Mubadala tennis
 

So an event is advertised as having Nadal in. Tickets are bought. Nadal confirms a few days before he is looking forward to playing. Then two days before the competition starts he drops out, with a 'bug'.

The draw was made on the basis of rankings and whilst Nadal got a bye to the next round Murray needed to win his first match. Nadal has been replaced by the worlds no 11, Murray is the worlds no 3.

So now Murray has been knocked out we have the situation where the worlds no 11 gets through to the final four without playing a game and Murray, who is a far bigger crowd puller, is knocked out after the first round. The organisers had time to redo the draw after Nadal pulled out but chose not to.

Very disappointing. Tickets still available to see the worlds no 11 though.

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

How would they have 'redone' the draw? Murray is ranked above Nadal these days so it would still have been Djokovic in one half of the draw, and Murray in the other. Tipsy (who beat Murray) is ranked 9th, Almagro 11th. Not much else they could have done.

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

To be fair I've got a bug at the moment and I'm f**cked.

Is Fed injured as well?

It's only an exhibition event after all. The 2008 event was really good - won by Murray, great set up for kids to learn on outsdie courts for free. Tickets probably a little too pricey.

Anyways as I was vegging on the sofa last night I had the choice of live sport - Ferrer v Berdych or Whitlock v Chisnall. The latter won - do do be do do, do be do do do, do be do do do, oy oy oy

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

Since the draw was based on rankings, they could have replaced Nadal with Murray and almagro, as the worlds no 11, would have had to play to get through to the semis.

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

What sort of bug? I think federer does not need the money or the practice.

Tickets are pricey, but hey, you get to see Nadal, er I mean almagro

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

I don't follow - Murray (3) is ranked above Nadal (4). Or was Nadal the other player guaranteed to be in the SFs without playing? If so, it can only be because the greedy organisers wanted to make Murray play as often as possible to ensure bigger crowds......... they got what they deserved then..........

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

But I thought Nadal said several months ago that he wouldn't be back to full fitness until well into the New Year. His withdrawal from this event was inevitable in my view.

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

He's ducked out of the Aussie Open too.

Re: Mubadala tennis
 

Murray was due to play on the thu, and if he won that he would have played on the fri and sat as well. Nadal got a bye to the fri and was therefore guaranteed to play on the sat as well. So Murray got knocked out, but Almagro, who was lower ranked than Murray played both Friday and Saturday.

So yes, I guess the organisers (but not the public!) got what they deserved. Instead of a stellar competition on the Saturday of Nadal vs Djokovic and Ferrer vs Murray we had a lot less interesting matches.

If they hade redrawn it would have been most likely to be a Djokovic vs Murray final and all those empty seats would have most likely been filled.

Anyway we have Tiger woods to look forward to in January assuming he does not succumb to a bug.