Tennis 2017

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wr8_utd said:
Zverev has a 13-14 record in Slams :lol:
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There's no magical age whereby players are supposed to win a slam. Murray didn't win one until around 26/27ish, so there's plenty of time for the likes of Zverev. Many players rise gradually in the rankings and don't really improving and reaching their true potential until they are in the 23-27 age group (give or take a couple of years), at which point they tend to play some of their best Tennis. Have a look at Murray's rise in the rankings over the years. Zverev and others could easily follow a similar path.

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Raoul said:
There's no magical age whereby players are supposed to win a slam. Murray didn't win one until around 26/27ish, so there's plenty of time for the likes of Zverev. Many players rise gradually in the rankings and don't start improving until they are in the 23-27 age group (give or take a couple of years), at which point they tend to play some of their best Tennis. Have a look at Murray's rise in the rankings over the years. Zverev and others could easily follow a similar path.

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I'm not saying Zverev should be winning Slams but when you have such an easy draw and have done well all season, translate those performances to 5 sets as well. Atleast make it to the 2nd Round? Losing to Cilic I can understand, not to inferior players. Murray might not have won till 26 but he was always going deep in Slams and challenging.
 
wr8_utd said:
I'm not saying Zverev should be winning Slams but when you have such an easy draw and have done well all season, translate those performances to 5 sets as well. Atleast make it to the 2nd Round? Losing to Cilic I can understand, not to inferior players. Murray might not have won till 26 but he was always going deep in Slams and challenging.
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That's not the point. You can see in Murray's rise that it happened gradually, and in a completely different way to that of Becker, Sampras and the like. Players can get very good at different points in their careers so there's no point in fixating on the usual short term trope of "he can't go deep in a slam in the present". You have to take the longer view with the knowledge that players almost always improve their games significantly from the age of 20 onwards.
 
Murray beat the 14th seed and took Nalbandian to five sets in his first ever slam at the age of 18. Zverev hasn't come close to doing something as impressive as that in his slam appearances so far. Obviously he'll improve but he should be doing better and the five set format is clearly a weakness for him right now.

Just for comparison, Novak made two semis and a final the year he turned 20, Nadal won his second French and made his first Wimbledon final, and Federer (who everyone agrees was underachieving at that point) made two quarters and beat Sampras at Wimbledon.
 
Raoul said:
That's not the point. You can see in Murray's rise that it happened gradually, and in a completely different way to that of Becker, Sampras and the like. Players can get very good at different points in their careers so there's no point in fixating on the usual short term trope of "he can't go deep in a slam in the present". You have to take the longer view with the knowledge that players almost always improve their games significantly from the age of 20 onwards.
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Murray is something of an exception to the rule and even he showed a lot more than Zverev has so far as noted by @Giggsy92 Murray also suffered from injuries iirc. Also It took so for Murray to win a GS because you had three of the the greatest players playing at their peak. Not that anyone's saying Zverev should have won a GS by now.

No one's writing him off but his performances have been very poor thus far. Thinking about it most of the top players / talents over the last 20-25 years had probably shown a lot more in grand slams by Zverevs age. Wawrinka is one exception that springs to mind immediately but I can't think of any notable ones. Federer, Nadal, Roddick, Hewitt, Safin, Djokovic, Murray, Del Potro, Agassi, Sampras etc.. All had good showings in grand slams by now.
 
Giggsy92 said:
Murray beat the 14th seed and took Nalbandian to five sets in his first ever slam at the age of 18. Zverev hasn't come close to doing something as impressive as that in his slam appearances so far. Obviously he'll improve but he should be doing better and the five set format is clearly a weakness for him right now.

Just for comparison, Novak made two semis and a final the year he turned 20, Nadal won his second French and made his first Wimbledon final, and Federer (who everyone agrees was underachieving at that point) made two quarters and beat Sampras at Wimbledon.
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You can't extrapolate that going a few rounds deep into a slam at 20 is or isn't tantamount to winning slams later. Becker won five of his six slams between the ages of 17-23. Wilander won all his seven slams by the age of 23. On the other hand Federer and Djokovic won 31 of their collective 32 slams after the age of 22. There is no magic forumla to saying just because player X got bounced from the US Open in the first round that they won't be successful in later years. What we do know is that a vast majority of tennis players do improve from their teenage form 17-20, to their prime career form between the ages of 23-29. That is where Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic have done their maximum damage and that is also where the likes of Connors, McEnroe, Edberg, Sampras, Agassi etc won most of their silverware. Therefore rather than cynically sneering at young players like Zverev, we would be wise to let them gradually improve over time just as those who came before them did.
 
Nighteyes said:
Murray is something of an exception to the rule and even he showed a lot more than Zverev has so far as noted by @Giggsy92 Murray also suffered from injuries iirc. Also It took so for Murray to win a GS because you had three of the the greatest players playing at their peak. Not that anyone's saying Zverev should have won a GS by now.

No one's writing him off but his performances have been very poor thus far. Thinking about it most of the top players / talents over the last 20-25 years had probably shown a lot more in grand slams by Zverevs age. Wawrinka is one exception that springs to mind immediately but I can't think of any notable ones. Federer, Nadal, Roddick, Hewitt, Safin, Djokovic, Murray, Del Potro, Agassi, Sampras etc.. All had good showings in grand slams by now.
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Again, you don't have to show as much as Murray did at the same age. Different players get better at different rates throughout their careers.
 
Raoul said:
Again, you don't have to show as much as Murray did at the same age. Different players get better at different rates throughout their careers.
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You could use this line of reasoning for any player. The fact remains however, that Zverev has been very poor at grand slams. You can look at his record in isolation or look at it relative to other top players in the recent past. Either ways it doesn't make for good reading. And this is in a time when the quality of Men's tennis has been the lowest in some time.
 
Nighteyes said:
You could use this line of reasoning for any player. The fact remains however, that Zverev has been very poor at grand slams. You can look at his record in isolation or look at it relative to other top players in the recent past. Either ways it doesn't make for good reading. And this is in a time when the quality of Men's tennis has been the lowest in some time.
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Like I said, you have to take the longer view with younger players like Zverev, Shapovlov et al. A player can get bounced in the early stages of a tournament this year and win it next year. Both of these players will improve immensely over the next few years at a time when the usual suspects are retiring, so it doesn't take a massive leap to presume that the current new crop of youngsters will be at or near the top of the rankings within a couple of years.
 
Raoul said:
Like I said, you have to take the longer view with younger players like Zverev, Shapovlov et al. A player can get bounced in the early stages of a tournament this year and win it next year. Both of these players will improve immensely over the next few years at a time when the usual suspects are retiring, so it doesn't take a massive leap to presume that the current new crop of youngsters will be at or near the top of the rankings within a couple of years.
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There is no guarantee of anything. For all we know they both end up like Kyrgios, Tomic or Gasguet etc.. Them being near the top of the rankings wouldn't be a surprise. That may or may or not mean much depending on how they achieve it. No one gives a feck about the Women's rankings these days and haven't for some time.

What we can say definitely is that so far these younger players have left a lot to be desired. Although I must qualify this by saying I haven't seen a lot of shapovlov. Im mainly talking about Zverev.
 
Cilic isn't looking convincing on his groundstrokes but holding with ease.

With the lack of good returners on his side of the draws, can't see him dropping a lot of sets.
 
Raoul said:
Like I said, you have to take the longer view with younger players like Zverev, Shapovlov et al. A player can get bounced in the early stages of a tournament this year and win it next year. Both of these players will improve immensely over the next few years at a time when the usual suspects are retiring, so it doesn't take a massive leap to presume that the current new crop of youngsters will be at or near the top of the rankings within a couple of years.
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As far as Zverev goes, he has a tremendous upside. The kid is currently the #4 player in mens tennis at the age of 20 and will continue to improve over time. Once he wins his first slam, he will win several more.
 
wr8_utd said:
This is a field with ALL the top players other than Fed and Nadal missing, John Isner is a Top 10 player so the least you can expect is atleast a credible performance from the kids.
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You keep saying "the kids" when you mean "Zverev and maybe Kyrgios", that's the problem. You seem to think no other young players are still in the tournament and doing well. Why am I even arguing with a broken record?
 
Nighteyes said:
At 21 actually. So we're both wrong.

However he had still quite comfortably shown a lot more than Zverev has to date. Zverev has yet to beat anyone of note in a grand slam or even make the quarters. There's no comparison.
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That's why I said he turned 22, it was 2 weeks or something after he won Wimbledon. At Zverev's age he had only won 1 Masters tournament and made 2 Slam QFs. Zverev looked good at the beginning of the year and lost to Rafa in 5 in a brilliant match, unlucky to get him that early.Of course he should have done better here, it seems like he is struggling with the pressure at the moment, but he has still all the time on his side. Someone like Rafa is rare and someone like Nole isn't common either in terms of winning something big at a young age. Federer was number 13 in the world at Zverev's age and number 6 the season after that. Zverev is already a Top10 player, solid on all surfaces and won two Masters, he is much more on track to become someone special than guys like Thiem, who is 3 years older, hasn't won something big and struggles outside clay. And all the other highly rated young players haven't shown anything comparable overall either, just glimpses of their potential here and there, while Zverev is delivering a good year, the slam results will follow in the future imo.
 
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Break-break-break-break.

Must be something in the water. Both of them doing their level best to throw the games away.

Quite fun to watch though. Crowd is quite funnily anti-Cilic.
 
Pyroblazer said:
That's why I said he turned 22, it was 2 weeks or something after he won Wimbledon. At Zverev's age he had only won 1 Masters tournament and made 2 Slam QFs. Zverev looked good at the beginning of the year and lost to Rafa in 5 in a brilliant match, unlucky to get him that early.Of course he should have done better here, it seems like he is struggling with the pressure at the moment, but he has still all the time on his side. Someone like Rafa is rare and someone like Nole isn't common either in terms of winning something big at a young age. Federer was number 13 in the world at Zverev's age and number 6 the season after that. Zverev is already a Top10 player, solid on all surfaces and won two Masters, he is much more on track to become someone special than guys like Thiem, who is 3 years older, hasn't won something big and struggles outside clay. And all the other highly rated young players haven't shown anything comparable overall either, just glimpses of their potential here and there, while Zverev is delivering a good year, the slam results will follow in the future imo.
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Zverev has never reached the QF's of a grand slam. He's only ever made the 2nd week once. If you're seriously trying to argue that Federer hadn't done more at the same age in grand slams you're way off base. It's actually more uncommon for a young elite level talent to be so poor in grand slams than not. I just looked at the grand slam winners of the last 20 years and there's very few players with a worse record at the same age. My only point here is it's not unreasonable to question Zverev not that he'll not do very well going forward.
 
Cilic 2 sets to 1 down. This really is a pretty pathetic half of the draw :lol:

It's shocking what Djoko and Murray missing can do to the field.
 
wr8_utd said:
Cilic 2 sets to 1 down. This really is a pretty pathetic half of the draw :lol:

It's shocking what Djoko and Murray missing can do to the field.
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Last set they went 8 consecutive games with neither one holding serve.

Cilic started solid enough but from the 8th game of 1st set onwards he became extremely erratic.
 
Nighteyes said:
Zverev has never reached the QF's of a grand slam. He's only ever made the 2nd week once. If you're seriously trying to argue that Federer hadn't done more at the same age in grand slams you're way off base. It's actually more uncommon for a young elite level talent to be so poor in grand slams than not. I just looked at the grand slam winners of the last 20 years and there's very few players with a worse record at the same age. My only point here is it's not unreasonable to question Zverev not that he'll not do very well going forward.
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He is obviously worse at slams than Federer at the same age, but not worse overall. His slam record us his big flaw so far, if he improves there, he is on course to be a pretty good player. I just don't think it's fair to compare him to the likes of Tomic, when the kid has been developing pretty fine so far.

If Cilic goes out the second half of the draw will be pretty weak. Shapovalov also a set down.
 
Cilic gone, what a tournament :lol:

I don't think any player in the second half of the draw has made it to a slam final yet, will be a big chance for those guys.
 
Hahahhahaa. This tournament is unreal. It would be hilarious if Nadal and Fed lost before the Quarters as well. This is the worst Slam I think I've ever seen in terms of quality and seeds :lol:
 
Edmund retired. Poor guy was ahead in the set as well and won nothing after.

Toughest player Shopavalov can get in the QF is Pouille. You've got to think he could make it to the semis here. The draw has really opened up for him.
 
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