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Second Week
Six of the top eight made the quarterfinals, along with 20th-seeded Niklas and not seeded at all Cojanovic as the party crashers. The first match was an unfortunate draw for Prakash Mooljee, who had to face Girsh again at this stage. Close, but not quite there was how things were looking for him in terms of being able to beat the #1 on this surface. What happened on this day though was stunning ... out of nowhere, Mooljee simply came out and dominated this match, 6-2, 7-5, 6-3. He didn't face a single break point, and points count was 96-71, a huge spread. Did not see this coming. It's only the second loss for Girsh in about the last eight months, and the only other one was a nail-biter final to Mehul last fall. It's been a very long time since he got beat like this.
Next up, Niklas kept moving with straight-sets elimination of Gustavo Caratti. This was another one of those matches in which the better player didn't really win; Caratti was just 2 of 13 on break points and lost two very close tiebreaks. But there's always a lot to be said for playing well when the match is on the line, and here Niklas was definitely the player who did that. Iglar(over Kinczllers) and Mehul(ending Cojanovic's dreams) both advanced in straight sets also.
So the semifinals set up with a matchup of two players who have never sniffed this rarified air before, and another pair who have been here more times than they could count. Mooljee started off fast against Tomas Niklas but the final set was a royal battle that he could easily have lost and let the Czech back into the match. He was just about to eke that one out, finishing a 6-2, 6-3, 7-6(5) win to get to the final. Antonin Iglar got off to a fast start against Mehul ... but it didn't last long. 2-6, 6-2, 6-1, 6-4 was the final there in their 54th meeting, with Iglar unable to do much after that first one.
An all-Sri Lanka final between the upstart and wily veteran. Both were ready to go for this one, and Prakash Mooljee was a slight favorite the way I saw things. Coming into the tournament he was 0-6 against both Girsh and Mehul, but you'd never know it by the way he beat both of them down. Mehul, bidding to become the oldest man to ever with a Slam, was thrashed 6-2, 6-4, 6-1 and never really had a chance here. Mooljee takes his first Slam title and shoots up to 5th in the rankings with a stunning championship at the first major tournament this year. I don't know that I've ever seen anyone win in their first visit to the second week. There were other big winners here ... Mehul didn't make a single Slam final last year so this was a big result for him and he's right on Caratti's heels now for third, Niklas shoots up from 21st to 13th, Cojanovic from 39th to 30th. The youth movement definitely made more than a few statements to start of this year, though some of them didn't do much(Janin, Cirakovic).
Girish Girsh is still #1 by a mile, but how long he stays there will depend a lot on how well he reacts to this.
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