Tennis: The Mercedes Cup Germany- Overview of First round matches
Tennis is a rich game and it has prospered to the every part of the world. Throughout the year, there must be some activity in the courts. Besides the Major titles, there are a lot of other tournaments and championship which complete the ATP World Tour. Most of these tournaments give underdog players an opportunity to show their skills, and be known to the world.
One such tournament is the Mercedes Cup, which is held in Germany every year. It is an ATP World Tour 250 series tennis tournament on the ATP Tour. It is an outdoor activity which is organised at the clay courts of Tennis Club Weissenhof, Stuttgart, Germany. It is a great tradition which has been revived since 1916.
The tournament involves total prize money of 450,000 Euros but this tournament has one discrete feature, that the title winner is awarded a Mercedes car, on top of prize money. It is a one week event which is held in the month of July. It lasts from July 12th to July 18th.
There are a great number of local players, who try their luck on the clay courts to keep the gold home. In the last ten years, none of the native players could make a difference and win the tournament. The title has been given to players from other parts of the world. The current world number 1, Rafael Nadal has a good record in the Mercedes Cup. He is the two-time champion since 2001.
In the current season, 26 years old Philipp Kohlschreiber was out in the court to contest his German compatriot Florian Mayer. Philipp currently holds the number 32 spot on the ATP world ranking. He has no big achievements to his name but he defeated Andy Roddick in 2008 at the Australian Open tournament. In U.S. Open 2008 and Wimbledon 2009, he was stricken out of the tournament by Roger Federer.
On the other hand, Florian Mayer is ranked at the 55th position in the ATP World ranking. He plays both the ATP Tour and Challenger Tour. He actually won five Challenger events in the past.
This year at the Mercedes Cup, he won against Philipp Kohlschreiber in the first round match. Florian defeated Philipp in straight sets of 6-4 and 6-2. The 35th-ranked Philipp was seeded sixth at the Stuttgart tournament but Florian Mayer was ranked 21 spots lower in the ATP rankings. This match was quite an upset.
In the other matches, Spain’s fifth seeded player Albert Montanes faced Philipp Petzschner of Germany. This match was won by Montanes in three easy sets 2-6, 7-5, 6-2. The Spanish Albert Montanes has advanced to the second round. Gulliermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain defeated his Spanish counterpart Ivan Navarro in two sets 6-2 and 6-3. The German Bjorn Phau won the match against Romanian Victor Crivoi. In one of the first round matches, Argentinean players Juan Chela and Eduardo Schwank stroked together but the victory was handed to Juan.
In the same scenario, German Simon Greul and Michael Berrer played a match in which Simon was winner. Among the other players who fought for the second round matches were; Spanish Daniel Gimeno-Traver, French Jeremy Chardy, Spanish Pablo Anduja and German Bastien Knittel.
At the end of game, Jeremy and Bastien were runners up, while the other two moved to the next stage.
The French Jérémy Chardy is the defending champion of Mercedes Cup. He defeated Romanian tennis player Victor Hănescu last year.
Last year’s runner up Victor Hanescu was also ousted in the first-round action on Monday. Marco Chiudinelli dumped him 7-6 (7-4), 6-3. Marco saved all the four break points he faced. This is how, last year’s Mercedes Cup runner up, dropped out of the tournament.
The action is still in progress and in the coming few days, the winner will be concluded who will take the prize money and the beautiful ride in the gift.
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