How has Murray overtaken Nadal??!!

[knyvette]

Last Monday Nadal was a little over 1000 points ahead of Murray and today he is over 600 points behind! How has this happened? I thought I understood the points system but clearly I'm missing something!

Here's my reading of Cincinnati. Murray won rather than getting to the final last year so he picks up the (presumably not that large) difference. Nadal sheds his winner's points from last year but receives points for reaching the quarter finals.

How the heck do those amendments amount to a change of 1600 points??

Can somebody explain using numbers?

Thanks

[funches]

Nadal's 800 points for winning the Olympics last year came off because the rankings only include results from the last 12 months.

It's that simple. Nadal has to make up the gap this week (extremely unlikely) to avoid being the NO. 3 seed at the U.S. Open because the seeds are locked in place next Monday.

[Forehand_lob]

For Nadal to overtake Murray by the end of the week, either Murray has to fall in the round of 32 with Nadal making the final or better, or Murray getting to the semis and Nadal winning.

[knyvette]

Aaaaah....thanks, lads, I'd quite forgotten about the points for the Olympics which , of course, wouldn't impact the boy Murray because he went out in the 1st round.

Now, THAT makes more sense! Without that factor he would still be No 2 by about 200 points. Even so, it's quite surprising that he would have shed 800 points anyway from the results from one tournament (Montreal which I mistakenly referred to as Cincinnati).

I think the Petcheys and Flemings etc might have pointed this out because I can't have been the only person to wonder why Murray was closing on Rafa so quickly...

Thanks again!

[Forehand_lob]

There is also an issue with the points system being changed from last year. Previously, a final at a Master's tournament would get you 350 out of a possible 500 points. So, as everything got doubled, that would translate to 700 points. Now, the same result will now only get a player 600 points. A semi in a slam would have gotten the equivalent of 900 last year while it only gets 720 this year; a final 1400 last year and 1200 this year. The effect is to make the rankings more dependent on Slam and Master's winners.

As a side note, the WTA did the doubling, but not the different weighting.