TENNIS – The Draw Ceremony of the Rogers Cup Master 1000 Tournament in Toronto was held today. Three.time Rogers Cup champion and this year’s Wimbledon winner Novak Djokovic attended the Draw Ceremony at the Ontario Legislative Building in Queen’s Park in Toronto. The potential quarter finals could be Djokovic vs Murray, Wawrinka vs either Dimitrov or Nishikori, Raonic vs Berdych and Federer vs Ferrer. Diego Sampaolo
Novak Djokovic will face a very tough tournament at the Rogers Cup which starts on Monday in Toronto. This year’s Wimbledon champion will face either Gael Monfils or Radek Stepanek in the second round and could square off Jo Wilfred Tsonga in the third round and 2013 Wimbledon champion and eighth seed Andy Murray in the quarter final.
Top-seed Djokovic will be looking to win his fourth Rogers Cup title after winning in 2007 against Roger Federer, in 2011 against Mardy Fish and in 2012 against Richard Gasquet. If he wins, he will become the third player to win 20 Master 1000 titles after Rafa Nadal and Roger Federer.
Murray will also face a second-round match against Australian rising star Nick Kyrgios who beat Rafa Nadal at Wimbledon reaching the quarter final.
The most important matches of the top-half draw of the draw will be 2006 Roger’s Cup finalist Richard Gasquet against Vasek Pospisil and Radek Stepanek against Gael Monfils. Pospisil, who reached the semifinal last year at the Roger’s Cup, beat Tomas Berdych this year in Washington
The second quarter of the draw features two potential third round matches like Kei Nishikori against Grigor Dimitrov and Stan Wawrinka and either Fabio Fognini or Kevin Anderson.
Wawrinka will start against Alejandro Falla in the second round or a qualifier. He could face a potential quarter final against either Nishikori or Dimitrov. The Bulgarian reached the semifinal in Rome and Wimbledon and won Acapulco, Bucharest and the Queen’s on three different surfaces
Nishikori will start against Phillip Kohlschreiber and the winner of the match between Austrian rising star Dominic Thiem and Giles Simon. Thiem lost the Kitzbuhel final against Belgian David Goffin.
In the third quarter of the draw last year’s Roger’s Cup finalist Milos Raonic could face Ernests Gulbis in the third round. Gulbis is always a dangerous and unpredictable player and reached a Grand Slam semifinal at the Roland Garros this year. The potential quarter final in this section of the draw could be Raonic against Tomas Berdych. This year’s Rome and Wimbledon semifinalist Raonic, who will start against the winner of the first round match between Jack Sock and Jurgen Melzer, finished runner-up to Rafa Nadal in the Roger’s Cup last year and will be looking to improve the result this year. Sadly Nadal has been forced to withdraw from Toronto and Cincinnati due to a wrist injury and may miss the US Open.
Berdych could face the winner of the first-round all-Spanish match between Roberto Bautista Agut and Feliciano Lopez. The other interesting first round match will be played Lleyton Hewitt and Julien Benneteau
Roger Federer, who won the Roger’s Cup title twice in 2004 against Andy Roddick and 2006 against Richard Gasquet, will start his US hard-court campaign against the winner of the first round match between Peter Polansky and 2013 Wimbledon semifinalist Jerzy Janowicz. The Swiss 17-time Grand Slam winner could take on either Marin Cilic or Denis Istomin in the third round, either David Ferrer or US giant John Isner in the quarter final and either Raonic or Berdych in the semifinal. Cilic-Istomin could be the most interesting first round match in the bottom half of the draw.
