Good morning all. We have a semifinals day ahead in ATP-land today, and two WTA finals. In Estoril the action starts at 6.45 a.m. TW time, with the women's final between Yanina Wickmayer and Ekaterina Makarova, and continues with Albert Montanes facing Paul Capdeville, then James Blake versus Nikolay Davydenko.
Miguel Seabra sent us today's picture from the Estoril Open, together with the following comments:
Here you have a picture of the historic Centralito -- the 65 year-old court of the Estádio Nacional that usually is the center court of the complex but that works as a Grandstand during the Estoril Open... it was taken during the quarterfinal marathon that saw Spain's Albert Montanes beat first seed Gilles Simon 7-6 in the third after saving a match-point at 5-6. As you can see, the match was played before a crowded house. From Saturday on, the Centralito -- included in the top 5 of the most beautiful courts in the world by veteran reporters like Bud Collins, Richard Evans and Philippe Bouin -- is reserved for doubles finals.
We'll have two outsiders in the top-half of the men's draw, but the second semifinal is promising: Nikolay Davydenko (winner in 2003, runner-up in 2006 to Nalbandian and 2008 to Federer) faces James Blake -- who is now the second best American ever in the 20th editions of the tournament, only after Todd Martin (1999 runner-up). His first round win against an excellent Frederico Gil was a pretty good match and right after that he said "I feel like this match is the turning point of my season, I haven't felt like this since the Australian Open, or San Jose".
Meanwhile the ATP semifinals in Munich - Mikhail Youzhny against a local player, Daniel Brands, and Jeremy Chardy facing Tomas Berdych - take place at 7 a.m. TW time. In Belgrade Ivo Karlovic takes on a qualifier, Lukasz Kubot, at 8 a.m. TW time; Novak Djokovic's match against Andreas Seppi will be at evening affair starting at 8 p.m. local time (2 p.m. TW time).
The WTA final in Rome begins at 10 a.m. TW time (4 p.m. local time), featuring Svetlana Kuznetsova, last week's winner in Stuttgart, and world number one Dinara Safina.
Early-round and qualifying action is also taking place this weekend for the joint WTA and ATP event in Madrid. I see that the new main court in the Spanish capital is named after Tournament Director Manolo Santana, while Aranxta Sanchez Vicario gets the honour on the second court.
As always, enjoy today's tennis.
- Rosangel Valenti