THIS WEEK: No time for a long preview, but I expect that Sampras will win this year, as he did when SRI Rankings rated him 9/4 favourite last year. The next ten on the list could all produce a big performance and knock him over, though.

ODDS	Player(s)
9/4	Sampras
10/1	Korda, Rios, Agassi
12/1	Bjorkman
14/1	Enqvist
16/1	Kucera, Rusedski, Rafter, Larsson
20/1	Krajicek
33/1	Henman, Kafelnikov, A.Costa
40/1	Pioline
50/1	Chang, Moya
100	T.Martin, Mantilla
150	Gustafsson, Kiefer, Woodforde, Corretja

SRI Rankings Wimbledon Special. Double Grass, No Clay. 23rd June 1998
Rank	Name	Rating Points	SRI Rank (all surfaces)	Comments
1	Pete Sampras	1283	1	Miles ahead again
2	Petr Korda	1065	6
3	Thomas Enqvist	1057	5
4	Andre Agassi	1041	4
5	Jonas Bjorkman	1038	11	Could go very very well
6	Patrick Rafter	1034	7
7	Marcelo Rios	1029	2
8	Magnus Larsson	1014	16
9	Greg Rusedski	988	10
10	Yevgeny Kafelnikov	973	18
11	Richard Krajicek	971	8
12	Karol Kucera	961	13
13	Cedric Pioline	933	17
14	Michael Chang	932	15
15	Tim Henman	930	22
16	Boris Becker	887	21
17	Albert Costa	870	3	SRI likes him - on clay
18	Mark Woodforde	864	34
19	Magnus Gustafsson	864	20
20	Nicolas Kiefer	850	38
21	Jeff Tarango	845	32
22	Carlos Moya	834	12
23	Wayne Ferreira	829	28
24	Andrei Medvedev	827	37
25	Todd Martin	824	19
26	Jan Siemerink	823	35
27	Thomas Johansson	818	41
28	Byron Black	813	36
29	Brett Steven	808	47
30	Scott Draper	803	69	In form on grass
35	Alex Corretja	774	14	Eliminated in 1st round
42	Felix Mantilla	752	9

SRI Rankings Top 50 Issue #M58. 23rd June 1998
Rank	Name	Rating Points	Rank Change	ATP Rank
1	Pete Sampras	1257	0	1
2	Marcelo Rios	1133	0	2
3	Albert Costa	1129	0	15
4	Andre Agassi	1127	0	19
5	Thomas Enqvist	1099	0	18
6	Petr Korda	1080	+1	3
7	Patrick Rafter	1058	+1	6
8	Richard Krajicek	1055	-2	12
9	Felix Mantilla	1013	+1	13
10	Greg Rusedski	1010	-1	4
11	Jonas Bjorkman	1007	+3	9
12	Carlos Moya	1005	-1	5
13	Karol Kucera	998	0	11
14	Alex Corretja	995	-2	8
15	Michael Chang	975	+1	14
16	Magnus Larsson	968	-1	37
17	Cedric Pioline	948	0	10
18	Yevgeny Kafelnikov	946	0	7
19	Todd Martin	941	0	32
20	Magnus Gustafsson	921	0	25
21	Boris Becker	911	+1	67
22	Tim Henman	909	+2	17
23	Alberto Berasategui	895	-2	16
24	Thomas Muster	891	+1	20
25	Jason Stoltenberg	890	-2	41
26	Slava Dosedel	868	0	42
27	Mark Philippoussis	851	0	28
28	Wayne Ferreira	849	0	27
29	Tommy Haas	840	0	44
30	Francisco Clavet	828	0	35
31	Fabrice Santoro	825	0	22
32	Jeff Tarango	821	+2	51
33	Chris Woodruff	818	+3	61
34	Mark Woodforde	817	-2	49
35	Jan Siemerink	817	0	26
36	Byron Black	815	+7	40
37	Andrei Medvedev	813	+7	94
38	Nicolas Kiefer	808	-5	21
39	Jim Courier	805	-2	45
40	Hernan Gumy	802	+2	84
41	Thomas Johansson	800	-2	43
42	Richard Fromberg	795	-4	36
43	Goran Ivanisevic	794	-3	24
44	Dominik Hrbaty	790	+1	47
45	Gustavo Kuerten	786	+2	23
46	Paul Haarhuis	785	0	87
47	Brett Steven	781	+1	46
48	Andrew Ilie	767	+1	74
49	Nicolas Escude	762	+1	34
50	Kenneth Carlsen	759	-9	60
52	Magnus Norman	755	+5	31
53	Todd Woodbridge	746	0	29
60	Julian Alonso	729	-5	30
64	Sargis Sargsian	721	+10	79
65	Franco Squillari	720	+31	98

Rating Winners:
Byron Black	+25	(RU Nottingham 98, 2R 97)
Jonas Bjorkman	+24	(W Nottingham 98, SF Rosmalen 97)
Andrei Medvedev	+24	(2R 's-Hertogenbosch 98)

Rating Losers:
Kenneth Carlsen	-32	(2R def Rios Nott'ham 97, 2R Hert. 98)
Richard Krajicek	-25	(W Rosmalen 97, QF wo Hert. 98)
Alberto Berasategui	-18	()
Greg Rusedski	-17	(W Nottingham 97)

[ wo - walkover, wd - withdrew, ret - retired, def - defeated ]

blurb version 2.1

These are the current full-year ratings of top players according to a "spectral radius" program. Spectral radius algorithms have had much success with college sports and some other sports in giving a mathematically reliable ranking of the teams/players involved.

This ranking is not intended to completely replace the ATP Ranking. In fact, it shows that the ATP system is more reliable than most people think.

However, this system removes the two most disliked aspects of the ATP Computer ranking: (1) the 14-tournament divisor is replaced by an arbitrary 20-match qualification cut-off, allowing good players to show up earlier, and nullifying point-gathering by players by including even the weakest results in the average; (2) the stagger is virtually eliminated, by (in most cases) replacing last year's results only when the corresponding tournament is played this year. Note that both Challenger and ATP Tour results are used (but not the qualifying rounds).

SRI = Spectral Radius at Infinity. For a relevant reference, see

"The Perron-Frobenius Theorem and the Ranking of Football Teams" by James P. Keener, SIAM Review, v.35 no.1, p.80 (1993)

SRI Rankings Top 50 mailing list subscriptions (either Men's or Women's tennis rankings) and back issues are available by writing to the address below. An HTML version of this chart is available via Tennis Worldwide Magazine, http://www.tennisw.com/twmag/

Thanks to JD ( http://www.jdland.com/tennis.html ) for the data.