Bob Larson's Daily Men's Tennis
August 12, 2024

At last the secret becomes clear. The trick to success in Sopot is not to have a number by your name, indicating a seed; it's to have a "Q" marked in the draw, for a qualifier.

Sopot had eight seeds, and only one -- Rafael Nadal -- made the quarterfinal. It had four qualifiers, and three of them made the quarterfinal. The first was Franco Squillari, who advanced Wednesday. Thursday, he was joined by Felix Mantilla, who took out countryman Albert Portas 5-7 7-5 7-5 in probably the day's best match (Mantilla's speed versus Portas's drop shot certainly makes high excitement) and by Jiri Vanek, who made his first quarterfinal of the year with a 6-4 6-4 win over Stefan Koubek. For Vanek, #163 coming in, that should be just about enough to get him back into the Top 150.

Meanwhile, 2002 champion Jose Acasuso eliminated the next-to-last seed in the field, #3 David Ferrer, 6-4 7-6. In addition, Adrian Garcia took out Olivier Mutis, who seems to be jinxed since beating Andy Roddick at Roland Garros, 6-2 7-6.

The upset bug wasn't quite as bad in doubles; #1 seeds Cermak and Friedl and #4 Garcia/Prieto made the semifinal. But #2 Arnold and Hood lost in three sets to Martin and Nadal, and #3 Pala and Perry managed to win only one game against Kohlman and Landsberg.