Milos Raonic – Canada Fan Blog an (unofficial) blog about tennis and Canadian player Milos Raonic

Updated again…: Australian Open Canadian Qualifiers Update and Draw Preview – 12 January 2012

As I sit here watching the rain delay in Pospisil's qualifying match with Carsten Ball of Australia (at 5-5 in the first set) I'll update some of the day's news.

Watch Online

AustralianOpen.com is covering the qualifying rounds in a high quality live video stream on its website.  Matches from the main draw will also be available, but it will be blacked out regionally depending on the broadcast rights in your country...  here are the links:

AO TV Qualifying (Pospisil's match on now)

Main AO TV- Main Draw

Milos Raonic's Australian Open 2012 Draw - Rounds 1 & 2

Milos has drawn Italian Filippo Volandri in his first round match (schedule TBD of course).  Should he win that match, he faces the winner of ROSOL, Lukas Rosol (CZE) / Philipp Petzschner (GER) in the 2nd round.  Of course, Milos got play Petzschner twice last year, losing the first one in the quarter-finals in Halle in June, and winning their rematch in 2nd round in Stockholm about 4 months later.

Milos' Draw - Round 3

In the 3rd round, the draw is much more interesting in my opinion.  The first possible opponent is Cedrik-Marcel Stebe (GER), who Milos didn't meet on the tour.

The next possible opponent for the 3rd round is the hometown wildcard, Lleyton Hewitt.  The awesome thing about this possibility is that the atmosphere of the match would be an amazing experience in, most likely, Rod Laver Arena.  Such a match would probably be the biggest crowd Milos has played in front of to date (about 5700 attended his exhibition match with Sampras last November while Rod Laver Arena can hold up to 15,000).

Another possibility for the 3rd round, if Milos makes it, is Andy Roddick, who won the epic final against Raonic in Memphis with that amazing shot directly following Milos' title win in San Jose at the SAP Open.  Click here to see the report from this blog from that match, including that shot embedded in a youtube video.  If you remember, Milos was glad to be part of the match whose video of the final shot would get the "Most Hits on Youtube"  A rematch would be excellent.

The 4th and final possible opponent for Milos' 3rd round would be Robin Hasse (NED).  Excluding his Davis Cup win versus Mexico in March 2011 with Vasek Pospisil as his partner (though he lost last week with Pospisil in the first round of doubles in Chennai), the only partner Milos was able to win with last year was Robin Hasse in Halle (he suffered first round defeats with Feliciano Lopez, Nico Almagro (twice), and Pablo Andujar).  He went all the way to the finals with Robin Hasse in Halle, and lost a very close match to the Indo-Pakistani duo of Rohan Bopanna / Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi, 6-7(8), 6-3, 9-11.

Updated: Milos' Draw - 4th Round

(revised 10pm thanks to Mark)

As you'll read below, Djokovic considers Raonic to be one of the most dangerous players in the draw outside of the top 4.  He was probably not happy then to learn that Milos is in his eighth of the draw.  The most likely opponent for Milos in the 4th round will be Novak, with 29th-seeded Radek Stepanek a distant second most likely.  Milos did not meet Novak in ATP play last year, but in 2010 he did.  In first-round doubles play with Vasek Pospisil at the Rogers Cup in Toronto in 2010 the duo famously (at least for Canadian fans) took out the team of Djokovic/Nadal.

Here are some HD highlights of that match:

The full main men's draw is available for download here from AustralianOpen.com.

Honourable Mentions

During the draw today on AustralianOpen.com, Milos was a hot topic of converation.  When Novak Djokovic was asked which players, outside the top four, were the most dangerous, he said Tsonga, Tomic (for the Aussie crowd), and Raonic.  He went on to say very nice things about Milos, before John McEnroe got up and said a few nice things after mispronouncing his name on purpose in his usual cheeky style - as if he hadn't heard of him or been paying attention to the last year in ATP tennis...  He mentioned that he didn't think Raonic could last or play as well during a 5-setter in a Grand Slam, but I have to disagree after seeing him play over 3 hours with Tipsarevic, not giving up a service game for the entire tournament and only allowing a couple of break-points in the final near the end of the match.

Update from an official tournament article posted later at AustralianOpen.com:

“From the seeds, (Jo-Wilfried) Tsonga, and then I’ll go with (Milos) Raonic and (Bernard) Tomic – two youngsters who are really, I think, on a roll these days,” Djokovic said.

Of these, home hope Tomic has arguably the toughest opening task, taking on 2009 semifinalist, 22^nd-seeded Spaniard Fernando Verdasco.

In-form sixth seed Tsonga has a tricky start against Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin and would likely pose a major hurdle for Murray in the quarters.

Giant Canadian Raonic is drawn to meet Roddick or Australian veteran Lleyton Hewitt in the third round before a potential fourth-round tussle with Djokovic. Wildcard Hewitt starts against German lefty Cedrik-Marcel Stebe.

“He (Raonic) is one of the guys who has the chance to be a grand slam winner. He’s finally back to where he was six months ago,” McEnroe said of the 23^rd seed’s chance.

--source: link http://www.australianopen.com/en_AU/news/articles/2012-01-13/201201131326425750531.html

Canadian Qualifiers Update

Play is still suspended in the Pospisil match, at an even 5-5 in the first set.  Erik Chvojka did eventually lose that 3rd set (3-6, 6-3, 6-2), so Canadian Qualifiers are 3 for 4 in the first round.  Polansky and Duclos are scheduled to contest their 2nd qualifying round matches today as well.

Update 10pm: Pospisil was apparently frustrated after a double-fault in the 1st set tiebreak, this threw him off enough to lose the tiebreak 7-9 and give up an early break in the 2nd set.  He did break back but has been broken again and is serving now while down 5-3 in the 2nd set facing the end of the match on Ball's serve if he's able to hold.

Update 10:15pm EST: Vasek Pospisil has been eliminated in the 2nd round of qualifying at the Australian Open, as Carsten Ball put away the final game at love.  Polansky and Duclos are yet to come, but we'll have to check those scores in the morning...

Update 13 Jan: Peter Polansky won his 2nd round qualie match versus Augustin Gensse (FRA) in straight sets 6-3, 6-2, while Andr Ghem (BRA) defeated Pierre-Ludovic Duclos in 3 setter 6-7(3), 6-3, 6-4.  Danai Udomchoke (THA) will be Peter's final round opponent in today's qualifying action - up second on Court 15 in the session that starts at 12:30PM local which means he'll probably be playing around 10PM Eastern (EST) today.

Update 14 Jan: Peter Polansky was eliminated from the qualifying as well in straight sets - leaving Milos as the sole Canadian on the Men's singles side.  Looking forward to watching our automatic entries on the women's side as well as Milos and Nestor...  Go, Canada, Go!  (link)

--wacb