THIS WEEK: Finally the Hannover draw arrives, and by the time I get to process it the matches have started. Oh well, pretend that we're back a day or so, and everyone has a clean slate.

As usual, we look at the record of the Hannover qualifiers against each other. In twelve months, there have been only 36 matches between these players, so the sample is not all that representative. Carlos Moya has the best win-loss ratio (four of those wins on clay), but Pete Sampras is rated highest overall. Alex Corretja has beaten only Agassi, but that was in the final at Indianapolis in August. That is the only indication that he won't be completely outclassed in Hannover this week.

The round-robin format makes the calculated odds a little shaky, and with only 11 of the 36 matches played indoors (7 on carpet, 4 hardcourt) I chose not to weight them based on surface.

ODDS	Player
5/2	Sampras
3/1	Agassi
9/2	Rios
7/1	Moya
9/1	Kucera
12/1	Kafelnikov, Henman
20/1	Corretja

SRI Rankings Hannover Special. Top Eight Players Only. 24th Nov 1998
Rank	Name	Rating Points	Win-Loss Record	ATP Rank	SRI Rank
1	Pete Sampras	628	6 - 4	1	1
2	Carlos Moya	614	7 - 2	5	8
3	Andre Agassi	550	5 - 6	4	3
4	Karol Kucera	544	4 - 4	7	7
5	Yevgeny Kafelnikov	492	5 - 4	10	11
6	Marcelo Rios	477	4 - 4	2	2
7	Tim Henman	437	4 - 8	9	13
8	Alex Corretja	257	1 - 4	6	14

Note that the top 3 are separated by only 2 points overall this week, with Rios slipping into second ahead of Agassi. Todd Martin hits the top 10 for the end of the year, while Jonas Bjorkman, who was never rated as highly by SRI as by the ATP, drops from 24 to 32 (ATP #20 -> #24). Younes El Aynaoui storms into 24th (ATP #47).

SRI Rankings Top 50 Issue #M75. 16th Nov 1998
Rank	Name	Rating Points	Rank Change	ATP Rank
1	Pete Sampras	1168	0	1
2	Marcelo Rios	1166	+1	2
3	Andre Agassi	1166	-1	4
4	Patrick Rafter	1083	0	3
5	Thomas Enqvist	1042	0	22
6	Richard Krajicek	1024	0	8
7	Karol Kucera	1011	0	7
8	Carlos Moya	985	0	5
9	Todd Martin	983	+5	16
10	Greg Rusedski	963	-1	11
11	Yevgeny Kafelnikov	958	-1	10
12	Albert Costa	956	0	14
13	Tim Henman	956	+2	9
14	Alex Corretja	947	-1	6
15	Boris Becker	939	-4	69
16	Thomas Johansson	929	+1	17
17	Mark Philippoussis	916	-1	15
18	Magnus Gustafsson	912	+1	31
19	Michael Chang	912	-1	29
20	Goran Ivanisevic	909	+1	12
21	Felix Mantilla	906	+1	20
22	Petr Korda	900	-2	13
23	Jason Stoltenberg	897	0	27
24	Younes El Aynaoui	882	+8	47
25	Cedric Pioline	872	+1	18
26	Tommy Haas	871	-1	34
27	Byron Black	863	+3	28
28	Gustavo Kuerten	860	+3	23
29	Thomas Muster	851	-1	25
30	Jan Siemerink	846	-1	19
31	Magnus Larsson	846	-4	43
32	Jonas Bjorkman	831	-8	24
33	Francisco Clavet	829	+1	30
34	Wayne Ferreira	804	-1	26
35	Alberto Berasategui	795	+3	21
36	Nicolas Kiefer	791	0	35
37	Marat Safin	786	-2	49
38	Bohdan Ulihrach	784	-1	33
39	Hicham Arazi	779	0	36
40	Slava Dosedel	775	0	64
41	Justin Gimelstob	771	+4	94
42	Mark Woodforde	767	+2	60
43	Jerome Golmard	764	-2	46
44	Dominik Hrbaty	760	-1	45
45	Andrei Medvedev	759	-3	61
46	Richard Fromberg	753	+1	40
47	Kenneth Carlsen	750	-1	82
48	Adrian Voinea	747	0	70
49	Scott Draper	744	0	51
50	Marc Rosset	743	+8	32
52	Jim Courier	739	+9	76
54	Jeff Tarango	737	-4	71
63	Daniel Vacek	716	-12	50
83	Mariano Puerta	676	+1	38

Rating Winners:
Todd Martin	+31	(W Stockholm 98)
Francisco Clavet	+27	(W Santiago 98)
Younes El Aynaoui	+27	(RU Santiago 98)

Rating Losers:
Jonas Bjorkman	-59	(W Stockholm 97, 2R 98)
Daniel Vacek	-29	(QF Moscow 97, 1R 98)

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

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