This is a wonderful day for TeninsCast folks. TennisCast Idol Juan Carlos Ferrero emerged victorious yesterday in his second round match against Florian Mayer. It hurt us to have to place him on the double faultin' list but apparently he wants to prove us wrong. Yesterday he served up a bagel in his straight set match beating Mayer 6-0, 6-2. His third round match is against Acasuso who already has a couple of upsets into the tournament defeating Grosjean in the first round and the commander himself Mikhail Youzhny in the second. The two of them have battled each other twice before and both have a victory under their belt, Acasuso tough has the latest victory when he defeated the Spaniard star in Basel in 2005. This is a different story as both are coming in to the match with positive reasons to think they can win. Although Acasuso will be the more tired of the two, his two previous wins must have him at a very high confidence level, while Ferrero, who is fresh after not only a bye in the first round but a routine second round match, will be
his spot in a possible 4th round match against Rafael Nadal who has to get by #32 seed Verdasco. Nadal and Ferrero have played 5 times before and the younger Spaniard has a 4-1 lead head to head but Ferrero should be confident that he can pull out the victory with Nadal not entirely at 100% and knowing he had the last victory in a tie breaker full match back in the Master Series of Cincinnati late last year. We'll be cheering for Ferrero this week, go Mosquito!
Believe it or not there were more results yesterday, but when Ferrero is involved we are sure to make it top priority. We had posted at the end of last nights post that Gasquet was in the middle of a match and winning. The currently rising French star finished his match strong and beating his fellow young star Juan Martin del Potro 7-6(2), 6-2. Gasquet moves on to face J. Nieminen. Last night we also reported that half of the Rochus family was out...with C.Rochus losing. Today we happily post that his brother O.Rochus stays alive after defeating the wannabe white rapper of the tennis tour Vincent Spadea. You thought we'd let you go without letting you know the names of the Rochus brothers? Well yeah...its funner and more confusing that way. Nadal learned his next opponent will be Fernando Verdasco after he defeated Andreas Seppi 7-6(5), 6-3. This should be an interesting match considering Nadal isn't at his most dangerous physical peak and that Verdasco is always a tricky opponent. I'll make it less interesting for you...Nadal dominates Verdasco head to head with 4 straight wins dating back to 2005 and even to a challengers event back in 2003...yeah Verdasco winning would be a definite update to say the least. The last result we're gonna share tonight involves Andy Roddick. While the match was nothing extraordinary ending in a pleasant two sets, 7-6(5), 6-4, it was the record crowd that made this match so much fun. More than 20,000 fans came to enjoy the night match setting a record at Indian Wells. Roddick should have an easy road to the last 16 he faces O. Rochus next and will most likely meet the young Frenchy Gasquet in the round of 16 where we think his tournament will increase in difficulty.
Later tonight we'll post more results from some more second round action thats been going on today at Indian Wells. Make sure to check back soon for all the results. TennisCast will also have an update from our Equipment section led by TennisCast contributor and co-host Mario later on so make sure to come back to check out what he has to say. Thats it for now folks remember to check out all the action over at Master Series TV where play is going on live. See ya soon!
That pic basically sums up the first day of the Rome Master Series. Empty seats, rain, and umbrellas. Albeit the rather heavy rainstorm the tournament did get five matches out of the way. Four of those matches were first round single matches while the fifth was a very interesting doubles match featuring the currently "tennis revitalizing" rivalry of Nadal and Federer. Players that got through their first round matches include non other than tenniscast heroe Juan Carlos Ferrero and fellow Spaniard Nicolas Almagro as well as tennis blogger Tursunov and that tall Argentenian Jose Acasuso. Nadal teamed up with Carlos Moya and took on Federer and Wawrinka in their first doubles encounter. Here are the results from the Rome Master Series Day 1.
