Australian Open 2020 Day 3: Stars emerging as seeds slide. Plus Day 4 picks.

The tournament is picking up pace now with some standout stars and epic matches emerging. We have lost some big names as others remain steady to provide some mouthwatering match-ups in the next few days. We start with the men this time and while Djokovic and Federer looked sublime in their rapid victories, there were […]

Australian Open 2020 Day 2: Maria’s last goodbye? Plus Day 3 picks

A similar day to yesterday in terms of these overall picture. We have our expected frontrunners doing just that and a few eyebrow-raisers peppering the scoresheets. The big stories again came from the women’s side, as Maria Sharapova -given a wildcard here and languishing in the 300’s on tour- beaten soundly by 19th seed Vekic. […]

Australian Open 2020 Day 1: Gauff downs Venus again. Plus Day 2 picks.

The much needed rain Down Under disrupted a few matches but overall things went smoothly on the opening day of this decade’s opening slam. The big names too remained largely untroubled. Defending champion Naomi Osaka looked good in her first round victory and there were easy wins for Serena, Kvitova and the soon-to-be-departing Wozniacki. World […]

Australian Open 2020: Winner predictions and the best Day 1 matches

With all that is going on in Australia at this time, tennis and indeed sport in general seems wholly trivial. Tennis Australia is doing a lot to support the bushfire crisis, but it will be telling to see how the tournament unfolds amidst still ongoing conversations surrounding player and audience safety. What of the tournament […]

TRIBUTE: Mercurial Marcos Baghdatis

A longtime fan favourite and a player who I always enjoyed watching either in person or on TV. Cypriot Baghdatis was an unpredictable player both in shotmaking and emotion. He would joke and play the jester at times, at others he would decimate the world’s very best. Most will rightly remember him best for his […]

NEWS: Australian Open air quality a massive unforced error

Concerning reports coming from Down Under today as highlighted by the BBC article on the first rounds of qualifying being majorly affected by the bushfire smoke engulfing Melbourne. Dalila Jakupovic, who retired a set up from her Q1 match due to the conditions described how it was difficult to breathe and naturally very alarming. Other […]

Guess who’s back (back yet again)

Another January post spouting the usual words of a renewed focus with this blog. Well, hopefully I can merely nail some sort of achievable schedule. Somewhere in between the daily posts of the first half of 2018 to the all-too-brief and lacking in heart content of late last year. What does this new year, indeed […]