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Cincinnati Masters
Hey look, I think I spelled it correctly this time ...
Anyway, this week was another one where the younger generation stepped up. Third-round upsets:
- (14) Daniel Long d. (6) Jochen Weigle 3-6, 6-3, 6-4. Long, from Ireland, isn't exactly young at 26 years old, but he's still improving. This was a pretty big surprise as he's not really in Weigle's category in terms of ability.
- (10) Johann Przalowik d. (2) Leon Polychroniadis, 7-6(6), 6-2. Anytime #2 goes out this early it's definitely worth noting.
- (11) Joss Fraikes d. (7) Toni Bardales, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4. This one we can pretty much put down to the home-crowd advantage.
Three double-digit seeds crashing into the quarterfinals. And the surprises didn't stop there. Faille actually lost the first set to Long, then took the last two 6-2, 6-1 as he was apparently not amused at this affront. Fraikes lost in a close two-setter to Cananis, Davide de Laurentiis was beaten by Caballero routinely, and in the most interesting match Przalowik kept going by knocking out Oleg Urazov 6-4, 4-6, 6-4. So much for Urazov backing up his performance last week.
Ene Caballero ate a bagel in his first set against the unstoppable french force of Faille, before doing better in the second but still losing. The other semifinal went right down to the wire, which usually means Renke Cananis wins ... but not this time. Przalowik moves on again, 2-6, 6-3, 7-6(3). Impressive run for him, which hits a dead end in the final with Ben Faille cruising 6-2, 6-2.
The most important upshot of this is that Przalowik moves back up to 9th, giving him that leg up on the other rising players again and the vital 8th seed at the US Open. Naturally, it wouldn't be a surprise if Fraikes makes another run there as well.
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