Snapshot: 13-19th May in tennis

Here is a comprehensive look at this week’s tennis stories:

ATP Tour: Federer denied 22nd Masters title

Roger Federer, the no.2 seed at the Rome Masters, was defeated in the finals by his longtime nemesis Rafael Nadal 6-1 6-3. Roger, who had not lost a set the entire week, displayed the duller shades of his game in making 32 unforced errors against Nadal’s 8. He hit 15 winners and Nadal, the victor, hit 12.  Federer broke Nadal’s serve when he was serving for the match at 5-1 but he failed to field resistance to Nadal’s superior performance. Fans who expected another ‘Fedal’ masterpiece were utterly disappointed by the hugely lopsided match.

In the doubles finals, Americans Bob and Mike Bryan defeated the Indian duo of Mahesh Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna 6-2 6-3.  This is the reunited Indian duo’s first final of the year from three events played so far. Earlier, Leander Paes and Jurgen Melzer lost to Scott Lipsky (USA) Santiago Gonzalez (MEX) in the second round in two straight tiebreakers.

WTA Tour: Serena achieves Madrid-Rome double

World no.1 Serena Williams won the title at Internazionali BNL d’italia, defeating Victoria Azarenka in the finals. The scoreline read 6-1 6-3, identical to that of the men’s finals. Another similarity is that both the champions came here as Madrid title holders.

In the women’s doubles event, Hsieh Su-Wei (TPE) and Peng Shuai (CHN) won the finals against the world no.1 pair of Sara Errani (ITA) and Roberta Vinci (ITA) 4–6  6–3 10–8. India’s Sania Mirza and her American partner Bethanie Mattek-Sands lost in the quarterfinals to the Italian top seeds.

ATP Challenger Tour: Monfis wins Challenger event

Indians did not fare well in this week’s challenger events. At the Samarkand $50,000 Challenger, India’s Vishnu Vardhan lost in the first round of singles to Spain’s Marc Giner 6-3 6-2. In the doubles event, partnering Taiwan’s Chen Ti, he reached the quarterfinals where they lost to the second seeds Radu Albot (MDA) and Jordan Kerr (AUS) 6-4 1-6 4-10.

Prakash Amritraj and Yuki Bhambri missed the event due to injury.

In the Bordeaux challenger event in France, Gael Monfils, who is on a comeback trail, defeated fellow Frenchman Michael Llodra 7-5 7-6(5) to win the title