The Championships, Wimbledon

** Okay... the new layout is finally nearing completion... Hope you like it. I still have more to add in the margin, but was able to get the positioning of right column corrected. Merchandise link is still on deck, I figure Sunday or Monday for sure. I'll be working on it as well as getting all the usual tennis updates in place. My three week, 15 days of 4.5 hours of class with a 3+ hour commute have now ended, so I can get all the links from Wimbledon up over this weekend.**

Saturday 3 July
Mixed Doubles Concludes

The amazing run of newly paired and unseeded Barbara Schett and Rainer Schuettler ended on Saturday as they lost 64 76(4) to sixth seeded Cara and Wayne Black. This quarterfinal showing, hopefully, may spark some future Mixed Doubles entries... US Open maybe?? Meanwhile, the Zimbabwe siblings play Bob (Beads) Bryan and Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. Cara Black, ranked 6th with partner Renae Stubbs, scored an upset in the Ladies Doubles Semifinal match earlier in the day on Saturday as they defeated top-ranked Suarez and Ruano Pascual 76(7) 46 64. They play 5th seed Liezel Huber and Ai Sugiyama for the finals, Huber and Sugiyama upset 3rd ranked Raymond and Navratilova 76(4) 75.

Friday/Saturday

More rain as we enter the final weekend, and more interesting scheduling to squeeze everything in after Friday's rain. As the Men's Singles Semis are to be completed on Saturday, Schuettler and Schett will take on 6th seeded Cara and Wayne Black in the Mixed Doubles quarterfinals. They are the third match of the day on Court 18 (play begins at noon), and the match immediately before them is a continuation at 3-3 in the 3rd set. A win there by Rainer and Barbara means they will play in the semis later in the afternoon against Lindsay Davenport and Bob (Beads) Bryan. So far that part of the semi draw is a TBA start. Bryan and Davenport (the 7th seed) played their quarters on Thursday, defeating Mahesh Bhupathi and Elena Likhovtseva 62 64. The Women's Final is scheduled to start not before 2pm, I hope for a three setter with Sharapova taking the win.

Thursday 1 July
Possible Friday Play

This is confusing, but here's my best summary... For Friday, the Navratilova/Paes v Black/Black match is set to resume as the 4th and final match of the day (play begins at noon) on Court 13. Both Cara Black and Navratilova have to play Ladies' Doubles semifinal matches earlier in the day (not against each other). The Mixed Doubles match was suspended at 67(7) 76(5) 10-10 in the 3rd set. The Schuettler/Schett vs the CB/WB-MN/LP winner for the quarterfinals is currently listed as a Friday TBA start. I will check early AM to see if anything has been confirmed.

Site Insight: A new monthly hits record was set for June!

Tuesday 29 June
Schuettler & Schett Still Smokin'

In third round Mixed Doubles play, the unseeded pair of Rainer Schuettler and Barbara Schett defeated Ram and Rodionova 76(4) 36 64 and now advance to the quarterfinals. Here are the stats from the match. They should get Wednesday off and await the 3rd round winner of 6th-seed-sibling-pair Cara and Wayne Black vs. ninth-seeded Martina Navratilova and Leander Paes.

Here is the page where the Wimbledon top people somewhat explain the court scheduling and basic schedule for the last days of the tournament (excuse me... 'Championships'). Another version here as well.
Here is the page that lists all the international media information. This page shows the coverage breakdown on USA's ESPN and NBC.
Take a peek at the prize money breakdown for everyone here.

Schuettler Shots... Photos


These pics from Wimbledon Web Camera feed


Monday 28 June
Mixed Doubles Anyone?

This is sounding familiar... Rainer match on Court 3, Rainer match on Court 3. Schuettler is back to play the second round Mixed Doubles match with Barbara Schett today against third-seed Mike Bryan and Lisa Raymond. Play begins at noon and they are the fourth out of five matches on that court. They follow the Malisse/Ancic match. It's 6am and I can't get to my usual background on the opponents, but is there anything that either of these two haven't won as doubles players? Yeah, even in mixed play together (2002 US Open, 2003 French Open) they're damn good, a Slam here and a Slam there.

UPDATE: Wow, Schuettler and Schett pulled off quite an upset and sent Mike (no beads) Bryan and Lisa Raymond home with a 36 64 64 win in the second round. Here are the match stats from Monday. Next up as a third round opponent are Andy Ram and Anastassia Rodionova (who advanced after defeating 13th seed Hood and Vento-Kabchi 64 64). I can honestly say I've never followed Mixed Doubles much before this, maybe watch some GS finals when they are shown on TV, but not round by round. This is quite a nice run for the German-Austrian pair.
UPDATE 2: Another 'Wow' here - Schuettler and Schett's 3rd round match against Ram and Rodionova is scheduled for Tuesday... on Centre Court. What a fantastic experience that will be, too bad almost no one in TV land will see it. They are the 4th match of the day (after Serena; Sharapova; Bryan Brothers) and play begins at 1pm. Maybe check out the web cams during the afternoon for any luck.


Sunday 27 June
People's Sunday

I don't know about the other folks, but I love the entire idea of People's Sunday. If I were near England last night, I would have been sleeping out in the field without a doubt. Unfortunately, in singles play, Rainer fell to Vince Spadea - who has blown through his first three matches now all in three sets apiece. Spadea won 64 62 63, the match stats can be found here.

Later in the afternoon Rainer was back out on Court 3 with Austrian Barbara Schett for mixed doubles against Irakli Labadze and Tatiana Perebiynis. They bounced back to win 26 62 62, so Rainer will play on in this second week, for a second round match against third ranked Lisa Raymond and Mike Bryan. The Americans were just announced as part of their respective upcoming Olympic squads.

Saturday 26 June
Persistent Rain, We're Gettin' Sunday!

After what was deemed 'persistent rain,' Saturday's matches were rained out - so to some extent there was a day of rest. The real good news is that for only the third time in tournament history, we are going to get a "People's Sunday"! Everyone waits in a field, camps out overnight for tickets - which can only be purchased with cash, and gets to have the run of most of the grounds on the sacred middle Sunday. I believe they hoped to get in two matches on various courts with 4pm starts on Saturday (with Rainer's being a second match after Suarez still), but the weather never allowed it.
SUNDAY: Rainer Schuettler v Vince Spadea, Court 3 at 11am. Than after two Ladies' Doubles matches, Rainer is back on Court 3 with Schett for their first mixed doubles match. Personally I am glad it's off of Court 2, but with the backlog of matches, almost certain that the US TV audience won't see much of Rainer's match. Also going first on other courts are Federer, Capriati and Shaughnessy v Sprem. The latter will get press because it's an American vs 'the girl who beat Venus.' However, Rainer has a shot since Spadea is an American... we shall see. They barely mention Rainer in even the updates, they posted up to the 7th seed, then in the sidebar started again with the 10th - like the 8th doesn't even exist!


Friday 25 June
Rainer Through in Singles

Today Rainer Schuettler battled back against homecrowd favorite Greg Rusedski to advance to the third round with a 67(5) 76(12-10) 67(5) 62 62 win. Rusedski had 21 aces, but also 16 double faults, while Rainer had three aces and three double faults during the 3 hour and 38 minute match. After the singles win, it was on to doubles play for Rainer with countryman Karsten Braasch. The Germans were defeated by 8th-ranked Suk and Damm in straight sets, 60 64. It's very likely that the delays and now the constant tennis played a role in the match. Schuettler played just over two sets on Tuesday, resumed the match on Thursday and went another three sets, five sets vs Rusedski early this afternoon and the two sets in doubles - only to be followed by his next match tomorrow against Vince Spadea.

The American, who has cruised through his first two matches (Mantilla 61 62 62, Reid 62 64 62) is having his best Wimbledon showing (previously the 2nd round in even years 1998, 2000 and 2002) this year in his 9th appearance by reaching the third round. Spadea did have a tight doubles match that went 67(5) 76(4) 64 with partner Todd Parrott against Brits Hilton and Marray. Against one another, Schuettler holds a 2-1 advantage, with Spadea winning their most recent meeting at the 2004 Rome TMS R64 Clay 26 62 57. Schuettler won the first two at 2000 World Team Cup RR Dusseldorf Clay RR Schuettler 75 36 61 and 2000 Hamburg Clay R64 64 36 63.

This year, Spadea won Scottsdale, was a semifinalist at Miami TMS, a quarterfinalist in Auckland, Adelaide, and Rome TMS, and an Adelaide semifinalist with Merklein.

The match is slated for Court 2, they follow the Suarez match and play begins on that court at 11:15am on Saturday.

Schuettler Shots... Photos






Thursday 24 June
Schuettler Advances

Rainer Schuettler moved into the second round with a 46 63 76(5) 16 62 win over Robin Soderling. The match, which began on Tuesday, was finally completed today. Friday holds another busy day for Rainer - singles and doubles. He faces Greg Rusedski on Court 1 , second match of the day after Serena's match (play begins at 11am). They met once before, at Nottingham in 2001 where Rusedski eeked out a 76 46 76 first round win.
This year Rusedski was a quarterfinalist at Surbiton and Nottingham.

Later in the day, back on Court 13 - Schuettler and Braasch take on Czech pair Suk and Damm as the last match of the day on that court.

One interesting note, Schuettler is also now entered in the mixed doubles as well. He's paired with Barbara Schett, I'll have to check, but this could be a first mixed entry for Schuettler.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Rain... Rain... Please Hold for rain...

Once again rain has interrupted play at Wimbledon. Well, today it didn't interrupt anything, they never got a chance to get any tennis going. So, "Take 3" for Schuettler and Soderling to complete their match. They are still on Court 13, but outer courts are starting at 11am in order to try to get in more time and catch up to the 75+ matches that are now behind.

ESPN, in the coverage I've watched so far, has improved slightly. I have seen Serena's first round match three times already, but their coverage from the booth/anchor desk seems to be much better than the French. I like how they are able to get some players in during the rain delays and their commentators have added some real knowledge and aren't just spewing fluff. It's still early though, it can get worse, but let's hope it continues to improve some more. I wish they'd show more post-match interview clips - the ones of Safin were great, and they did play a bit from Coria post-French that was on the verge of heartbreaking. He said how with what has happened to him with the doping allegations he always dreamed of winning that tournament, then to get there and have his body and mind let him down... all while holding back the tears.

(TUE)UPDATE: Rain has stopped play for the day, the Schuettler match was just starting the third set. Soderling took the first 64 but Rainer won the second at 63 with Soderling up 1-0 in the 3rd. The match is scheduled to resume on Wednesday as the first match on Court 13 (play begins at noon).
Two photos from Tuesday's partial match as well as a couple new links were added - including notes on Schuettler being elected president of the ATP Player Council. (**In the next couple days the site will take on a new look, so if it looks different you're still at the right place. New things include layout, redone header with photos and graphics, the shrinking font corrected and also a link to buy merchandise.**)

Rainer Schuettler v Robin Soderling are scheduled for Tuesday as the middle match of the day on Court 13. This court is at the opposite end of the grounds from Court 1 but it has a decent seating area. Play begins at noon and they follow the Lopez/Bloomfield and Petrova/Pennetta matches. Depending on the times, head over to Court 18 to catch Haas and Burgsmueller in their first round matches, Popp is on Court 10.

Weather: Tuesday's matches will be competing with the forecast, it's supposed to rain throughout the afternoon I heard.

There's Something About Rainer... Articles

• Sport.ard report on German players


• Sport.ard article on the Olympic Tennis nominations


• ATP News on Player Council


• Yahoo Deutschland report


• Another Yahoo link

Schuettler Shots... Photos



Begins June 21
Crazy Eights

Rainer Schuettler arrives for his seventh Wimbledon as the eighth seed, and hopes to improve upon last year's fourth round appearance. Andre Agassi has withdrawn, and earlier today Nalbandian has also pulled out. Schuettler faces Sweden's Robin Soderling in the first round, their first Grand Slam meeting since the Australian Open in January where Soderling scored the first round upset 64 64 57 36 46. Schuettler evened them at 1-1 recently in Munich where he managed a 64 76(5) victory. This season Soderling was a finalist in Marseille and this will be his second Wimbledon (reached the third round last year).

Aside from singles, Schuettler is also playing doubles this year with countryman Karsten Braasch. They face Czech pair, and 8th seed, Martin Damm and Cyril Suk. The duo won at Doha, were finalists in Marseille, semifinalists at Monte Carlo TMS and Rotterdam. Suk won Prague with Kucera (they played vs Damm and Karol) and Damm was a semifinalist in Milan with Stepanek. Schuettler and Braasch paired up in 2002 for their personal best Wimbledon showing, advancing to the second round where they lost to Americans Donald Johnson and Jared Palmer 67(1) 67(4) 36.

Be sure to check out the event's website, it's full of information, schedules, interviews and highlights. They also have a feature that for a small fee you can get extra coverage (normally access to more interview or video/audio). In the US, both ESPN and ESPN2 will be covering the matches - let's all hope they implemented some improvements since Roland Garros. Here's their first week schedule and the second week listings. If you check them after each day's order of play is released they normally list what players they'll highlight.

There's Something About Rainer... Articles

• Site's preview of the seeds, has this Rainer mention: Roddick's scheduled quarter-final opponent is Rainer Schuettler of Germany who was the second most improved player in the world last year, winning 71 matches. At the semi-final stage Roddick is due to face the Argentine David Nalbandian, finalist in 2002. Nalbandian played his first match on Centre Court in that final against Hewitt and was given special permission to warm up on the court beforehand.


• Scotsman listing of the men's and women's 32 seeds


• Sports Illustrated's Jon Wertheim's men's seeds report, has these two Rainer bits: 8. Rainer Schuettler: Not the player he was a year ago. His lack of a bread-and-butter weapon will hurt him, particularly on grass. Then... Schuettler vs. Soderling: Possible first-round upset special.


• Wertheim's SI weekly tennis piece -t this one is all foreign players, all the time. No Rainer mention but great suggestions for renaming ESPN in light of their ridiculous coverage of just American players


• RTE Sports (Ireland) also has seedings, but I think is the first Irish link so I had to include it


• TennisMagazin.de report on Germans at Wimbledon


• Sportal Australian site with seed info

Various preview articles:

• Sporting Life, Financial Times, CBC Sports (Canada), Glasgow Daily Record, Xinhua (China), and Teesside UK


• The Australian editorial on what's wrong with tennis


• Fox Sports take, mainly in Roddick but a decent read


• Sport.ard report for Wimbledon, mentions that Camp Schuettler can't believe the irony of drawing Soderling and that it's not a simple match


• Sport1.de interview with Kiefer


• Sport1 German tennis preview of Wimbledon


• Sportbild.de piece on revenge for Rainer v Soderling, same as Sport.ard

Site Adjustment - Continued

Voluntarily Experiencing Technical Difficulties

Friday 18 June

OK, in the grand scheme of the world, this was not even a blip... but as you may have noticed, the site has been down for the past 24 hours. Well, the blue background would load, but that was it... and after I got my jaw off the floor I tried to get help from blogger, but they have yet to reply. The text may continue to shrink as you scroll down the page, I am working on that. I am also trying to fix any of the little tweaks I had done this week that didn't make it into the code I cut and pasted from around the internet of my previous pages. I'll never complain about cache anymore, it saved me big time. Needless to say, my new photo grid effort is on hold until I get the site back to normal and the Wimbledon post up and current. Back to normal, not sure when but Wimbledon will be up by Friday night or Saturday afternoon (US time).

NEW: Yes, raging graphic chaos, I am playing with the photo grid but not having the results I was hoping for... still trying to figure out how to keep the images contained so that when the screen size is enlarged, all the pics don't spread out. The logo I got from a UK guy in exchange for a GMail invitation, I'm thrilled with the trade, I wouldn't even know how to begin creating that.
The pictures in the new rough draft weren't taken by me, and I have no interest in getting into copyright trouble, so they may very well change or I'll try to track down the sources so we can see some different shots. The one with Schuettler posing is from the terribly trashy 'paper' Bild.de, but that picture cracks me up every time I see it. Hey, he obviously posed for it, so I'll include it for now.

WIMBLEDON: I've had some emails from Rainer and general tennis fans who have tickets to Wimbledon (lucky bastards) and were inquiring about setting up a meeting place on the grounds... email me if anyone has an easy to find place where any Rainer/tennis fans can meet - maybe form a Rainer cheering crowd. Of course the draw and times are unknown, but something like 11am and 3pm at the spot is a possibility for those who want to talk tennis.

I know, the Ordina results aren't up... before Wimbledon they will be.

Back to homework (at my age?) and sleep soon. I swear I haven't gone to bed before 10pm since the third grade.

OLD: As you can tell, I am adjusting the headline banner, I'm adding more pictures to it in order to fit the new logo and create more of a mosaic effect. Since I know very little about html and sizing the pictures to scale, this will take me hours. I may go crazy and see if it works in a frame, but I have to figure out how to create a frame first. But, hopefully it will look great and level when I am done.

I also tried to create a little more space between the main posts and the right side column of information. The info for this week's tournament is also being gathered, so (cross your fingers) that will all make it up Sunday night.

I am in NYC every day for the next 15 weekdays, so I will update as much as humanly possible - especially during Wimbledon. Good thing # 1 is I am home before 5pm, good thing # 2 is that it's only three weeks. Bad thing # 1 is I have to be on the road by 6am and bad thing # 2 is that after quite a few years out of school, I'll actually have homework - but... revert back to good thing # 2.

Once the new graphics/tourney info are up, I'll delete this posting... we mustn't interrupt the grass court season! I am going to try to create a little box at the top of the right hand column to post further updates or similar things that don't justify an actual post.

Ordina Open / 's-Hertogenbosch

Sunday and Monday

Rainer, coming off a semifinal appearance in Halle, next plays in the Ordina Open (may take awhile to load) at 's-Hertogenbosch in The Netherlands.

Schuettler, who is seeded second, will face Raemon Sluiter in the first round, a tongue twister for sure. Rainer is not slated to play any doubles during this event. This will be their first meeting, in 2004 Sluiter - who no doubt will have some home crowd appeal - was a quarterfinalist in Rotterdam and Auckland and reached the doubles semifinals at St. Poelten (w/ Ancic).

Schuettler v Sluiter is scheduled for Tuesday, but I can't find the order of play on the event site and I can't get the ATP one to load... but it's at 1pm German time.
A live ticker link can be found in the right hand column of TennisMagazin.de and on the event's main site. On the event site is also a link for live video from Center Court.

Top seed is Guillermo Coria, with Sjeng Schalken and Tommy Robredo rounding out the top four.