PETE ZIEBRON
Defending Champion Sam Querrey saved match points in consecutive matches, yesterday in the semifinal against Janko Tipsarevic and in the Final today against top seed Andy Murray, to win his 4th tournament in 2010 at the Farmers Classic ATP 250 in Los Angeles. Prior to the singles Final, Querrey's K-Swiss brethren Bob and Mike Bryan broke the all-time doubles victory milestone by winning their 62nd tournament.
Querrey, who came into the match with a 7-25 record against the ATP Top Ten, had never taken a set (0-9) from world # 4 Andy Murray in their four previous meetings. Murray dug deep to win the first set 7-5 and then Querrey saved a match point late in the second set and forced the set into a tiebreaker, where he prevailed 7-2. A weary Murray was broken early in the 3rd set and Querrey was able to will his way to victory yet again, holding steady in all of his remaining service games to win the match 5-7 7-6(2) 6-4. Murray's title drought now extends to November 2009 when he defeated Mikhail Youzhny at the Valencia ATP 500.
Bob and Mike Bryan defeated a doubles team making their debut as a tandem, Eric Butorac and Jean-Julien Rojer 6-7(6) 6-2 10-7 to win their 62nd title in the 100th tournament final that they have played as a team. The Bryan's came into the match tied at 61 doubles titles with the legendary Australian team of Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde. The Bryan's and Sam Querrey won their hometown tournament as the Bryan Brothers hail from Camarillo, CA and Querrey from nearby Thousand Oaks.
Across the Atlantic, two more ATP 250 tournaments were being contested, these on clay. Juan Carlos Ferrero, a finalist last year in Umag, Croatia and this year's #4 seed defeated unseeded Potito Starace 6-4 6-4 to win the Studena Croatia Open. The win was Ferrero's 3rd title of 2010 in 4 final appearances and 15th career title in 33 finals appearances.
Fellow Spaniard Nicolas Almagro won his 2nd title of the year by defeating #7 seed Richard Gasquet 7-5 6-1 at the Allianz Suisse Open in Gstaad, Switzerland. The final was relatively easy for the 2nd seeded Almagro compared to his matches earlier in the tournament when he was pushed to 3 sets in 3 of the previous 4 matches. Almagro improves to 7-2 in his career in tournament finals.
With the Ferrero and Almagro victories, Spanish players have now won 16 titles in 2010 and 13 of these wins are tournaments that have been played on a clay surface. By contrast, Querrey's win was the 9th by an American this year (Querrey 4, Andy Roddick 2, Mardy Fish 2, John Isner 1) and 6 of the victories have come on a hard court. The extended clay court season that started in South America in February came to an end today in 2010 (except for the BCR Open ATP 250 in Bucharest, Romania in late September) with conclusion of play in Umag and Gstaad. The baton is now passed to an exclusive hard court schedule leading to preparation for the US Open
The Legg Mason Tennis Classic ATP 500 tournament in Washington, DC, which got underway today, is the only tournament being played this week and precedes the Rogers Cup Masters 1000 in Toronto and the Western & Southern Financial Group Masters 1000 in Cincinnati.
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