By Rosangel Valenti, TW Contributing Editor
Good morning. This is the Tribe's daily space for talking tennis - specifically, the matches taking place during the last Masters series event of the year, in Paris. It looks likely that I'll be heading there myself tomorrow, in order to watch as many matches as possible live, and to complete the last leg of my "Rafa Euro-spectator Calendar Slam".
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!Img_6657_1aMatches of the Day
Today's Order of Play can be found on this link.
Most of the big names play their first matches tomorrow. However, two of the contenders for the remaining three Shanghai berths are in action today. Third on Court Central, Juan Martin Del Potro plays Mario Ancic; these two have never faced off before. Later, during the evening session, after Novak Djokovic (can he win a match in Paris this year?) has played Dmitry Tursunov, Andy Roddick faces Feliciano Lopez, against whom he has a 4-0 winning record. After last night, when Lopez played in the same timeslot, I'm beginning to think that the Bercy organisers are consciously categorising the fair Spaniard as suitable only for late-night action.
There will be a few doubles matches going on today; the one that will be allocated the prime early evening spot on Court Central is, unsurprisingly, two Frenchmen (Nicolas Mahut and Paul-Henri Mathieu) against Rafael Nadal and Juan Monaco.
Picture of the Day
I'm going with another of my previously unseen shots taken in Madrid during the recent Masters Series event there. I hope to post the related picture gallery in this space later today. Depending on ongoing developments, I may use another picture from Madrid to introduce tomorrow's matches.
As always, enjoy today's tennis.
[Update: here's the link to my web gallery of pictures of Rafael Nadal playing Richard Gasquet; pictures of Stan Wawrinka and Rchard Gasquet can be found here. Click on any picture to enlarge, and use the arrows to page through].