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

Milos Seeded No.4 in Memphis

It's a quick turnaround for Milos Raonic after winning the SAP Open for the second year in a row on Sunday. He's in Memphis this week at the Regions Morgan Keegan Championships where he was a finalist a year ago.

The draw has been released and Raonic has been seeded No.4 in the tournament. Big serving Americans John Isner and Andy Roddick are the top two seeds respectively and Radek Stepanek is in the No.3 spot. Raonic is in Andy Roddick's half of the draw which is who Milos lost to in the finals last year in a stunning three set match.

But before we get ahead of ourselves, Milos has a first round match to take care of. Raonic has drawn up against Ernests Gulbis (LAT). The two have met just once previously with the Canadian winning in straight sets on the clay in Monte Carlo. The hard court conditions clearly favour Milos this week and he is carrying a lot of momentum in to this tournament after winning his third ATP Tour title in San Jose.

Raonic's first round match is scheduled for Wednesday evening, after the Roddick vs Malisse match. There is no word yet if this match will be shown on Sportsnet, but their TV Schedule indicates their coverage begins on Sportsnet ONE at 7PM EST on Thursday, February 23rd.

-multi

(Here's a little treat from the SAP Sponsors: A look back on the week Milos had on his way to winning the SAP Open for the second year in a row.)

Sportsnet One to air Raonic vs Harrison on tape delay

According to this tweet from @Tennis_Canada, the semi-final match between Milos Raonic and Ryan Harrison at the SAP Open will be aired on tape delay at 6:30PM EST on Sportsnet One.

Here you go, #TeamRaonic. RT @Sportsnet: Catch Milos Raonic in the #SAPOpen semifinals tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET on Sportsnet One

—Tennis Canada (@Tennis_Canada) February 18, 2012

Raonic in San Jose to Defend Title

Milos Raonic has made his way to San Jose to defend the title he won last year at the SAP Open. All indications are that he will be ready to play Tobias Kamke (GER) on Wednesday evening (Feb. 15) after Andy Roddick's 2nd round match. Raonic defeated Kamke in straight sets on the grass in Halle, Germany last year.

It has been difficult to find any information about Raonic's knee injury since Canada lost the Davis Cup tie to France on Sunday. Assuming he takes the court tomorrow, all eyes will be on the knee that has been giving him trouble recently. Perhaps we will learn more as it gets closer to match time.

SAP Open draw on Friday

The draw to determine the first round matches at this year's SAP Open in San Jose will take place at 12 noon on Friday, February 10. You can follow the results live via their twitter account. This means that by the time the first Davis Cup rubber begins, we should know what the draw looks like for Raonic's return to San Jose next week.

Defending champion Milos Raonic is currently the third highest ranked player on the list for the tournament -- the top eight will be seeded. Raonic was unseeded last year and had to face fourth seed Xavier Malisse (BEL) in the first round. He would later defeat the top two seeds on his way to capturing his first ATP title. It will be another first for Milos when he returns to San Jose after playing Davis Cup this weekend: He gets to experience what it's like to defend a title.

UPDATE: Milos Raonic has a first round bye at the SAP Open and will face either Tobias Kamke (GER) or Izak Van Der Merwe (RSA) in the second round. Raonic is seeded #3 and is in the same half of the draw as Gael Monfils (FRA).

You can view the draw here.

-multi

Canada’s Davis Cup Team Announced

The team for Canada's World Group first round tie against France has been set. There were no surprises. Veteran Daniel Nestor and Milos Raonic will lead the Davis Cup team and are joined by Vasek Pospisil and Frank Dancevic. The fifth player will be Peter Polansky.

Team Canada will face some stiff competition in Vancouver. The French team features two top players in Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Gael Monfils. Doubles specialists Julien Benneteau and Michael Llodra round out the team. The only player that Raonic has a winning record against is Llodra (3-0). He has lost once to both Monfils and Benneteau, but has yet to meet Tsonga on the tour.

The tie gets underway on February 10 at the Thunderbird Sports Centre in Vancouver. The home crowd advantage will be crucial during the matches, especially for Vancouver's own Vasek Pospisil who stepped up in the playoff with Israel last year. Of course, fans will be clamoring to see Milos Raonic serve up some bombs on a Canadian court. Normally this opportunity comes but once a year.

We will post details on television coverage when they become available.

Go Canada, go!

-multi

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

Updated: Milos Raonic pulls out of AAMI Classic as Canadian qualifiers perform in Melbourne

Milos Raonic pulled out of the AAMI classic after his first-round loss to Mardy Fish, citing an upset stomach.  Hopefully it's nothing serious...  Here is the CBC's report on the match:

http://www.cbc.ca/sports/tennis/story/2012/01/11/sp-tennis-melbourne-raonic.html

Update: Canadian qualifiers on the men's side are doing well leading up to the 2012 Australian Open.  In the first round, Vasek Pospisil, Pierre-Ludovic Duclos, won three-setters at 3-6, 7-6(5), 6-2 and 6-3, 1-6, 6-4 respectively.  Peter Polansky won his first round match 6-3, 6-2.  Erik Chvojka was in the middle of the third set in his match when play was cancelled yesterday, and he currently trails at 6-3, 3-6, 1-5 with his match set to finish up in the morning (late tonight, 11 Jan, if you're following from North America).

As for the women, we have nobody in the qualifying rounds, but it looks like Stephanie Dubois, Rebecca Marino, and Aleksandra Wozniak are direct entries on the players list.

Daniel Nestor has entered the doubles competition as a direct entry as well.  Last year, he made it to the semi-finals here and won the next Grand Slam of the year at Roland Garros.

--wacb

Raonic to be seeded No.23 at the Australian Open

Fresh off the title win at the Aircel Chennai Open, we have just learned that Milos Raonic will be the No.23 seed at the 2012 Australian Open. Here is a complete list of the men's seeds. Raonic moved up six places from 31 to 25 when the ATP Rankings were updated this week. He also joked that he is currently tied with Murray and Tsonga for first place in the ATP points race. I wonder how long he will able to keep pace with them and the other top players looking to finish their season in London later this year?

-multi

Update: The nice thing about this is he certainly won't have to face anyone ranked/seeded higher than Tipsarevic until the Round of 16 at the earliest.  Last year of course he faced M. Youzhny in the round of 32, who was ranked #10 at the time, and eventually lost to 7th-ranked David Ferrer.  Based on his lack of seeding at the time (he had to win a three-setter in the final round of qualifying last year) he could very well have faced such highly ranked players in the earlier rounds.

On that note: As I was confirming the info for this update (and how to spell "Youzhny") at atpworldtour.com, just a bit below on the screen was a reminder of Milos' improvement over the past year that caught my eye.  I thought I should share it with you:

Aussie Open and Chennai - Milos Raonic - 2011

Milos failed to even qualify last year for the tournament that he won this year.  Of course, at the time Milos had not started his "meteoric" rise and had not started to post the results that would earn him "Newcomer of the Year", so those results weren't anything to write about...  He had to qualify for the ATP 250 tournament he played after the Australian Open last year in South Africa, but he obviously has not had to bother qualifying since - now he's the 23rd seed at the Australian Open.

--wacb

Raonic Off To Great Start in 2012

Canadian Milos Raonic has started the season off right by winning the Aircel Chennai Open today. Raonic came back from a set down to defeat Janko Tipsarevic (SRB) in an epic 3 hour and 13 minute match, 6-7(4), 7-6(4), 7-6(4).

This is the second title for Milos, adding to his win in San Jose last year. For anyone who watched the match or followed the live updates, you know you were treated to something special. Raonic had not been broken throughout the entire tournament and today's final was no exception. The Canadian bombed a mind-blowing number of aces (35) and hit a 228km/h serve in the opening game of the match. There is no doubt that Raonic needed all the free points he could get today as Tipsarevic was displaying some amazing work ethic in chasing down every ball. While neither player as able to convert any break points during the match, Raonic had more chances to do so than his opponent.

I got the impression that while the scoreline was incredibly close, Raonic had a slight edge over Tipsarevic. It was clear that Milos had more than his fair share of easy service games where Janko was almost completely shut out from getting into rallies. Conversely, Raonic was able to challenge Tipsarevic's serve more often and force him to come up with some big saves at key moments. It is often the case these close matches hinge on Raonic's ability to serve himself out of trouble. He was obviously able to do that today, which allowed Milos to take more chances on the return game. This is perhaps the most encouraging thing about the Canadian's performance today.

We know that if Raonic is serving well, he can hang with the best players in the world and give himself a chance to win. But in order to capitalize on those chances, it is important to be aggressive when returning serve to put pressure on the opponent. If you rely too much on holding, like so many big servers tend to do, then your sets are inevitably decided by tiebreaks. This is a risky strategy to say the least. While each set today required a tiebreak to settle, I could see that Raonic was making a real effort to keep that from happening. It didn't happen in this match, but this is an anomaly. Next time Milos faces a Top 10 player it may be a different story.

The Chennai final was a real treat to watch. Both Raonic and Tipsarevic were at their best. A tennis fan couldn't ask for more. Things look promising for Milos in 2012 and winning the title today will give him a lot of confidence heading into the Australian Open. The 250 points also gives Raonic a well-deserved boost in the rankings, and he may move into the Top 25 when it is updated tomorrow. It was such an impressive performance today that it is hard to be overly optimistic about the rest of the season.

I couldn't resist...

-multi