TENNIS Thread! The French Open is coming- will it be #RG10 for Rafa?

[Raahh]

or number 1 for Djokovic?

given recent form, things look less than great for Nadal-but he likes the big stage and slams are a different beast to other tournaments.

So- new thread to talk ( mostly) about tennis- though it's not compulsory., and we all have different favourites and respect that others might not love our favourites as much as we do.

so...a week to go. May Murray be less tired, Rafa more confident , and a happy tournament be had by all.

Vamos

Halep is losing to Lucic- who was a big star in waiting, but it never happened. Halep had treatment for some quite nasty blisters before.

Schwartman is playing Monfils. He makes a strange squeaky noise when he serves

Gael is looking very smart. I do like watching him play- except when he's messing about.

Lots of booing going on in the Paire/Foggy match. No sure what is happening. ..

ooh- Foggy was 10 minutes late for the match, and looked like a panto villain when he did turn up.

He is being really bad tempered on court, and is losing to Paire, the French crowd will be loving it

Monfils has lost his first set.

Gulbis 4-4 with Mahut in the 3rd.

Ernie has just totally destroyed his racquet after going to 2-1 down against Mahut. I mean, ripped it apart with his bare hands.

There are a lot of Frenchmen playing today- they all seem to be doing quite well, Monfils has drawn level at 1 set all.

Foggy has lost to Paire .Sounds like a bit of a scrap.

Mahut is beating Gulbis. I like Mahut, though I always think of him as being very short- he's 6ft 3. Think it was his infamous match against the very tall Isner that makes me think that.

Wanted Ernie to win, though.

ooh Radek might get this set!

Go Radek!

Hi Raahh! I see you've been busy keeping us up to date with the gossip . I'm off home shortly to catch some of the action.

Monfils ought to have this in the bag.

But it's Monfils...

Monfils seems to specialise in long matches. Too much messing about.

I like Mahut. He's one of those players who comes out of the woodwork every summer & plays well, especially on grass, then you don't hear anything about him the rest of the year.

at Foggy the pantomime villain! Describes him very well.

Drama- yes, Monfils does a lot of messing about- and throwing sets when he's a bit tired. it was obvious in at least 2 of his matches last year. I find that far more annoying and unsporting than Rafa spending a couple of extra seconds towelling down after a long rally. And I really like Monfils- I just think his methods of winning are sometimes suspect.

Plus, he knows here he has the crowd behind him.

And yy to Mahut seeming to disappear half the year. He's more of a doubles player these days- has won quite a bit on that circuit.

Fabrice has nailed it really- when Gilles Simon takes the court, he has a plan, and is out to win. When Gael goes on court, there is no plan. He wants to put on a show as much as he wants to win.

They are discussing the Davis Cup France/GB tie at Queen's club. Could be interesting. Fabrice saying, despite the bigger number of top 100 players, France aren't so hot on grass. He says Monfils can play on grass, but basically can't be arsed.

And I have just realised , that for reasons known only to my tivo box, it had gone right back to start of play this morning.

I wondered why they were discussing matches that had already been on!

I really, really want this match to go to 5- must be hard for them to play each other, as Davis Cup team mates and friends though.

Bastard wank badgers on ITV 4 have given up on tennis & gone over to fucking footy.

I was expecting tennis until 9pm.

Cunts. Utter cunts.

Can you tell I am not a happy bunny?

I have just discovered that as well.

Bastards.

I wouldn't mind, but ITV have a number of channels to choose from...

Bastard ITV never put any tennis on their iplayer thing so I can actually watch it. You don't get this problem with the bbc.

Rafa no you don't.

Although Sue Barker (a.k.a The Voice of Doom) is fond of appearing and switching channels.

Sue Barker makes me twitchy when I watch online. Her appearance in the middle of a match usually means I'm watching something I probably shouldn't be.

Although if bbc helpfully labelled their feeds with 'you need a licence to watch this', I wouldn't have that problem at all.

that would be too easy, Rafa. and i suspect they are happy to catch people out .

Which is why they I suspect they didn't answer my e-mail asking them to clarify which bits of the bbc sport site could be watched. Anything not being broadcast on live television is difficult to define when there are multiple streams some of which may or mzy not be being broadcast on the red button, which may or may not count as live tv.

wrote a long post and lost it.

Rafa faces a tougher test today against Almagro, so I hope he's feeling confident. Murray up after him- his match should be straightforward.

Djok and Ferrer in action. Should be a good day. Don't have to go out til puppy training this evening, so bring it on