Why does the rest of the big 4 have garbage players for the first two rounds and Novak doesn't?

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Really, i think this draw rigging thing with Djokovic is now getting a bit amusing. After giving him del po in the third round at RG, and constantly getting put into Roger's half now 13 out of 17 grandslams and 5 in a row, then compound that with Murray, Nadal, and Federer getting the easiest of first two round opponents; while conveniently Novak doesn't. Novak is probably the guy in terms of ratings that the organizers would least like to see make it to the finals. His first round opponent is 53 in the world, and his second round opponent is ranked #36 and has one of the top 10 serves on tour. While Djokovic gets a dangerous, huge server in the second round, Andy Murray gets number 83 ranked virtual walkover Tobias Kamke.

Federer average ranking of first two round opponents: 58th in the world (add round 1 and 2 ranking divide by half
Nadal Average ranking of first two round: 79.5 in the world
Murray average ranking of first two round opponents: 71 in the world
Djokovic average ranking of first two round opponents: 45 in the world

Things that continue to make you say hmmm. Novak should have a 50 percent chance of drawing Roger gets Roger 13 out of 17 times and 5 times in a row. Gets Del Po and the worst scheduling at the french open playing as late as possible. Now at wimby has by far the toughest draw of the big 4. And his draw is even tougher as number 36 kevin anderson is most certainly much better than his ranking on a grass court as he has one of the best serves in the world. While Murray and Fed get two clay courters who are actually weaker on grass than their rankings would indicate.

I know people are tired of me raising these issues. But these are the hard facts. Everyone wants to see a Fed nadal final, and if not that everyone would love a fed murray final at least as far as the british public is concerned. Just funny how all these coincidences are going towards the more marketable players and against Novak.

Exactly.

erictheblueuk wrote:For anyone who keeps bellyaching about unfair draws, here is the list of players please arrange them into a fair draw for us all to see:-

http://www.wimbledon.com/en_GB/scores/draws/ms/r1s1.html

socal1976
carrieg4

I've still had no takers !

Eric, my last response was to Pauline1981 who said that there was no garbage in the draw. The flow and meaning kind of got lost in the page cut off !!

My previous posted stated that I don't believe there is such thing as an easy draw.

Eric

Probably because the draw came out pretty well, especially when you factor in the tournament being on grass.

Rafa has what looks on paper the toughest R3, R4, QF combination (up and coming star, former USO champ and last year's Wimby RU) but then the marginally easier SF, and there are ?s about the form of both Del Potro and Berdych.

Murray has a moderately tough run through R3 (now Ljubicic rather than Cilic) and R4 (Gasquet/Wawrinka) before potentially tough QF (Roddick, former RU here and multiple Queens champion, who has a not too bad path through to there now) and SF opponents.

Federer gets a possibly tough R3 against Nalbandian, not too bad in R4 (clay specialist Almagro or Youzny), before potentially an in form Tsonga in the QF and this year's form player in the SF.

Djoko gets reaonsable R3 and R4 draws (Baggy, Llodra) and Soderling as the seeded opponent in the QF is not as dangerous on grass as on clay or hard - indeed, I wouldn't be surprised if Melzer beats him in R4. He does though get the tougher SF draw.

So none of the top 4 got a cake walk, and no-one got a draw of death.

Well this might not go down a bundle But John MacEnroe has just said during his commentary on the Nadal match that he thinks Rafa got the worst draw ---- having said that Im off now

And I wouldn't argue with Mac neither!

Isnt this an exaggeration...?
Anderson has achieved nothing of note in the game at 25 years old.
This is furthest he's got at Wimbledon (2R), ok he lost narrowly to Davydenko in 1R last year but Davydenko is hardly a grass monster. All he has is big serve and he wont be serving big every point, so when he has average service games, Nole will break him easily.

However..........he has only ever beaten 1 top ten player (and nothing near that before). Guess who?

Novak Djokovic

socal1976 wrote:Just funny how all these coincidences are going towards the more marketable players and against Novak.

Well, your theory, which is quite credible, is not favoring Federer either. Federer rather plays against Rafa in the semi than after a slugfest with Djoko. Nadal is the laughing third, over and over again.
Prepare yourself for a Djoko-Federer Semi at the Us open too, and of course it will be the second match on super saturday.

Looks like Nadal's draw got a lot easier with Raonic pulling out with injury and JMDP a set down against Rochus and now having to play his fourth day in a row!

Didn't take long

I'm gutted Raonic had to pull out. That would have been a great match up with Nadal.

It's fair to say his draw has just got a fair bit easier. Anyone know who Gasquet has in R3?

If I remember rightly, I don't think there is a draw for the first 8 seeds.

If you look here, you can see how the seed placings are diametrically ordered for the first 8 main seeds in their rankings (ie, those seeds/ranks will always go to that position). And the draw is a lottery from then on as to how the rest of the 32 ranked players are positioned on there, meaning that there are positions that relate to where the drawn player will go. (aka, the highlighted players in the list) then its a draw for the rest of the 128 players.

http://www.wimbledon.com/en_GB/scores/draws/ms/msdraw.pdf

The only way you can rig this is to draw names out purposely to get a player where they want, but drawing blind out of a bag makes it pretty impossible, nigh on completely impossible if done in front of cameras and the paparazzi.

Its quite simple in terms of statistics, nothing that is not normally done in all the other slams to apportion places to seeds, if I remember correctly. (a little brain cell memory from 606 ages ago)

I haven't read all of this thread, but to insinuate that the draws are being tampered with is ridiculous. The '13 out of 17' times where Djokovic has had to play Federer in the semis is irrelevant, since 17 is not a large enough number to be statistically significant.

Jubbahey wrote:If I remember rightly, I don't think there is a draw for the first 8 seeds.

Nope! The draw at the grand slams, and every tournament on both the ATP and WTA except for the year-end championships (which uses a round-robin format for the elite eight players who qualify), is done randomly - in a fashion. This means that at Wimbledon (even if that is not strictly ATP's event) for example, the #1 (Nadal) and #2 (Djokovic) seeds are automatically placed in opposite halves, but after that the other seeds are randomly (in a fashion directed by ATP Rules) drawn into either the Top half (Nadal's) or the Bottom half (Djokovic's).

ATP Rules are very simple and clear:

A. Place seed 1 on line 1 and seed 2 on
- line 32 (32 draw),
- line 64 (64 draw) or
- line 128 (96 draw) -- That's Wimbledon and remainder will be shown onyl for those --; and

B. To determine the location of the remaining seeds, draw in groups according to the following:

Seeds 3 - 4:
- First Drawn - 33
- Second Drawn - 96

Seeds 5 - 8
- First Drawn - 32
- Second Drawn - 64
- Third Drawn - 65
- Fourth Drawn - 97

and so on and so forth and that's why in the end you get that nice, symetricaly looking Draw .

If you look here, you can see how the seed placings are diametrically ordered for the first 8 main seeds in their rankings

Yup - and that's b/c it was meant to be that way - but as previously said, the placing is not preordained, names are drawn from the Hat but in directed (as by Rules) manner.

That said - yes, where there's a draw there will always be talk about cheating, but of course that all the talk about Poor Djkovic and his unbelivable streak of facing Federer is pure BS. But totally understandable. Not that Conspiracy Theorists are not equally divided among the nations of the Earth, but people from former's Djokovic's country (he is for long time now countrymen only with his fellows billioners in Monaco ) are somewhat specific in that manner, where other countries have maybe 10 to 20 percent of CTs there they are clear majority (maybe even in over 85% ;>)

Which is sort to be expected, during the whole 90s decade only single digit percent of the population has been outside of their country, and every media and every TV and radio station in the country was dedicated to show them how there is a Global Conspiracy against their fine people. Whole world hates them - that's a Cosmic Axiom there (and is even included in their curiculum from elementary through mid and high-school ). So, it is normal that even if Djokovic's fan is not from there, by mere fact that one is his fan, one inherits the Paranoia ;>

Chazfazzer wrote:I haven't read all of this thread, but to insinuate that the draws are being tampered with is ridiculous. The '13 out of 17' times where Djokovic has had to play Federer in the semis is irrelevant, since 17 is not a large enough number to be statistically significant.

Ah, it is statistically significant! It clearly shows some serious thinkative problems. It is, by that number of draws, implied that the Whole World is in Conspiracy against Djokovic! When one claims that those draws were riged in favour of Nadal it is possible only if officials in all those various countries (all over the World) are in cahoots to help Nadal (or to get Preffered Final - Nadal Federer) and hurt Djokovic. Those Conspiring Cahooters are in each and every country of the same mind - They All Want only One Thing.

Well, there are those who will say - well, yes, it is the way of the world to conspire, but I think that even most hard boiled conspiracy buffs would shake their head at this doozy

Btw, as statistics and odds go, given that first 4 players are always the same and in the same ranking order (which they were not ) the odds that Djokovic will get Federer will ALWAYS be 50% no matter how many times before he got him. Its that simple

First of all dresdten, I am not serbian, and I don't believe there is a worldwide conspiracy against Djokovic. There doesn't need to be. Gather the organizers of wimbeldon, the Uso, AO, and FO and their respective TV broadcasters and ask them what is the final they would like to see. If one person in the room says anything other than Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal that man should be strapped to a lie detector or sent in for some serious counseling. Its capitalism, that is where the money lies, and no conspiracy theory is needed.


Here is the scenario, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer have been either 2 and 3 in the world, or 3 and 2 for the last 5 grandslams. It makes no difference who is 3 or who is 2 for the analysis. Either way they have a 50 percent chance of being seeded against each other in the same half. Well, well 5 straight grandslams they are seeded against each other and 13 of the last 17. Said Tournament directors and their sponsors, and their broadcasters all prefer a Nadal- Fed final, not because of a conspiracy but because they like money. This incredible longshot of 32 to 1 comes to the wonderful benefit of the pocketbooks of the very people who control the process and have absolute no control or transparency involved in said process. Why i must be a raving conspiracy theorist to assume that people who want to make money might do anything slightly unethical to make money, I mean when has that happened in the history of the world?

First of all what is all this rubbish about Nadal having a tough draw because Del Potro was put in his quarter. Juan martin on hardcourt yes, on clay where he got matched up with Djoko early at RG, yes. On grass some of the posters on this site might be able to beat him, he has never even made the 3rd round of wimbeldon.

Now that Djokovic dismantles Chardy all of a sudden Chardy can't play and Gimeno Traver that famous grass courter is so tough at wimbeldon. Djokovic hit 84 percent of first serves to beat Chardy. Kevin Anderson is no world beater but he is almost seeded and with his serve is by far, by far tougher than anyone the other 4 players have to play in the second round. Just as Chardy is better than clay courter Gimeno Traver or foor fout two inches tall Michael russel on this particular surface. As for Djokovic having it easier in rounds 3 and 4, Michael Llodra is probably one of the last guys in the world you want to play on a quick court. Again a player whose ranking doesn't properly reflect the danger he poses on this particular surface.

Of course Djokovic can't come out and say its a fix that keep getting Roger federer the ATP would probably fine him and he would get crucified by the Roger and Rafa loving media of the world. But I have seen him in interviews where he was asked this question and he was ticked off and very sarcastically (not with a smile on his face), basically (paraphrase) "oh yeah I got federer again, what a surprise."

gallery play wrote:

socal1976 wrote:Just funny how all these coincidences are going towards the more marketable players and against Novak.

Well, your theory, which is quite credible, is not favoring Federer either. Federer rather plays against Rafa in the semi than after a slugfest with Djoko. Nadal is the laughing third, over and over again.
Prepare yourself for a Djoko-Federer Semi at the Us open too, and of course it will be the second match on super saturday.

Gallery, I agree and disagree, to some extent. It does help Federer I don't think Fed wants to play Rafa in the semi. But when Fed was #2 and Novak was #3 and not playing well do you really think Fed worried about playing Novak, Novak had only one win against him in a grandslam prior to the USO 2010, and that was at the AO 2008 where fed was not health wise at his best. Therefore, up until six months ago Fed probably didn't mind having Novak instead of Andy. Yes he has beat Andy in two grandslam finals but overral Andy has a winning record against him and up until the beginning of Novak's streak he probably would have preffered Novak as opposed to Andy. And right now he certainly still would rather play Novak in a semi than Rafa.

do you really think Fed worried about playing Novak, Novak had only one win against him in a grandslam prior to the USO 2010
--------------------------------
Of course he did! Novak was underestimated by most players because he was often stopped by Federer at the USO but all there matches were close even if in 3 sets. It's Djoko that stopped Federer from winning his 6 USO on the trott. It was also Djoko that stopped Federer winning quite a bit of TMS like Montreal, Shanghai 2010 because their matches were physically very demanding. But you don;t see that, do you? you only see the Ws and Ls and think Federer had it easy v Djoko.

Tenez wrote: It's Djoko that stopped Federer from winning his 6 USO on the trott.
But you don;t see that, do you?

Seems you dont see that it was Delpo who actually stopped Fed winning 6 on bounce.
No point in letting the facts get in the way of a good story hey?

lydian wrote:

Tenez wrote: It's Djoko that stopped Federer from winning his 6 USO on the trott.
But you don;t see that, do you?

Seems you dont see that it was Delpo who actually stopped Fed winning 6 on bounce.
No point in letting the facts get in the way of a good story hey?

Delpo was being taught a tennis lesson until Federer lost a step. Only those with an agenda would refuse to see that. It was the match of the night before that suddenly started to kick in. Delpo was younger, finished his match 4 hours before and had a stroll in the park v Rafa.

But of course, you have not factored in the physical factor of the game yet (how funny for someone who pretends to know the game)...I guess you don;t want to cause all players talk about it but hey, it doesn;t suit your agenda. It's all bout talent right? relative talent of course in the eye of the beholder!

Tenez - WHAT are you prattling on about????

Fed beat Nole in straight sets - and then lost another tight match in 5 sets, something Federer has proved quite adept at over the years.

3 tight and tough sets less than 20 hours before would not count right? I know now that you don;t play tennis, certainly not at a decent level.

It was not tight at all between Federer and Delpo until he lost a step.

For the record Lydian is right it was JMDP that stopped fed winning his 6th straight USO. I never assumed it was easy for Fed to beat Djokovic. But this streak of having Nole and Roger in the same half has been going on for years. And for 4 years Novak has been #3. Up until USO of 2010 Novak had a lengthy grandslam losing streak against Roger, so until the end of last year I think if you asked Fed or federer fans who would Roger prefer in the semi Andy or Novak, they would have all said Andy despite Andy's 2 losses in finals to Fed he has overrall the better record. Then last year Novak beat Roger at the USO and beat him at the AO this year, so now today if you asked the question of would Roger prefer andy or Novak nobody would say Andy. But now that Fed is #3 and not number 1 or 2 his choice isn't between Andy and NovaK, its between being in Rafa's semi or being in Novak's semi. And again between these two Roger would obviously prefer Novak. And guess what that is what he gets from the tournament committee 13 of the last 17 times, and 5 in a row.

Not claiming that Rafa or Roger or their camps are doing the tampering, they don't need to. The tournaments themselves know that by far the best global TV ratings would occur if Roger and Rafa are in opposite ends of the draw. Therefore, they are always on opposite ends of the draw and Roger now as the #3 has to play Novak to maintain the opposite side of Rafa phenomenon. No conspiracy is needed, just a few capitalists in each tournament choosing to set aside sporting fairness for the possibility of bigger rates and more money.

socal1976 wrote:For the record Lydian is right it was JMDP that stopped fed winning his 6th straight USO.

Didn;t I read from you that it was Federer that killed the chances of Djokovic to beat Rafa at the last USO? So when it suits you it's the match before the final and when it doesn't it's not.

Actually it wasn't me that said that as Novak had a day's rest thanks to rain delay. He lost that match because his serve abandoned him like it often did in 2010 and the second half of 09. He actually hung with Rafa pretty well from the baseline from start to finish and it wasn't exhaustion. He lacked the serve and therefore the belief to fight Rafa on that day.

Yes he had a day rest, yet he was tired. They were both (with Federer) very tired.

Tinfoil hats anybody?

As someone once said, you can use statistics to prove anything.

None of the top 4 face opposition in the early rounds that should trouble them unduly. If they're as good as their world rankings suggest, it shouldn't be a problem.

You can even argue that a couple of tough early matches gets them in a better frame of mind for the quarters and semis (if they get that far).

Better IMO to have had to up your game against a good opponent, early on, to avoid getting complacent and blown away, later on, by one of the big guns, after strolling your first couple of matches.

Tenez wrote:3 tight and tough sets less than 20 hours before would not count right? I know now that you don;t play tennis, certainly not at a decent level.

It was not tight at all between Federer and Delpo until he lost a step.

HELLOooo - incase you hadnt noticed they play Masters events every day over sometimes 3 tough sets. The players are used to it.
Get real and stop making excuses for Federer losses in tight situations - you do remember his 5 set record compared to others right?

Guys I am locking this thread and this has descended off topic and it is like a never-ending baseline rally. I shall unlock at some stage once you guys take a breather.