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Shanghai Masters
Girish Girsh had a couple of fairly easy matches against a qualifier and a journeyman before running into 5-seed David Alvarez, a player he should beat most of the time by this point. His recent impressive form didn't carry over though in a 7-6(1), 6-3 loss. It was pretty close, really the difference was in the key moments. Not a horrible setback but fairly disappointing, even if he did still go one round further than last year. It looked a little better when the in-form Alvarez upset Benda in the quarterfinals though ...
Anil Mehul easily dispatched Federer again in the third round, but had a tougher time than expected with Blanco after that. 7-5, 7-5 he advanced in straight sets, but it looked like the fatigue was beginning to show again. Had he not come up big in saving all six break points against him he could easily have lost. In the semis though he crushed Alvarez easily, including a first-set bagel, and once again reached the final against Iglar. After taking a long tiebreak, he didn't have quite enough left and lost one of those matches where the legend was off his game a bit vulnerable. 6-7(9), 6-4, 6-4 was the count, a good effort considering how much he's been playing but short of the mark once again and the second of his two Masters titles last year goes back to the normal owner.
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