any points for all the travel and effort.

Therefore to answer your earlier question, you can see why Goffin and others enter challengers as they can amass points more easily to get themselves into a position where they don't have to qualify for the main events anymore. Once Goffin gets into the 30s he should be able to qualify for Masters, etc, more easily and can then drop the Challenger tour...but it's risky for the young guys entering the ATP events as we know the slower conditions and increased physicality make it harder for them to make headway...as Tomic is showing.

Tomic should be beating Tursunov regardless. Not good at all, it's sad to see (what I view as) a great talent wasting his ability...

Yep, Tursunov is a relative journeyman...Tomic shouldnt be losing to these guys. All isnt right in his world it would seem. Sometimes the young players get to a point where its 2 steps back, 1 step forward. I'm sure he'll come good for 2013 at some point. Maybe just needs to mature abit more upstairs...probably thinking it should all be happening a bit sooner. He's still only technically 19...20 very soon...so he has plenty of time on his side so I wouldnt say he's wasting talent quite yet.

And all the more surprising M4C as Tomic turned in this performance last week...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-doK-Oir7E

When you watch that you realise he could be quite a player...

So so poor from Tomic today, really expected better. Oh well.
Harrison also lost, bravely, in 3 sets to Feliciano Lopez- losing this 1st set on a TB, but the last set 6-2.

At-least Raonic played well, beating Stepanek.

Will update the results bar, (top of this page), Monaco vs Dimitrov scheduled for tomorrow.

Lopez is a beast to play at times...when he's on he's almost unplayable, so no disgrace for Harrison to lose to a staple top20 player really.

"Wandering Eye" Stepanek is almost ready to hang up his shoes really...only the divorce payments to Vaidisova are probably keeping him going.

Keep up the good work on this thread IMBL

lydian wrote:Lopez is a beast to play at times...when he's on he's almost unplayable, so no disgrace for Harrison to lose to a staple top20 player really.

Harrison fought bravely too, good on him

lydian wrote:
"Wandering Eye" Stepanek is almost ready to hang up his shoes really...only the divorce payments to Vaidisova are probably keeping him going.

He's not playing at his best, but I think he shouldn't retire just yet.

lydian wrote:
Keep up the good work on this thread IMBL

Thanks Lydian

Turbot is nearly 34 now...not many miles left on his clock I guess but he's still doing well at #38 ranking. I think if nothing else the other guys find him hard to play because he presents a different way of playing - S&V!! On his day he can cause anyone problems...but these days he's too up and down to be a proper threat anymore.

I like Harrison, has a good approach to the game and a compact style. He's an allrounder too...I see him becoming top 20 next year.

Oh dear... Dimitrov gets thrashed by Monaco, could only win 3 games.

Anyway good news is that a youngsters called Copil is playing well, beat Cillic this week and is a set up against Mayer!

Yes, beating Cilic was good but I think Cilic will still be trying to get over that capitulation and if he were to lose all his remaining matches this year it wouldn't surprise me.

think I put the mockers on Copil!
said he was a set up and praised his serving in the 1st set, proceded to get broken twice in the second and is now broken 1st game of the 3rd!
Sorry Marius!

Kuznetsov racking up a good reputation at the challenger events I can definitely see him as a top 20 player by 2013 the only player I reckon will do well of your Red Group.

Josiah Maiestas wrote:Kuznetsov racking up a good reputation at the challenger events I can definitely see him as a top 20 player by 2013 the only player I reckon will do well of your Red Group.

I agree that he is doing well
Ranked 72 at 21, I see him as future top 20 player. Not sure if he will do that by next year though.

Hmmm....lets see what he can do in an ATP event yet...doing well at Challengers is one thing.

As I suspected, the wily Llodra beat Goffin
That was an unbelievably tough 1st round draw in a Challenger (never mind an ATP event) - pitted against a singles player who only just over 12 months ago was almost Top20 and on fast indoor courts his adept S&V style is a nightmare to play.

Llodra could beat just about anybody indoors, his serve is abit easier to relinquish when the breeze is flowing. Goffin is almost an artist but not quite in the Fedopolov mould.

Raonic through as Troicki withdraws 0-3 down 1st set.

Out of interest why is Nishikori not up here?

Probably because he isnt under 22 at a guess.

TSJ, you had to be 21 or under to be considered here, Nishokiri is 23 in December

He is still a good prospect though, no doubt. Has risen well in the past few years.

Raonic beats Tipsarevic in three sets.

9-7 in the 3rd set TB, great result for Raonic beating Tipsy!

Will Raonic make top ten by the end of the year?

Pleased to see one of the young guns quietly plugging away.

time please wrote:Will Raonic make top ten by the end of the year?

Pleased to see one of the young guns quietly plugging away.

TP does Raonic's success not cast doubt on this notion that behind the top 4 there isn't any talent and we are in for a dark age? I am very impressed by him. His returning is terrible and his backhand is hit and miss, but the rest of his game is exceptional. Even movement wise for a man his size he moves real well. Not quite as good as del po, but much more like Del po than lets say Isner. He is a notch better in terms of movement than the other big bodied servers.

Just looking at the green group. Both Saville and Golding are in futures action. Saville has reached the SF and Golding is into the final in Australia and Qatar respectively.

May not sound much but a title will move Saville up about 50 places into the top 350 and will edge Golding up near the top 400. Starting to get near the level they can get direct entry to some of the weaker challengers.

socal1976 wrote:

time please wrote:Will Raonic make top ten by the end of the year?

Pleased to see one of the young guns quietly plugging away.

TP does Raonic's success not cast doubt on this notion that behind the top 4 there isn't any talent and we are in for a dark age? I am very impressed by him. His returning is terrible and his backhand is hit and miss, but the rest of his game is exceptional. Even movement wise for a man his size he moves real well. Not quite as good as del po, but much more like Del po than lets say Isner. He is a notch better in terms of movement than the other big bodied servers.

Of course there is talent behind the top 4, but it is hard to see where the next star is coming from. Raonic has one win over Murray and has not threatened since. He is the most consistent of the young guns but he is not challenging the 'establishment' as the top four did at the same or younger age.

If they can't 'take' the top four, one has to wonder whether if at least three of the top four can continue to be consistent for the next four years, that the next serial major winner isn't yet on the senior tour.

Big win for Raonic there, well played.

Raonic, beats Murray!!!!!

6-3 6-7 7-6 Saves 2 Match points!
Now faces Nishokiri to seal title, would be the biggest title of his career.