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2013 Fall Season, Regroup! Allez!

96K views 2K replies 44 participants last post by  Gillouthe best 
#1 · (Edited)
Happy New Year to everyone!

Here we go again. 2013 Season begins...This year a new adventure for Gilles as he's going solo. Hopefully, he's healthy and ready. I'm preparing for another roller coaster ride as long as the ride isn't too bumpy for the stomach ;).

First stop, Brisbane.

(1) Andy Murray (GBR) vs Bye
Tatsuma Ito (JPN) vs Qualifier
Radek Stepanek (CZE) vs (WC) Lleyton Hewitt (AUS)
(8) Martin Klizan (SVK) vs Denis Istomin (UZB)

(4) Alexandr Dolgopolov (UKR) vs Bye
Julien Benneteau (FRA) vs Jarkko Nieminen (FIN)
Tommy Robredo (ESP) vs Qualifier
(5) Kei Nishikori (JPN) vs Marinko Matosevic (AUS)

(6) Florian Mayer (GER) vs Santiago Giraldo (COL)
(WC) Benjamin Mitchell (AUS) vs Marcos Baghdatis (CYP)
Qualifier vs Alejandro Falla (COL)
(3) Gilles Simon (FRA) vs Bye

(7) Jurgen Melzer (AUT) vs Qualifier
(WC) Matthew Ebden (AUS) vs David Goffin (BEL)
Grigor Dimitrov (BUL) vs Brian Baker (USA)
(2) Milos Raonic (CAN) vs Bye

Allez Gilles!
 
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#1,686 ·
"Psoas" is the same in English and is a mass of muscle in his lumbar region which would explain the trouble with the serving. It's funny, usually I'd be angry about a loss like this much like I was the last couple of tournaments, but now, I'm really just starting to feel sad and sorry for him :sad:. He just can't seem to catch a break or have any luck health-wise for a decent stretch of time.

I really really hope he can turn it around next season and have a good stretch of productive play like he used to before the 2010 season when he started becoming plagued with injury issues going forward. Like I said before, I worry that he may just feel it's not worth the trouble anymore and with two kids now, decide it's time to hang up the tennis racket. That's probably just me fearing the worst though...probably.

Thank goodness for the one title though in Metz keeping his "at least one title a year for the past seven years record alive" or else this would've been a horrendous 2nd half of the season instead of just mostly horrendous.

Get better Gilles. We know you still have good tennis left in you. :cheerleader:
 
#1,688 ·
He plays Dolgo or Mahut on R2, I wouldn't look any further than that ATM ( he's in dire form, and I don't see him doing a run a la 2012). I hope he finishes the season giving his best, and giving a good impression to his public :yeah:
 
#1,693 ·
Hi! First time poster here though I've been lurking for quite some time ;)
I was at the doubles, Gilles was not playing badly at all, some really great volleys, the serve eventually got better. He actually was the one carrying the team (it was definitely not Chardy's day, he was terrible pretty much from the beginning of his single match to the super tie break when he suddenly made some great points).
The return of serve was way off though, not sure why.
It was such a laid back double, Monfils, Gilles and Mannarino were cracking up all the time. after some points Monfils would decide do debrief with Gilles instead of his actual double partner which made the whole thing quite messy. and Gilles accidentally hit Jeremy's butt with a bad return and then decided that it was a good idea to actually kiss it better. which Gael thought was hilarious but I think Jeremy is fearing ****.
hope it wasn't too boring a read :)
 
#1,696 ·
Welcome on board, Suz-ee. And thanks so much for the report, it was great.
That's why Gael and Gilles never win doubles, they don't ever take double seriously, do they :p. :lol: @ Gael debriefing with Gilles. I wish I got to see that, it's hilarious just to think of these 2 talking among themselves despite on opposing team. Poor Jeremy though.
Thanks for the welcomes!
The whole thing was so funny. Gael and Gilles are really children when they're playing doubles. And even after ;) Youzhny came onto the court to practise when Gilles and Jeremy were still signing autograph and Gilles sort of bowed to Youzhny repeatedly to greet him. I'm not sure I fully understand how their minds work :p
 
#1,695 ·
Welcome on board, Suz-ee. And thanks so much for the report, it was great.
That's why Gael and Gilles never win doubles, they don't ever take double seriously, do they :p. :lol: @ Gael debriefing with Gilles. I wish I got to see that, it's hilarious just to think of these 2 talking among themselves despite on opposing team. Poor Jeremy though.
 
#1,700 ·
Just awful tennis from Gilles. It's clear he's back to his old "no confidence in his shots" ways again. Should've won this in straight sets 6-4 6-4. Then he should've won it in the tiebreak when he was up 4-1. And now he's thrown away a 4-1 lead in the final set. Even if he manages to scrape this one out, which is a big if at this point, he doesn't stand a chance against Ferrer playing like this.
 
#1,702 ·
Yeah, it was very frustrating. Every key point he had he either dumped the ball in the net barely trying to even put anything on it or pushed it long. The match was a minute shy of 3 hours and he could've won it in about an hour and half so another example of wasting his energy unnecessarily too. I'm glad he won, but unless he plays tons better next round against Ferrer, it may be a pretty good drudging because Ferrer is mr. consistency off both sides of his groundies and today Gilles was missing almost every other shot. He had a lot of help from Mahut who really wasn't playing much better. We'll see I guess. Good luck Gilles! :cheerleader:
 
#1,704 ·
Well, that was horrible, so many unforced errors. It's too bad because if he was connecting with his shots I feel like he could have made this competitive but he had too many easy errors at key moments. Good riddance to this horrible season.

One positive aspect of this season is that he was awful basically the entire year and somehow managed to scrape out enough wins to stay in the top 20 even while essentially missing out on the entire summer. It shows how much of a fighter he is because his form this year was dire.

Hopefully he comes back much better next year.
 
#1,705 ·
Yep, expected outcome :sadface:. Gilles actually played worse today than yesterday. At no point in this match did I even feel Gilles had a chance. It was really just a formality for Ferrer. I only watched because I knew it would be the last time I would see him for the season and the next two months or so. Sad but true.

He just played like his new old self again. No belief or confidence in his game. Nothing like Metz at all. It's really hard to watch after seeing his level in Metz with the confident and blistering ground strokes and belief in himself and his game. I don't think unfortunately Gilles is ever going to get back to any level of consistency again. I think from here on out it's just going to be spotty tennis where he peeks for certain tournaments and then dips down again etc. etc. because he just can't seem to sustain it whether it's do to lack of confidence creeping up on him again, his age and fitness coming into play or an injury that stops his momentum or both.

But since I'm a fan of Gilles that means I'll still be right there on the roller coaster that is his career supporting him every step of the way until the day he decides to get off the ride. Have a good off season Gilles. All the best for next year. :kiss:
 
#1,707 ·
He won one more match than I expect of him in this tournament ;). Yes, expectation was low, so low that I'm already rather happy that he didn't fall out of Top 20. Like Mike said, what a horrible season but he managed to keep his title streak alive and stay in Top 20.

There is always next year. Hope he can sort out things during off season. It's not that there's any easy solution to his physical issues, but we can always hope.
 
#1,708 · (Edited)
Only one positive thing for him this year imo, he was at the net after good approaches more often than before in some tournaments.
But the rest of his game particularly the forehand and movement (sometimes sluggish) most of the time :no:
I think his best match was against Del Potro in Marseille
And his worst (too many to list), against Paire in IW.

Otherwise, he said he will play french interclubs at the end of November and will work in Germany during the off-season.
 
#1,709 ·
His movement was so bad today, seems like he can't string two tough matches in a row :sad:

De Witt said in an itw before Metz that he wanted a whole new Gilles for the AO, maybe we will see him really fit, but I doubt it, I just hope that he keeps having moments of brilliance next year, that is just what I want, I think Top-10 again is really unlikely at this point, but maybe he will have a late career consistency ( extremely unlikely though).


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#1,710 ·
So I guess I don't need to tell you anything about the single match :p I didn't expect it to be that bad... The only thing that may be interesting is that Gilles actually hits the ball very hard all the time, I don't know if tv doesn't do him justice or if this was just this match but it was really surprising.

Anyway, I went to see the double match : it was awful as well. Gilles was totally discouraged. At moment it felt like he was just trying to prove to Jeremy that he wans't able play at the moment...
As a whole the match was less fun than last Monday, you can see that Jeremy and Gilles get along well enough but Gilles and Gael have more "chemistry", were always laughing together... Plus Dodig and Melon were absolutely not amused and kind of scary up close to be honest :p

I really hope Gilles gets it together for the AO, even though I don't have much hope anymore... :(
 
#1,713 ·
Just a quick report : I went to the interclubs today, Gilles defeated Laurent Rochette 6-1, 6-2. It doesn't mean much since the guy is ranked 638 but still. Some very good volleys, lot of pace, the forehand was working great. The serve was nowhere to be found though. And his new haircut is horrendous.
 
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