FERNANDO VERDASCO

'Fernando Verdasco Carmona' (born November 15, 1983 in Madrid) is a professional tennis player from Spain. Currently he is one of the best Spanish tennis players, and he plays well on all of the surfaces. Verdasco started playing tennis at four years old and got a full-time coach when he was eight. Verdasco considers his forehand his best shot, plays left-handed and has a double-handed backhand. Andy Roddick has said he considers Verdasco's forehand the biggest in the game today.

Contents

Career

Early years

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

Titles (3)

Singles (2)

Singles finalist (3)

Doubles (1)

Doubles finalist (1)

Performance timeline

Trivia

External links

Career

Early years

He turned professional in 2001, finishing as world number 464. 2002 was a good year for him after winning his first Futures category title in Spain F1 and finishing runner-up in Spain F3. He played his second career challenger in Segovia, where he reached the final after beating Belarusian Vladimir Voltchkov in the semifinals, then he reached two more Challenger semifinals in Kiev and in Eckental, finishing the year in the top 200 (#173).

2003

In 2003 Verdasco played his first Masters Series tournament (Miami Masters. He joined the main draw as a qualifier, and after beat Karol Kucera and Max Mirnyi, Fernando lost to countryman Carlos Moyà in the third round. After this good performance, he made a bad clay season and he lost in the first round in Wibmbledon against Finnish Jarkko Nieminen in five sets. Then Verdasco played in Cincinnati, where he lost to Andy Roddick in straight sets and he reached the third round at the US Open, where he lost to Thai Paradorn Srichaphan after won countryman Tommy Robredo in the first round and Italian Davide Sanguinetti in the second round.

2004

After finishing 2003 as world #109 (with a 15-8 record in challengers), he had his breakthrough in 2004 when he won his first ATP title in Valencia beating defending champion Juan Carlos Ferrero in the semifinal and Albert Montañés in the final. He also reached the final in Acapulco, losing to Carlos Moya. His good results also included the quarters in Halle and in 's-Hertogenbosch on grass, two Masters Series third rounds (Hamburg Masters and Madrid Masters), the quarterfinals in Stockholm, the semis in Kitzbühel and a doubles title in Stockholm (with countryman Feliciano López), ending the year 36th in the world.

2005

In 2005 he beat Andy Roddick twice, in Miami and in Rome. In Rome, the match was famous for Roddick being matchpoint up on Verdasco's serve and having the match end with a double fault from Verdasco, but Roddick claimed that the serve wasn't out and the match went on, with Verdasco winning. He also reached the quarters of Valencia (where he was defending the title), Rome and New Haven; the semis of Sankt Petersburg; and was finalist in Kitzbühel, where he lost to Argentine Gastón Gaudio. But Verdasco reached his first Grand Slam fourth round at the US Open, where he lost to Jarkko Nieminen after defeating Serb Novak Đoković. His year-end ranking improved slightly to No. 33 in the world.

2006

Fernando reached the fourth round of Wimbledon after beating Vince Spadea and German Benjamin Becker and also upsetting 3rd Seed and former runner-up David Nalbandián in straight sets in the third round. Verdasco then lost to Czech Radek Štěpánek in five sets. At the US Open, Fernando reached the third round, but lost to eventual runner-up Andy Roddick in five sets. In previous rounds, Fernando defeated Fabrice Santoro in four sets and Thiago Alves in three. Fernando then lost in the quarters of Palermo where he lost to Rubén Ramírez Hidalgo and then he lost to Ramírez Hidalgo again the following week in the first round of Metz. Verdasco didn't win any match in the rest of year, he lost to Italian Daniele Bracciali in Moscow, and then in the last two Masters Series tournaments of the year, he lost to Tim Henman in Madrid Masters and to Michael Llodra in Paris Masters. Verdasco finished the year ranked 35th on the ATP rankings.

2007

In 2007, he lost to Serb Novak Đoković in the 4th round of the French Open. In the previous rounds of Roland Garros he beat Jérôme Haehnel in the 1st round, Dmitry Tursunov in the 2nd round and David Ferrer in the 3rd round. Before reaching the 4rd round in the French Open, he lost in the first round in the 3 Masters Series tournaments on clay. He lost to Frenchman Richard Gasquet in both Monte Carlo Masters and Rome Masters, and to Czech Tomáš Berdych in Hamburg Masters. In the grass season, he lost in the 1st round in Queen's and he reached the 3rd round in Wimbledon, where he lost to 3rd seed Andy Roddick after beating American Bobby Reynolds in the 1st round and Italian Andreas Seppi in the 2nd round.

Titles (3)

Singles (2)

'Legend'

Grand Slam (0)

Tennis Masters Cup (0)

ATP Masters Series (0)

ATP Tour (1)

Challenger (1)

'No.'	'Date'	'Tournament'	'Surface'	'Opponent in the final'	'Score'
1.	April 12, 2004	Valencia, Spain	Clay	Albert Montañés	7-6(5), 6-3
2.	August 5, 2007	Segovia, Spain	Hard	Alun Jones	6-2, 6-4

Singles finalist (3)

'No.'	'Date'	'Tournament'	'Surface'	'Opponent in the final'	'Score'
1.	2002	Segovia, Spain	Hard	Olivier Mutis	6-4, 6-2
2.	2004	Acapulco, Mexico	Clay	Carlos Moyà	6-3, 6-0
3.	2005	Kitzbühel, Austria	Clay	Gastón Gaudio	2-6, 6-2, 6-4, 6-4

Doubles (1)

'Legend'

Grand Slam (0)

Tennis Masters Cup (0)

ATP Masters Series (0)

ATP Tour (1)

'No.'	'Date'	'Tournament'	'Surface'	'Partnering'	'Opponents in the final'	'Score'
1.	October 25, 2004	Stockholm, Sweden	Hard (Indoor)	Feliciano López	Wayne Arthurs Paul Hanley	6-4, 6-4

Doubles finalist (1)

'No.'	'Date'	'Tournament'	'Surface'	'Partnering'	'Opponents in the final'	'Score'
1.	July 22, 2007	Stuggart, Germany	Clay	Guillermo García López	František Čermák Leoš Friedl	6-4, 6-4

Performance timeline

''To prevent confusion and double counting, information in this table is updated only after a tournament or the player's participation in the tournament has concluded. This table is current up to the end of Wimbledon 2007.''

Tournament	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	Career win-loss
Australian Open	A	A	1R	2R	2R	2R	3-4
French Open	A	A	2R	1R	2R	4R	5-4
Wimbledon	A	1R	2R	2R	4R	3R	7-5
U.S. Open	A	3R	2R	4R	3R	3R	10-5
'Grand Slam Win-Loss'	'0'	'2-2'	'3-4'	'5-4'	'7-4'	'6-3'	'23-16'
Indian Wells Masters	A	A	1R	2R	2R	2R	3-4
Miami Masters	A	3R	1R	3R	2R	1R	5-5
Monte Carlo Masters	A	A	A	1R	1R	1R	0-3
Rome Masters	A	A	A	QF	2R	1R	4-3
Hamburg Masters	A	A	3R	1R	QF	1R	5-4
Canada Masters	A	1R	A	A	3R	3R	4-3
Cincinnati Masters	A	1R	1R	1R	A	2R	1-4
Madrid Masters	A	1R	3R	2R	1R		3-4
Paris Masters	A	A	1R	2R	1R		1-3
'Total Titles'	'0'	'0'	'1'	'0'	'0'	'0'	'1'
'Year-End Ranking'	464	109	36	33	31		'N/A'

Trivia

★ Verdasco supports Real Madrid football club.

★ Verdasco's ex-girlfriends are Argentine professional tennis player Gisela Dulko and Spanish model and actress Dafne Fernández.

External links

★

★ Fernando Verdasco's unofficial site

★ Verdasco Recent Match Results

★ Verdasco World Ranking History

★ Fernando Verdasco statistics