Shanghai

ATP Shanghai; WTA Linz, Tianjin

Both Koreas in it! Sorry!

The women take the back seat this week with just two WTA Internationals. The men have a Masters 1000 in Shanghai. The penultimate one of the year.

Rolex Shanghai Masters

Avoiding skyscrapers!

Old Shanghai is prettier than the new! I mean all new stuff is just skyscrapers. Seen one - seen them all.

Shanghai Qizhong Forest Sports City Arena. Yes, this is our current background too!

It's a 56 players draw with the top 8 seeds having 1st round byes. Top 30 absentees: Nadal, Nishikori, Anderson, The Man, Dimitrov, Kyrgios, Raonic. Boo! The lazy seeds: Djokovic, Federer, Medvedev, Thiem, Zverev, The Tsi, The Khach, RBA. The busy seeds: Monfils, Fognini, Berrettini, Coric, Goffin, Schwartzman, Basilashvili, Isner. The draw looks like this (chalk r16):

1st quarter:

Djokovic v Isner

Monfils v The Tsi

Also in here: The Tiaf v The Shap (yep, 1st round), Pouille, FAA.

2nd quarter

Medvedev v Schwartzman

Fognini v The Khach

Other notables: Simon, Sir Scot Guy, Verdasco v Fritz.

3rd quarter

RBA v Berrettini

Basilashvili v Thiem

Opelka, Struff, Albot, Paire are in here too.

4th quarter

Zverev v Coric

Goffin v Federer

Others in here: Edmund, Rublev, Gasquet, ARV v Cilic.

DRAW

DOUBLES DRAW

OOP

Daniil Medvedev and a pretty cool trophy (courtesy ATP)

The women split camp: some start the mini European Indoor Swing while some still stay in China.

Upper Austria Ladies Linz

Linzer torte (oops, hedake objects to food!) Black eagle - national bird of Austria.

WTA International (280 points) that starts two weeks of indoor action in Europe. We have the last gasps in the road to Shenzhen battle. Bertens and Bencic both got WCs this week, trying hard to get back to China! 8 seeds with no byes in here: Bertens, Bencic, Sevastova, Vekic, Goerges, Sakkari, Strycova, Alexandrova. Also in the draw Petkovic, Blinkova, AVU, Mladenovic v Siniakova, Ostapenko. Gauff shows up in qualies (no WC needed).

DRAW

DOUBLES DRAW

OOP

Cori Gauff and her 1st trophy ever! She's lucky! Not a vase!

Tianjin Open

Binhai Library. Yes... again. It's too gorgeous not to use it! Besides... you really want skyscrapers?

WTA International again. So 8 seeds, no byes. Here they are: The Energizer Bunny (Kenin), Wang(Q.), Yastremska, Garcia, Zhang, Putintseva, Zheng, Linette. Kenin just won in doubles in Beijing (with BMS) and has played every week since USO (going fairly deep every time). Hooray! You go girl! So who else is here? Jabeur, Stosur, Venus, Davis, Tomljanovic, Watson and The Whole Chinese Horde!

DRAW

DOUBLES DRAW

OOP

Rebecca Peterson (winner, left) and Heather Watson (runner-up) and two very nice trophies.