Chapter 603 Chaos Frequently
In 2014, the third day of the Shanghai Masters was still going smoothly, but as mentioned before, various reasons led to the last two Masters at the end of the year always being full of upsets. The first round of this year has proved this, and the second round continued this state.
The highest seed eliminated in the second round was No. 2 seed Nadal.
The dream of "Gawain VS Nadal 2.0" was shattered.
In fact, objectively speaking, Lopez's victory over Nadal cannot be considered an upset. Although Lopez is also a Spaniard who grew up on clay, his best court is actually grass, followed by hard court.
Remember the list of male players with the most aces in history? Karlovic and Isner are competing for the title of the first in history, while Lopez is ranked fifth on this list. As of 2014, his aces are even more than Federer.
Lopez has defeated Nadal twice in his career. The first time was in Basel in 2003, on an indoor carpet court; the second time was at Wimbledon in 2010, on grass; today was the third time, still on a fast hard court.
But no matter what, Felipe Lopez defeated his compatriot and advanced to the third round, where he will face Gao Wen, so an interesting scene was formed:
Fili Lopez defeated Koggenakis and then Nadal, and finally stood in front of Gawain. The two potential opponents that Gawain was looking forward to both lost to Fili Lopez, which also means that the upcoming third round showdown should be very interesting.
Nadal wasn't the only player in trouble, Federer was in trouble as well.
In the second round, Federer faced Argentine player L-Mayer - yes, it was Gao Wen's first-round opponent in the Imperial Capital Open last week. Unexpectedly, Mayer's visit to Shanghai made Federer break out in a cold sweat, and he almost created the biggest upset since the start of the Shanghai Masters.
Federer saved five match points and won the final set tie-break with a score of 9:7. The audience followed Federer through a roller coaster ride.
Mayer's outstanding performance was one reason, and another reason was that this match was Federer's first official match in three weeks after the US Open.
If even Federer and Nadal are like this, then other upsets don’t seem to be so “shocking”.
Like Federer, fourth seed Wawrinka was playing for the first time since the US Open, and he was also in trouble, but he was not so lucky. Facing Simon, a master of tough tug-of-war style, he was eliminated after three hard-fought sets.
In addition, wildcard player Monaco defeated Raonic. To be precise, when trailing 2:5 in the first set, Raonic retired due to injury. The season is coming to an end, and any injury is annoying. It is not known whether it will affect the rest of the season, and he still needs to be examined by a doctor to be sure.
French veteran Julien-Benneteau unexpectedly defeated Dimitrov, who was out of form throughout the game, as if sleepwalking. The deep impact of the "Grand Slam Syndrome" was also clearly visible.
If Anderson, who lost to Kukushkin, is included, then after the second round, there will be only seven of the sixteen seeded players left, a loss of more than half.
In addition, there is a duel that attracts the attention of all Chinese fans, Wang Chuhan challenges Jia Zeli, who is ranked 75th in the world.
Jia Zeli advanced to the main competition through the qualifying test. For Wang Chuhan, this is undoubtedly the best opportunity to advance to the third round.
However, the match was disappointing. "6:0", "6:4", Jiazeli easily defeated Wang Chuhan, lost the first set and advanced smoothly.
The dream bubble that the media had eagerly inflated just died down and disappeared without a trace in the blink of an eye. This also means that, apart from Gao Wen, there is still no Chinese player who can win two consecutive games in the local competitions in the Imperial Capital and the Magic City.
It was precisely because of this that the gaze focused on Gawain's shoulders became even more scorching and crazy.
A little while ago, Gao Wen was eliminated in the third round of the Imperial Capital Open, which caused complaints from some netizens. They believed that Gao Wen had too many off-court activities after winning the US Open and failed to prepare well for the Asian season. He failed to meet people's expectations and missed the opportunity to win the championship in his hometown.
The complaints have not become a big deal, but they do exist objectively.
Especially when Wang Chuhan unexpectedly defeated Fognini to advance to the second round, these comments reached a small peak. They believed that local players could also achieve such good results, so Gao Wen, as a Grand Slam champion, should naturally become a leader and perform even better.
But before the words had time to ferment, in less than 24 hours, they had shut up.
Maybe Gao Wen is not in the best condition at the moment, but the Imperial City has won two consecutive games, the Magic City has also won two consecutive games and is still moving forward. Such performance has already proved that Gao Wen is worthy of being the representative player of China at present. Even including female players, the banner of top players now needs to be carried by Gao Wen.
Then, those questioning and provocative voices disappeared.
However, they all know that this is only temporary. As long as Gao Wen is still competing in the professional arena, he is a moving target. Whether he wins or loses, his every move will trigger countless discussions. Things will obviously not stop so easily.
The point is still about Gawain: he doesn't care.
The off-court gossip has no meaning and no weight to him. His attention is all focused on the upcoming third round showdown.
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Felipe Lopez is not an easy opponent to deal with.
In the latest world ranking, Felipe Lopez ranked 16th, but because his world ranking was 21st when the registration for the Shanghai Masters closed, he was not included in the seeding.
Lopez started his professional career in the Challenger Tournament as early as 1997. Because of this, his playing style follows the tradition of the 1990s. Compared with the playing styles of clay court masters such as Nadal, Ferrer, Robredo, etc., he is closer to the grass court playing style of Sampras and Federer.
It is no surprise, then, that Wimbledon was his best performance in the four Grand Slams, and in 2005, Lopez became the first Spaniard to reach the Wimbledon quarterfinals since 1972, making history and formally establishing his place in men's professional tennis.
On grass and fast hard courts, Lopez is best able to fully utilize her strengths, powerful serve, excellent forehand and excellent net ability.
As an excellent doubles player, Felipe Lopez's ability at the net is definitely at the top of the pyramid in the tour, which makes his playing style different from most players who stick to the baseline, and he frequently goes to the net to break the deadlock; at the same time, he has excellent stalemate ball ability at the baseline, which also makes him always have a special position in the tour.
Simply put, this is a type of player that Gawain has not encountered so far, a completely new encounter.
(End of this chapter)