fantasy tennis

Well I can't believe it's that time again, the tennis season has come to a close. Most women I know are relieved when the football season is over, but I doubt most people even know when the tennis season is. Well I'll tell you, it runs from January to October with a big end of season tournament in November.

Speaking of said tournament, that was played this week where the worlds best 8 players from the season come head to head for one final showdown. It involved the like of Roger Federer, new world no.1 Rafael Nadal, and for the first time Britain's Andy Murray. The eventual winner was Novak Djokovic in an unexpected final with my least favourite player Nikolay Davydenko. Murray had a descent run too, winning all of 3 his group games (including Federer), only to go out in the next round.

This season, since March I have been playing a fantasy tennis game kind of like what you get with fantasy football. The idea was to choose who you thought would win each of the first round matches for all of the masters series events, and then guess who would progress through the draw based on those predictions. The further your 'picks' got in the tournament, the higher the points were on offer. I had some really good tournaments and some not so good, but I was very almost rewarded for my conistant picking. After 8 tournaments, I finished 12th from 23,033 players, and had Roger Federer not pulled out injured in the Semi-finals of the last tournament, there was a pretty good chance I could have won the whole thing (The grand prize being £1000 and an all expenses paid trip for 2 to any tournament of my choice!).

I was livid having been so close, but still pretty proud of my efforts! So hopefully when I make a tennis prediction now it carries some sort of credibility, and next year I'm gonna predict the following. Andy Murray has a lot of points to gain in the first half of next season, with poor efforts in the aus open, early masters series and clay court season this year. He is ranked 4th in the world, which will mean being seeded to make at least semi finals in big tournaments which should make it easier for him to progress through the draw, instead of having to face the likes of Nadal in the 4th round! I expect more of the same from rafa, dominating on clay, and trying to be more competitive on hard court. I think Djokovic will always be a danger, but I think he lacks the legend factor that Nadal and Federer clearly have. Speaking of Roger - I wouldn't write him off just yet, he will not be pleased with how things have went this season, and he will want to prove everyone wrong, and get back to no.1, and I think he certainly could do it. Lastly my one to look out for next season - well there are a few. Jo-Wilfred Tsonga and David Nalbandian (if he ever shrugs off that false dawn syndrome!).

The picture below is evidence for my efforts in the fantasy tennis league (I am antykz, click to enlarge). To play next season log on to http://challenge.atptennis.com