Tennis Tournament Draw..Who Goes Where?

Everyone keeps asking me..Why did Andy Murray play Roger Federer in the semi and not Novak?

Well..read on..

Usually, a few days before the tournament starts, a draw ceremony is held. This is where each player’s name is selected and placed on the draw board. The top-seeded player is placed at the top of the draw and the second-highest seed is placed at the very bottom of the draw so that the top seed and second seed, if they win all of their early rounds, would only meet in the final match.

The third seed is next chosen, and randomly assigned to either the top seed’s section of the draw or the second seed’s section of the draw. The same is done for the fourth seed. For example, the third seed could fall in the second seed’s section and the fourth seed could fall in the top seed’s section or vice-versa. But the third and fourth seeds, should they win all of their early round matches, would only meet the top or second seed in the semifinals.

Any remaining seeded players are then chosen at random to fill out the rest of the brackets. If there are eight seeds, the eighth seeded player could meet the top seed or second seed in a quarter final match. For example, the #1 seed could play the #8 seed, #2 could play #7, #3 could play #6, and #4 could play #5.

So the reason is..its all done on probably a toss of the coin..No 3 seed up..or down..and so on.