World No. 6 Marin Cilic of Croatia will be the top seed in the 2017 Chennai Open with organisers confirming that four-time champion Stan Wawrinka will, as expected, not defend the title he won this year. Cilic won the title at Indias longest running and most prestigious ATP tournament, in 2009 and 2010.Cilic, the 2014 US Open winner, is in some of the best form of his life, having won titles in Basel and Cincinnati to finish the season at a career-high No. 6. The Croat leads a lineup that includes World No. 14 Roberto Bautista Agut (Spain), No. 27 Albert Ramos-Vinolas (Spain), No. 35 Martin Klizan (Slovakia) and No. 48 Borna Coric (Croatia), adding to the star value of the ATP 250 event, scheduled for January 2-8, at the SDAT Tennis Stadium in Nungambakkam.Former top-10 players Tommy Robredo (Spain) and Mikhail Youzhny (Russia) also return to India, the former after 12 years and the latter after two years, threatening to give the top seeds a run for their money.Robredo, who had gone as high as World No. 5 in 2006, is a player of high pedigree, having won 10 ATP singles and starring in Spains Davis Cup conquests thrice. The first and only time he played in Chennai in 2004, he teamed up with Rafael Nadal to win the doubles title. He is currently No. 57 and, even at 34, cannot be trifled with.Youzhny is a familiar and popular star in Chennai, having won the 2008 title after beating Nadal in straight sets. He pulled out in the second round with an injury during his last stint in Chennai but has been showing glimpses of his much feared all-round game in recent months. He also holds the distinction of making it to the quarterfinals in all Grand Slams, along with the Big Four of Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Nadal.Frenchman Benoit Paire, ATPs most improved player of 2015, will be another star who can cause a ripple in Chennai.This is an impressive lineup, Tom Annear, Chennai Opens tournament director, said. Tennis fans in India can expect high quality tennis this year, he added.Indias campaign will be charged by local hero and wild card entry Ramkumar Ramanathan, who also has a training base in Barcelona. The 22-year-old rose to prominence in 2014 when he toppled Somdev Devvarman in the opening round in Chennai. He has been a national champion and has been part of Indias Davis Cup team as well and is currently No. 2 in AITAs rankings.We have great faith in Ram, TNTA president MA Alagappan said. We believe he will go a long way in world tennis. Moreover, Indias fans love him and will give him all the support that he needs.Moldovas Radu Albot, who has become a bit of a star in his country with his tennis exploits, is one of the upcoming players to look out for. The World No. 97 from the tiny Eastern European country has created a series of records, winning his countrys first ATP Challenger, first doubles title and even the first ATP World Tour event.
Air Max Baratas Outlet . Irving scored 23 points, Tristan Thompson had 20 points and 10 rebounds and the Cavaliers beat the Denver Nuggets 117-109 on Friday night.
Air Max Por Mayor . -- Jimmy Walkers first PGA Tour trophy came with a special gift tucked inside.
http://www.airmaxespanabaratas.es/ . Following a lopsided 5-2 loss against the New Jersey Devils on Wednesday night, Paul MacLean told reporters that "theres a lack of focus, theres a lack of leadership and theres a lack of preparation" with his struggling team. That came on the heels of Bryan Murray taking the unusual step of going into the locker room at the Prudential Center and addressing the players himself.
Air Max Baratas Envio Gratis . The head of USA Boxing came out swinging Tuesday with an open letter to Tyson -- a former Olympic hopeful himself -- that accuses the former heavyweight champion of trying to poach fighters who might be candidates for the U.
Air Max Outlet España . After Gasquet beat fifth-seeded Ivan Dodig of Croatia 7-5, 6-3, Tsonga followed up with a 6-7 (3), 6-2, 6-2 win against sixth-seeded Edouard Roger-Vasselin in an all-French match. SAN DIEGO -- Melvin Gordon was having the game of his life, running for 111 yards on 23 carries, as the San Diego Chargers were trying to play catch-up against the Denver Broncos.Melvin ran better than maybe Ive ever seen him, center Matt Slauson said. He was decisive, confident and powerful. It was a lot of fun. Fun to watch, a lot of fun to block for a guy when he was running like that.And then it stopped.Trailing 27-19, the Chargers had the ball first-and-goal from the Denver 2 with 2:54 left Sunday. Gordons number wasnt called once. Philip Rivers threw four straight incompletions and Denver took over.Although the Chargers got the ball back with 2:08 to go, they didnt come close to scoring. They dropped to 3-5, snapping a two-game winning streak that had given fans a reason to think they could climb into the AFC West race.Although guarded in their comments, some offensive linemen said they had the confidence Gordon could have gained those 2 yards.Yeah, absolutely, left guard Orlando Franklin said. As an offensive lineman youre going to have pride. You talk about being efficient. We talk about four yards or more being efficient in the run game. Obviously, youre going to have confidence. Fact of the matter is, I dont get paid to game-plan. Thats not part of my job. The coaches are going to call whatever they think is going to put our team in the right position and its our job to go out there and execute.Said Slauson: As an offensive lineman, I want to run the ball every play. If I had it my way it would be 75 straight plays of just running the ball. The reality is, Im not in charge of calling plays. Thats (Ken) Whisenhunts job and hes a fabulous coordinator. Ive got all the confidence in the world in him..dddddddddddd The dude spends, so many hours looking at what is going to put us in the right call. So any call he makes I have the full belief that it is the right call. Its not my job to second guess anything. Im here to block.Was there frustration as the pass calls kept coming in?Like I said, I want to run it all the time, Slauson said. But I dont have time to yell at Phil, `Why arent we running it? Were there to block the call and score and win and we didnt get that done.Asked if he wished the Chargers had tried a running play or two during that sequence, right tackle Joe Barksdale said: Im going to no-comment that one because theres no good answer to that question.Coach Mike McCoy refused to second-guess the play-calling.Regardless of what we call, I wish we score, McCoy said. Whether it was a run or pass, youre calling things you think are going to work and score for you. It didnt work. We can look at it today and say we should have called this or called that but we didnt score. We were all trying to score.Did he not have confidence Gordon could gain 2 yards?We called what we did. We got a great quarterback we thought could do what we did to score, and we didnt, McCoy said.The Chargers host Tennessee on Sunday, two days before the team will ask voters to approve an increase in the hotel occupancy tax to raise $1.15 billion to help pay for a new downtown stadium. The measure is expected to fall short of the third-thirds majority needed to pass.---Follow Bernie Wilson on Twitter at
http://twitter.com/berniewilson---Online:
http://pro32.ap.org/poll and
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