Went to see a few matches on Sunday at the Abama Hotel Tennis Centre, where the ATP are putting on a Challenger tournament this week.

The Challenger series is the stepping block for those guys wanting to break into the top 100 in the World, and its tough out there.

The match I watched was a qualifier, between above Gero Kretschmer from Germany and below Matthew Ebden from  Australia.

Gero has a present ranking of 442 and Matthew is 307 in the World.So they were playing each other for a place in the main draw.Apart from a main draw place, the winner would get 3 ATP points, but no money guaranteed.Once you are in the main draw, if you lose first round you get zero ATP points and win a sum of 310€.

The overall winner takes a prize of 4,300€ and 75 ATP points.So how tough

Is it for the guys who want to get into the top 100.

Tournament after tournament chasing the points required to start to qualify in the main ATP tournaments.Traveling around the World, sometimes not sponsored and with no-one with you - hard out there on Planet Tennis.

But look what a difference the points would make - take for example Matthew Ebden, who won the match in three sets.If he was to go on and win the event the 75 points would take him from his present position with 215 points up to a total of 290 points and a ranking of 257 in the World.

The ATP Tour is now in Rome, where the top 50 players in the World, plus a couple of qualifiers are in the main draw.But look at the difference in points and prizes.

If you lose 1st round in the main draw you win 7,650€ and 10 points.
If you win the event you get a mere 434,000€ and a 1000 points.

The other side of the coin is that you also have to defend your points from the previuos year, hence Novak Djorkovic won the event in 2008, so unless he wins it this year he will lose points.
One sad point this year, Spain's Juan Carlos Ferrero who won the event in 2001 had to qualify this year and lost in the final round - and he is ranked 100 in the World - tough eh!!!!!

Gero's forehand - nice wrist lay back and focusing on the ball.

Matches on every day this week, starting at 11am.