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  • Veteran feel to Chennai Open

    12/21/08 4:45 PM | Ricky Dimon
    Veteran feel to Chennai Open Next month's ATP event in Chennai, India welcomes a strong field of players, but also a relatively old field of players in terms of contestants' ages. Nikolay Davydenko, Carlos Moya, and Rainer Schuettler are among the participants.

    Young up-and-comers have been taking the ATP Tour by storm recently, but a strong contingent of veterans will try to hold them off at a season-opening event in Chennai, India next month.

    Nikolay Davydenko headlines the field as the No. 1 seed. He will be joined by seasoned veterans Carlos Moya, Rainer Schuettler, and Ivan Ljubicic. Ivo Karlovic, who will bring his big serve to the Chennai Open, has been coming on strong in the latter stages of his tennis career.

    Davydenko, 27, was once No. 3 in the world but now comes in at No. 5. The Russian reached the Masters Cup final this season and that will give him some momentum heading into 2009. Moya, 32, won the French Open way back in 1998 and his best days are clearly behind him. The Spaniard is 42nd in the world. Schuettler, also 32, came out of almost nowhere to reach the Wimbledon semifinals this summer. Ljubicic, 29, was No. 3 in the world as recently as 2006, but injuries are creeping up on him and have left him at No. 44 in the world. Karlovic, a late bloomer, is playing the best tennis of his career at age 29. The 6'10'' Croat reached a career-high ranking of No. 14 after defeating Roger Federer en route to the Masters Series Cincinnati semifinals, and he is now 26th.

    Seeded second and third at the Chennai Open, however, will be members of a different tennis generation: Stanislas Wawrinka and Marin Cilic. Wawrinka, 23, reached a career-high ranking of No. 9 in the world this summer and now stands at 13th. The Swiss teamed up with Roger Federer to win doubles gold at the Beijing Olympics. Cilic is part of a heralded group--which includes Juan Martin Del Potro and Ernests Gulbis--born in 1988. The 20-year-old Croat is 23rd in the world, one of his career-high, and this summer he won a title in New Haven.

    India's singles hopes are Prakash Amritraj and Somdev Devvarman, both of whom received wild cards. Amritraj reached an ATP final on the grass courts of Newport, Rhode Island this summer. Devvarman, who attended the University of Virgina, won his second straight NCAA singles this spring and immediately won four Challenger tournaments in a row upon turning professional. Amritraj is ranked No. 210 in the world while Devvarman registers at 204th.

    Lukas Dlouhy was awarded the third wild card. Dlouhy plays doubles with India's Leander Paes.

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Comments

And it seems to me that the Stan's highest ranking this summer was better than 23 lol. Quoting Fed "everybody can enter Top.10 these days" :p

acionescu , 12/22/08 9:23 AM



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