• The KillerFrogs

TCU Men's Tennis 2021-2022

Jared7

Active Member
Rybo got torched in the first set against Nicola Kuhn in Poland 6-2. It's 1-1 in the 2nd currently. Even if he loses, he'll still get ATP points for making the Round of 16 at a Challenger - you have to make the semis to earn them at an ITF event. That's why making the leap from Futures to Challengers can be so transformative; Rybo is on the cusp of doing that having jumped 25 spots in the ATP rankings merely by doing Challengers in the last few weeks.

Rybakov falls 2 and 2.
 
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Jared7

Active Member
It looks like the first big event for most of our current roster will be in Fayetteville for an ITF tourney in Arkansas from 9/20 to 9/26. The draws haven't been released yet, but Pedro Vives Marcos (ATP#714) is already into the main draw and will be seeded 9th. The qualie list includes Tomas Jirousek (#809) as the top qualie seed, but if there is a withdrawal, he could make the main draw. Jake Fearnley (ATP#1081) is 7th on the qualie list; Juan Carlos Aguilar (ATP# 1179) is 12th; Sander Jong (#1257) is 13th. Luc Fomba is on the alternate list (21st) and so is Tim Ruehl (38th) but there'd have to be a lot of withdrawals for them even to make the qualies. The only one not listed is Lui Maxted.

Also at the tourney will be Liam Draxl (preseason ITA #1 from Kentucky); Sam Riffice (preseason #2 from Florida and defending NCAA champ); Paul Jubb (former NCAA champ), Ryan Shane (former NCAA champ) and Tadeas Paroulek (former Frog now at Baylor). So at least 5 Frogs will get some action starting this weekend in this $15,000 ITF Futures event.

There's another ITF tourney the following week in Lubbock.
 

Jared7

Active Member
After Fayetteville (and potentially Lubbock), there will be the ITA All-American tourney in Tulsa from October 2 through the 10th. Fomba and Aguilar are already into the main draw and Jong is listed as an alternate. Others might qualify. If, say, Fomba doesn't get into the pro tourneys, it seems likely that he'll go to Tulsa - the withdrawal deadline in 9/29. Because the All-American is a college event, coaches can go (and coach) there although they can't at pro tourneys. Mixing and matching the pro events v. college events and where their guys go is what Roditi and Bowen do in the Fall.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Alastair Gray will be staying in the RSA for the next few weeks. He'll be playing another tourney in Johannesburg next week (a $25,000 ITF event) and then one in Pretoria the following week - he's listed on the acceptance lists for both and is currently in the qualies although it's possible that he could squeeze into the main draws.

Searching for Rybo and Chappell involves a whole different set of sites because the Challenger tour is run by the ATP and the Futures tour is run by the ITF. Why can't they merge the systems so that it makes it easier on me? There's a Challenger in Columbus next week that J.J. Wolf and Mikael Torpegaard have won recently, so that's a possibility, but Alex and Nick were both in Europe last week so they might be staying there, where there a a bunch of other Challengers. I'm just going to wait til they've actually started rather than play "Where's Rybo" for hours...
 

Jared7

Active Member
Alastair Gray has advanced to the semis in Johannesburg with a 2 and 4 W over Alafia Ayeni and he will now face Dylan Salton for a ticket to the finals. Making the semis means ATP points, so Ali is now starting his upward climb in the rankings.

Alex Rybakov is in Portugal this week for the Braga Challenger. His singles matches haven't been scheduled yet, but he'll be teaming with Thai-son Kwiatkowski in doubles and their first rounder will be on Tuesday.
 
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Jared7

Active Member
Earlier today, Alastair Gray beat Dylan Salton 1 and 4 in the semis at Joburg and has advanced to the finals where he will play Australian Jeremy Beale tomorrow. And then, to top that, he and Daniel Cukierman just won the doubles finals 7-6 (7-5), 6-3 and took the title. This is fantastic for Alastair so early in his full-time pro career - a singles final and another doubles title.
 
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Jared7

Active Member
Alastair Gray just won his first pro singles title with a 7-6 (7-4), 6-4 W over Australian Jeremy Beale in Johannesburg/Markspark! This is after he won the doubles title yesterday teaming with Daniel Cukierman. In just his first few weeks as a full-time pro, he's now won 2 doubles championships and 1 singles title. This is comparable to Cam Norrie who started his pro career in 2017 with two quick singles titles. And this is a $25,000 tourney, so he'll get a nice payday as well as 10 ATP points. Congrats to Alastair!

Fayetteville starts tomorrow for most of our current roster. Alex Rybakov won his first round qualie match at the Braga Challenger in Portugal this morning over Jeroen Vanneste 2 and love. His 2nd rounder will be tomorrow against Kaichi Uchida at 5:30 a.m. (CDT).
 
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Jared7

Active Member
The Order of Play for tomorrow's Fayetteville qualie rounds have been announced and multiple Frogs will be in action in this $15,000 ITF pro tourney. Juan Carlos Aguilar will open against Blu Baker, a 20-year old Brit with an ATP ranking of 1831. Sander Jong will face Parth Aggarwal, an 23-year old Indian who started at Eastern Kentucky, transferred to Kentucky and, I think, has now gone full-time pro, with an ATP ranking of NR. Tomas Jirousek is not listed, so either he got into he main draw (he was the first alternate) due to a withdrawal or got a bye in the first qualie round. Pedro Vives Marcos is already into the main draw. Luc Fomba and Tim Ruehl apparently didn't qualify for the qualies.

Action starts tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. Rybo plays in Portugal at 5:20 a.m.
 

Jared7

Active Member
The first action in what promises to be a busy day for Frog tennis is occurring in Braga, Portugal, where Rybo is currently losing to Uchida 3-6, 4-5 in a 2nd round qualie match at the Challenger there. But he just got a break to get it back on serve in the 2nd set, so he's still in it; albeit barely.

And, even though Alastair's first singles title was great for him, we should tap the breaks a little on comparing him to Norrie's pro start. Because he had already been playing loads of pro tourneys prior to 2017 and had even made a Challenger final, Cam was starting from a base already in the ATP 300's; Alastair is starting in the 1,000's and will have to jump 700+ ATP spots just to get where Cam was starting from.

5-all for Rybo!
5-6.
Rybo falls 3-6, 5-7.
 

Jared7

Active Member
One of the advantages for Gray of winning a tourney and then playing the very next week in the same city is that he got a special exemption for the second week and earned a first round main draw bye. Last week was played at Markspark; this week at EllisPark, which, if you watched Invictus, is in the same complex in Joburg where they played the famous 1994 Rugby World Cup final, which got the South Africans back onto the world sports stage. And one of the advantages of playing down in the RSA for Alastair is that not that many pros venture there, so it's a relatively light field and, arguably, he's got a better chance of winning than, all the Frogs at Fayetteville, which has a strong field. Like Fayetteville, action is starting today in Joburg, but Gray will get a day off. As mentioned upthread, Alastair will be there this week and in Pretoria next week.

Going forward, Alastair will have some of the advantages that Norrie has/had. Being British, he'll get coaching and training and a home base in London from the U.K.'s strong national tennis program. And, he'll get wildcards and berths in the U.K. tourneys in June leading up to Wimbledon. As yet, though, he's got no Facundo Lugones; which I think really helped Cam. Rybo got some help from the USTA for a year or so, but, like Chappell and Stalder, he's largely been on his own because the U.S.-level support is not comparable to other countries. Lopez, who is on the Mexican Davis Cup team, probably gets more national support than do the Americans.
 
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Jared7

Active Member
Add Nick Chappell to the list of Frogs in action today - unlike Rybakov, he crossed the pond to return to the U.S. and play in the Columbus Challenger (where Buckeyes usually rule). He's schedule to play Nicolas Mejia, a Colombian Davis Cup player, with an ATP ranking of #295, in the main draw Round of 32 at 2:20 p.m. (CDT). This'll be a tough match for Nick - he won't be favored.
 

jake102

Active Member
The first action in what promises to be a busy day for Frog tennis is occurring in Braga, Portugal, where Rybo is currently losing to Uchida 3-6, 4-5 in a 2nd round qualie match at the Challenger there. But he just got a break to get it back on serve in the 2nd set, so he's still in it; albeit barely.

And, even though Alastair's first singles title was great for him, we should tap the breaks a little on comparing him to Norrie's pro start. Because he had already been playing loads of pro tourneys prior to 2017 and had even made a Challenger final, Cam was starting from a base already in the ATP 300's; Alastair is starting in the 1,000's and will have to jump 700+ ATP spots just to get where Cam was starting from.

5-all for Rybo!
5-6.
Rybo falls 3-6, 5-7.

Gray jumped about 300 spots to 718 with the title.
 

Jared7

Active Member
No scores reported from Fayetteville yet - either it's raining or they don't know how to work the live scoring system. Aguilar and Jong should both have started.
 

Longfrog

Active Member
Apparently Fomba, Ruehl, Fearnley & Maxted played in a college tournament in San Francisco this week. Everyone but Ruehl won at least two matches. Fearnley played against Maxted in the quarters but had to retire in their 1st set. Dostanic from USC ended up winning.

Most impressive win from our guys was Maxted in straights vs. UT's #2 Braswell.
 

Longfrog

Active Member
Pretty sure Fearnley is playing a different sport than tennis with all the injuries

That's what I thought about Gray his first couple years here. Maybe a Brit deal.

I also remember Gray retiring vs Fearnley halfway through a match in a futures tourney. So maybe it's just how they welcome the new guy.
 

Longfrog

Active Member
Wow, now that I actually went back and looked, that was a crazy run by Fearnley in Fall 2019. Right after he got here, he gets through qualifying and wins a couple rounds in the Forth Worth futures before going down to a very solid pro (Peniston) in the quarters. Here's who he beat...

- Ruehl (in straights)
- Catanzariti (also in straights; Catanzariti's a good player, best known for the epic racket smash/kick following loss in deciding match vs Rybo)
- Fomba
- Hijikata (probably UNC's #1 this year)
- Gray (who w/d down 1-6, 0-1)

Following month he lost in the final of the Austin futures tourney in 3 sets to Altamirano.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Well, all of today's matches were delayed long enough for me to have to go to work, but here are today's results. Sander Jong beat Aggarwal love and 3 to advance to his 2nd qualie round. Aguilar lost to to Blu Baker 4 and 4 so he's out of the singles. Jirousek did in fact move into the main draw because of an apparent withdrawal so his main draw Round of 32 match tomorrow is against the top seed - Sekou Bangoura. Vives Marcos isn't playing tomorrow - he will apparently get a qualifier the day after. And Jong's next round opponent isn't set yet.

Nick Chappell lost in a walkover in Columbus to Mejia - he was down love-5 and just decided that was enough.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Apparently Fomba, Ruehl, Fearnley & Maxted played in a college tournament in San Francisco this week. Everyone but Ruehl won at least two matches. Fearnley played against Maxted in the quarters but had to retire in their 1st set. Dostanic from USC ended up winning.

Most impressive win from our guys was Maxted in straights vs. UT's #2 Braswell.
Yeah, it makes sense that the 4 guys not at Fayetteville went elsewhere. There are several non-ITF pro tourneys that college guys frequent; we hosted one last year in Ft. Worth. Fearnley's ranking was high enough to qualify for Fayetteville - I was wondering why he wasn't there.
 
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