TENNIS World of Tennis – Big numbers for Nadal and Federer. Tsonga and Sharapova celebrate their birthday. Laura Robson will undergo surgery. British tennis stars rally for Baltacha and who is playing where. Joshua Bosco
Federer 950th, Nadal 300th on clay
On Friday World No.4 Roger Federer won his 950th tour-level match after beating Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 2-6 7-6(6) 6-1 in the quarterfinals of the Monte Carlo Rolex Masters.
The 17-time Grand Slam champion is just the third player to reach the 950 win milestone in the Open Era after Jimmy Connors (1253) and Ivan Lendl (1071).
The day before, World No.1 Rafael Nadal became the 11th player to win 300 tour-level clay court matches in the Open Era when he defeated Italian Andreas Seppi 6-1 6-3 in just 74 minutes.
He then lost in the quarterfinals to fellow Spaniard David Ferrer who is not far behind him with 270 wins in this special ranking, topped by Guillermo Villas with an incredible 644 clay victories.
Happy Birthday Maria & Jo-Wilfried
World No.12 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga celebrated his 29th birthday on Thursday coming back from a set down to beat Fabio Fognini 5-7 6-3 6-0. After the match he was congratulated by the crowd with a rendition of “Bon Anniversaire”.
Maria Sharapova turned 27th on Saturday and she celebrated by adding Speedy, a new candy in the form of a Porsche 911, to her Sugarpova range.
Robson wrist concerns
Laura Robson announced last week that she will undergo surgery to resolve the wrist problem that has been troubling her for more than a year. The British No.1 will now miss both Roland Garros and Wimbledon.
In a message on her Facebook page she said that she will be operated at the Mayo Clinic by Dr Richard Berger, the same specialist that recently performed surgery on Juan Martin del Potro.
Rally for Bally
Many British players will get together on 15th June to hold a fundraising event to show their support for former British No.1 Elena Baltacha, who was recently diagnosed with liver cancer.
The event, dubbed “Rally for Bally”, will see the likes of Andy & Jamie Murray, Heather Watson, Tim Henman, Greg Rusedski and WTA legend Martina Navratilova (who herself survived breast cancer in 2010) take on each other in mixed doubles matches at Queen’s Club, Eastbourne and Birmingham.
The proceedings from the Rally, which follows a similar event held last year in support of Ross Hutchins, will be equally split between the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity and the Elena Baltacha Academy of Tennis.
Who’s playing where
After the first ATP Masters 1000 of the season in Monte Carlo, some players will rest before Madrid while others will be playing in Barcelona or in Bucharest.
World No.1 Rafael Nadal will try to shrug off his shock defeat in Monte Carlo with a ninth title at the ATP 500 event in Barcelona. Here he will be joined by fellow Spaniards David Ferrer, Tommy Robredo, Nicolas Almagro, Fernando Verdasco and, among others, Fabio Fognini, Kei Nishikori, Ernests Gulbis and Benoit Paire.
In Bucharest Lukas Rosol will have a hard time defending his 2013 title in a draw including eight Top 50 players including top seed Grigor Dimitrov, Mikhail Youzhny, Gael Monfils and Andreas Seppi.
World No.3 Agnieszka Radwanska will lead a star-studded draw at the Premier event in Stuttgart. Aga will be joined by defending champion Maria Sharapova and other Top 10 players like Simona Halep, Jelena Jankovic and Australian Open semi-finalist Dominika Cibulkova. German players Andrea Petkovic and Julia Georges have received wildcards for the event.
In Marrakesh Francesca Schiavone will be up against Daniela Hantuchova, Elina Svitolina, Bojana Jovanovski and Garbine Muguruza as she tries to win back-to-back titles at the Grand Prix SAR La Princesse Lalla Meryem.
