If you know me or follow my website, you also know that I might not be the biggest tennis fan in general, but I am a huge fan of Davis Cup Tennis (with a big favor for the Indian team) and I love watching double tennis. I feel it is more dynamic, more versatile, I also prefer the skill set which is or at least used to be necessary. Without a player like Leander Paes, who has been a genius at the net, the the Australian team Todd Woodbridge and Marc Woodforde, I would have very likely not run into the sports that deeply at all. The recent weekend of 3rd to 5th February 2023 made afraid of the future of doubles tennis in general.
Here are my thoughts. Thereby, I want to emphasize that I don’t want to blame individual performances. As an Indian tennis fan, I know best that Davis Cup performances do not reflect what is happening on the ATP Tour (ATP = Association of Tennis Professionals, the organization of male professional tennis). Nonetheless, I believe there is a deeper message behind these things. Hope you enjoy reading.
Introduction
I unfortunately did not make it to the tie of the Indian team in Hillerod, Denmark, this time. But the results in doubles broke my heart. If you look at the doubles rankings only, India, who had a comfortable 1-1 score after the first day, were the absolute favorites. The very experienced Rohan Bopanna (ATP Doubles Ranking #17) and Yuki Bhambri (ATP #90) had a by far better so-called combined ranking (i.e. the sum of their rankings) of 107 compared to the Danish pairing Johannes Ingildsen and Holger Rune, whose combined ranking was 554 at that day. Rohan Bopanna just recently played the final of the Australian Open (in Mixed Doubles). Denmark won 6-2 6-4.
It is just an individual match – and there are many stories behind it. One, of course, is that the match was in Denmark, they had choice of venue, surface and had the home crowd. Thus, there was an advantage for the host nation. Furthermore, Holger Rune is #9 in the ATP Singles ranking, he is a world-class player in the “other world”, the one which is in the media frequently. Doubles tennis does not get the attention which I feel it deserves. The later rounds of Grand Slams and Master Tournaments, the Olympic Games and the Davis Cup are the main showcases.
Some Facts about the Davis Cup Weekend
It was of course not a single match, which triggered me to write this posting. And, to be very clear, the loss of India against Denmark in doubles was not the biggest upset on that weekend. I give you a full reference of the two highest groups the Davis Cup Qualifiers and World Gorup I Play-Offs (there was also World Group II, but they typically have rather high rankings) below. I only concentrated on the doubles ranking and majorly compared the sum of the ATP Doubles Rankings of the players to the in-fact result. If the team with the higher (i.e. worse) combined ranking won, I call it an upset. Overall, I looked into 24 ties, twelve each in every division.
In the Davis Cup Qualifiers, there were six out of twelve upsets. The most remarkable ones definitely happened in La Serena, Chile, and Espoo, Finland. The Chilean team Tomas Barrios Vera and Alejando Tabilo (combined: 1724) beat Kazakhstan with Andrey Golubev and Aleksandr Nedovyesov (113) in straight sets. In Finland, the locals celebrated a three set victory of Emil Ruusuvuori and Harri Heliovaara (840) against Maximo Gonzales and Andres Molteni (Argentina). Four of the 48 players nominated this weekend did not even have an ATP Doubles ranking.
Situation in World Group I
World Group I did only feature four upsets, you have to state, though, that half of the matches featured at least one unranked player as well. It is questionable if a “World Group” can stand that nations nominate players, which are obviously not used to play this discipline. Turkiye won the doubles again Slovenia with a fully unranked team. Another remarkable match was the victory of Japanese Ben McLachlan / Yosuke Watanuki (combined: 1348) at home soil against Lukasz Kubot / Jan Zielinski (Poland, comb. 266) in three sets. An interesting fact: if you take the ATP Doubles ranking of all four players as a metric of the “potential quality” of a match, the doubles match in Denmark was the sixth best one of all 24 this weekend (including Qualifiers).
Some more Statistics
I just give you a few facts before I come to my conclusion:
- I just mentioned that you could argue, summing up the rankings of the four doubles players could be some sort of “metric” of the potential quality of a match. In that regard, the Austrian upset by Alexander Erler and Lucas Miedler in Croatia versus Ivan Dodig and Nikola Mektic was the doubles match of a weekend. The summed up ranking was 124, i.e. in average each player was roughly ranked #25.
- Even though they were playing to qualify to the Finals, Czech Republic played with two unranked players, i.e. who hadn’t played an official professional level doubles match the year before that tie.
- Excluding the four unranked players, 34 of the 96 players involved in doubles in both division are ATP Top 100 in Doubles (Qualifer only: 26/48 players). Of course, many nations have more than two players in that part of the rankings and a few nations don’t need to qualify. But the stat feels very low.
- Even worse, the average doubles ranking of these 96 players, already excluding the 13 unranked ones, is 379.2. For the Qualifiers only, this average is at 242. I feel this is drastically bad. I compared it to the average ATP Singles ranking of the four players used for singles in the Qualifiers division on Day 1 (Day 2 might be not representative due to dead rubbers), which is 149.2. This means that that the average ranking of a Davis Cup doubles player is 100 spots worse than the singles one.
Why Do I Feel that this is worth mentioning
In general, in whatever blog posting I do, I assume that people act smart. So do I in here. I believe that all 48 Davis Cup captains nominated their best doubles team. However, they obviously several times went for players which are successful in singles – and they succeeded in quite many cases. Doubles tennis has a lot of trouble and bringing it back on track is one of the key issues tennis has in my point of view. The reformed scoring system did not bring back singles players into doubles as tennis dreamed. Roger Federer, for example, was known to be an excellent doubles player, but he went for that skill more or less only if there was a chance for an Olympic medal or to save his country in Davis Cup.
This is what is worrying me. There seem to be better doubles player out there, like Holger Rune. They just don’t compete in that discipline for various reasons. The much I love doubles tennis, the much can understand these reasons and do not criticize them. The problem is: how can you take doubles tennis seriously if you know that at least a part of its top class players is not competing? In several occasions, like in Olympic Games, these players can use their singles ranking to qualify into doubles. It feels unfair, but maybe it is, in case of my example Holger Rune (who is still having a decent doubles ranking), more realistic. His ranking does not reflect his strength.
The Identity of Doubles Tennis
The daily business of tennis are all the tournaments out there. The ATP Doubles Ranking determines who is thought to be the best doubles player in the world. Likely, current #1, Wesley Koolhof (Netherlands) is indeed the best doubles player of the world. But does the rest of the table tell you a good story?
To me it feels like winning a medal in high jump knowing that others might be better, but they just cash in better in long jump. Or in 100 meter sprint racing. You are always second class, subordinate. And you can never emancipate. Because you cannot proof that I am wrong does not work. Maybe doubles specialists might be superior over a whole season, without home crowds and Davis Cup. But they cannot proof it. Because this competition never takes place.
Reference – Davis Cup Results of the Weekend
Here are the Davis Cup results in doubles of the weekend. The winning pair is given in bold in the set score columns, the favorite regarding the Doubles Ranking (ATP ranking as of 30th January 2023) is highlighted in the ranking cell. An empty field in the ranking cell means that the player is unranked and does not have an ATP Doubles Ranking, I marked the sum with an UNR in that case. As in the posting as such, I only looked into the Davis Cup Qualifiers and the World Group I ties.
Davis Cup Qualifiers (to the Davis Cup Finals)
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Croatia |
Ivan DODIG |
11 |
19 |
3 |
6 |
|
Nikola MEKTIC |
8 |
Austria |
Alexander ERLER |
49 |
105 |
6 |
7 |
|
Lucas MIEDLER |
56 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Hungary |
Fabian MAROZSAN |
485 |
2004 |
6 |
7 |
|
Mate VALKUSZ |
1519 |
France |
Nicolas MAHUT |
51 |
202 |
2 |
6 |
|
Arthur RINDERKNECH |
151 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Germany |
Andreas MIES |
21 |
41 |
6 |
6 |
6 |
Tim PUETZ |
20 |
Switzerland |
Dominic STRICKER |
615 |
1677 |
7 |
3 |
4 |
Stan WAWRINKA |
1062 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Uzbekistan |
Sanjar FAYZIEV |
189 |
602 |
2 |
4 |
|
Sergey FOMIN |
413 |
USA |
Austin KRAJICEK |
9 |
12 |
6 |
6 |
|
Rajeev RAM |
3 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Columbia |
Juan Sebastian CABAL |
23 |
46 |
4 |
4 |
|
Robert FARAH |
23 |
Great Britain |
Daniel EVANS |
82 |
83 |
6 |
6 |
|
Neal SKUPSKI |
1 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Norway |
Viktor DURASOVIC |
165 |
165 + UNR |
4 |
6 |
3 |
Herman HOEYERAAL |
|
Serbia |
Nikola CACIC |
70 |
70 + UNR |
6 |
3 |
6 |
Filip KRAJINOVIC |
|
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
South Korea |
JiSung NAM |
152 |
299 |
7 |
7 |
|
MinKyu SONG |
147 |
Belgium |
Johan VLIEGEN |
53 |
108 |
6 |
6 |
|
Sander GILLE |
55 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Chile |
Tomas BARRIOS VERA |
572 |
1724 |
6 |
7 |
|
Alejandro TABILO |
1152 |
Kazakhstan |
Andrey GOLUBEV |
48 |
113 |
4 |
5 |
|
Aleksandr NEDOVYESOV |
65 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Sweden |
Andre GORANSSON |
66 |
885 |
4 |
2 |
|
Elias YMER |
819 |
Bosnia and Herzegovina |
Tomislav BRKIC |
59 |
484 |
6 |
6 |
|
Mirza BASIC |
425 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Netherlands |
Wesley KOOLHOF |
1 |
20 |
6 |
6 |
|
Matwe MIDDELKOOP |
19 |
Slovakia |
Lukas KLEIN |
607 |
883 |
3 |
3 |
|
Alex MOLCAN |
276 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Portugal |
Nuno BORGES |
122 |
183 |
7 |
7 |
|
Francisco CABAL |
61 |
Czech Republic |
Tomas MACHAC |
|
UNR |
5 |
6 |
|
Adam PAVLASEK |
|
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Finland |
Emil RUUSUVUORI |
830 |
840 |
7 |
4 |
6 |
Harri HELIOVAARA |
10 |
Argentina |
Maximo GONZALES |
45 |
81 |
6 |
6 |
4 |
Andres MOLTENI |
36 |
World Group I Play-Offs
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Japan |
Ben McLACHLAN |
79 |
1348 |
4 |
7 |
7 |
Yosuke WATANUKI |
1269 |
Poland |
Lukasz KUBOT |
251 |
266 |
6 |
5 |
6 |
Jan ZIELINSKI |
15 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Greece |
Alexandros SKORILAS |
625 |
762 |
6 |
4 |
|
Petros TSITSIPAS |
137 |
Ecuador |
Gonzalo ESCOBAR |
43 |
136 |
7 |
6 |
|
Diego HIDALGO |
93 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Denmark |
Johannas INGILDSEN |
358 |
554 |
6 |
6 |
|
Holger RUNE |
196 |
India |
Yuki BHAMBRI |
90 |
107 |
2 |
4 |
|
Rohan BOPANNA |
17 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Brazil |
Rafael MATOS |
27 |
165 |
6 |
6 |
|
Felipe MELIGINI ALVES |
138 |
China |
Jie CUI |
1216 |
1927 |
2 |
3 |
|
Ze ZHANG |
711 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Thailand |
Pruchya ISARO |
455 |
1011 |
4 |
6 |
6 |
Thantub SUKSUMRARN |
556 |
Romania |
Marius COPIL |
511 |
618 |
6 |
2 |
4 |
Victor Vlad CORNEA |
107 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Latvia |
Ernests GULBIS |
|
UNR |
3 |
3 |
|
Karlis OZOLINS |
|
Israel |
Daniel CUKIERMAN |
247 |
731 |
6 |
6 |
|
Edan LESHEM |
484 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Mexico |
Isaac Arturo AREVALO |
2070 |
4369 |
6 |
4 |
|
Cesar RAMIREZ |
2299 |
Taiwan |
Chun-Hsin TSENG |
474 |
643 |
7 |
6 |
|
Yu Hsiou HSU |
169 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Peru |
Ignacio BUSE |
632 |
948 |
6 |
7 |
|
Jorge PANTA |
316 |
Ireland |
Simon CARR |
783 |
783 |
2 |
6 |
|
Jack MOLLOY |
|
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Ukraine |
Ilya BELOBORODKO |
531 |
676 |
6 |
6 |
|
Vladyslav MANAFOV |
145 |
Lebanon |
Benjamin HASSAN |
434 |
434 |
4 |
3 |
|
Hasan IBRAHIM |
|
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Turkiye |
Cem ILKEL |
|
UNR |
7 |
4 |
6 |
Altuq CELIKBILEK |
|
Slovenia |
Sebastian DOMINKO |
1269 |
1269 + UNR |
4 |
6 |
4 |
Blaz ROLA |
|
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
New Zealand |
Artem SITAK |
133 |
149 |
6 |
3 |
6 |
Michael VENUS |
16 |
Bulgaria |
Alexander DONSKI |
281 |
800 |
4 |
6 |
3 |
Petr NESTEROV |
519 |
Country |
Player |
DBL Rank. |
Comb. Rank. |
1 |
2 |
3 |
Lithuania |
Tadas BABELIS |
1802 |
3133 |
1 |
6 |
6 |
Vilius GAUBAS |
1331 |
Pakistan |
Aqeel KHAN |
|
UNR |
6 |
2 |
2 |
Aisam-Ul-Haq QURESHI |
|
Title picture taken from my 2022 Norway vs. India Davis Cup coverage
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France, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and Malaysia - I am just coming back from a massive aviation trip, which is the ...
The seizure of operation by Everynoise.com made it necessary to reform my country music playlists. I already mentioned this one ...
Andreas Dorau is one of the artists I follow for the longest time in my life. In 1997, just when ...
Happy New Onbaord-Food Year! At least, there is one flight experience from 2024 in this posting already, a Lufthansa Business ...
Is it really New Year's Eve already again? The last day of the year? I am posting this one in ...
Yeah, I am still more of an album person. I feel that a long-play is still able to tell stories ...
It's time to look back to . After I shared my new format My Year in Travel with you the first time, ...
Let's try out something new: in addition to the Best of postings I present you at the end of the year, I ...
Unfortunately, I could not complete the Country Christmas Playlist this year due to technical issues. However, since the days become ...
When I wanted to work on 8th December 2023, preparing the base data for my two country music playlists, I ...
After my eleventh Food I Had Onboard posting majorly concentrated on two Lufthansa First Class legs between Frankfurt (FRA) and ...
And then, it were three. I already shared Christmas songs by country artists twice as a playlist. For the Flyctory.com ...
At the end of September, some miraculous things were happening on the Instagram accounts of the Country To Country Festivals ...
I felt it is a good time to publish my next episode of Food I Had Onboard in this week in ...
When Swiss International Air Line recently released the seat map of their new Airbus A350 fleet, a real advantage of ...
It is just mid-year 2023 and I already start working on my 2024 Rock of Ages International Tour list. I am sure ...
In the life of a sports fan, there are those days you simply remember. Great victories and upsets, huge disappointments, ...
Are we really in the double digits now? I am really happy about my "new" category Food I had Onboard. Also, ...
Even though I am German, I am not an overwhelming soccer (or, for major parts of the world: football) fan ...
I am surprised that it has never been there before, stated Jackson Dean, one of the four artists, who will ...
Home is where the heart is - I had the idea to this posting about my favorite cities of the ...
Last week, the NHL released their schedule for the 2023-24 season. This typically means a bunch of work to me, ...
After I gave you three postings about the music at the Seepark Biker Days 2023 in Pfullendorf already, it is ...
I am not a Harley rider and I will travel to Pfullendorf by rental car. But I am really looking ...
One more Food I had onboard until I have a full set of ten postings. Hope you also enjoy reading ...
This weekend will be a tough one, a very emotional one for me. After 52 shows with the British production ...
Iceland is definitely one of the countries I love to travel to most. The unique nature, a very interesting culture ...
Oops, I did it again. Just within about a month, I feel that I had a nice volume of flights, ...
I did a bit of an ESC week this week, featuring Guildo Horn's Guildo hat Euch lieb! in my Songs of the Week and ...
Eight days of traveling along the Icelandic Ring Road are done. The trip was just intense. My wife and I ...
Using public transport all over Germany for 49 Euro? Sounds like the perfect deal, especially if you are a visitor ...
I have to give in: the red carpet is not my favorite location. Nonetheless, I felt very thankful that after ...
A major part of optimizing your travel portfolio is to determine the loyalty program which suits best to you. Thereby, ...
The last legs of the 2023 Weird Al Yankovic European Tour, Rock of Ages shows, the Pittsburgh Penguins and many ...
Damn, it is already four years... And it is more than 2,750 postings since then. On 25th February 2018, I ...
Today is a very special day to me: Weird Al Yankovic is playing is first-ever concert in Germany tonight, at ...
Wow, it's already half a dozen of episodes. This time, I start my Food I Had Onboard posting with two ...
The last posting of the year - Best Ones 2022 is introducing you to my best experience last years (as ...
While the music market is more and more focusing on singles and even writes weird stories like Taylor Swift's "Top ...
Since I started working with Flyctory.com, I present you a list of my favorite songs at the end of every ...
I recently told you about my very different pandemic and post-pandemic (re)booking experience with different airlines. The level of service ...
March 2020 changed my life. Covid-19 temporarily took me quite a bunch of habits, which I felt to be essential ...
Just some ten days left until Christmas. Instead of my typical album preview, I this time go for a preview ...
Time for another episode of Food I had onboard. Between September and November 2022, I had some really interesting experiences, ...
I recently ran into a very interesting discussion of the German aviation travel channel Frequent Traveler TV. Lars Costen, the ...
The 7th November 2022 is one of these days I will hardly forget so quickly. In a Weird Al fan ...
Even though I haven't been overwhelmingly optimistic about success on the sports side of the Indian tennis team at the ...
After I rolled out the Country Christmas Playlist 2021 in late November that year, I am this time a bit ...
After I gave you an overview of 2022 European appearances of my favorite musical Rock of Ages, I felt to ...
Already the fourth edition of my Food I Had Onboard category. Even though my Covid-19 infection changed quite a lot of ...
Every year, some time in June or July, I am spending hours and hours looking into flight schedules, checking out ...
The Bergisch Coffee Table (Bergische Kaffeetafel) is a traditional meal, somewhere between a brunch and an afternoon tea. And: it ...
Early summer 2022. After the Covid-19 crisis feels to have come to a certain end, air travelers all over Europe ...
After my second posting about Food I Had Onboard in mid March 2022, I had a couple of interesting flight experiences ...
He was ready to make a few people happy. For one evening. Ready to be the star of a luxurious ...
After I got some quite nice feedback about my first Food I Had Onboard posting, I felt to continue this ...
I am quite sure I will never forget this 24th February 2022. Like I will know what I did on ...
The Winter Olympic Games 2022 are finished. I have to say, I am relieved. It may have been the two ...
Especially for tourists, Dubai rather means entertainment, luxury and posh shopping. Thus, having a boat ride in a swan-shaped pedal ...
Last week only, I had to cancel or rebook four trip due to Covid-19 related reasons. Three of them included ...
It is time for the final posting of the years, simply named The Best Ones 2021. After looking into my ...
2021 definitely lifted Flyctory.com to another level. The community is steadily increasing - days with less than 2,000 page hits ...
Year-end is the time to look back to all the stuff what happened to you. Ideally you rather remind the ...
Christmas is approaching really quick now. While I traditionally do a festive edition of my Country Music Picks, I also ...
Even though I do have a couple of airport reviews on Flyctory.com, I so far missed a lot of the ...
Okay, I give in. In the world of country music, Christmas starts in early September. That's when the first song ...
In October 2021, on a flight from Munich (MUC) to Keflavik Airport (KEF), I decided to go for a new ...
Summer feels to be over - Fall 2021 is coming. Finally, I had much more - and better - trips ...
This is a posting I am aiming to write since ages somehow. I visited so many hotels - not just ...
The Summer Olympic Games 2020 in Tokyo are over. Two weeks of intense sports coverage are lying behind us. Definitely ...
After the 2018 PyoengChang Olympic Winter Games, I already felt urged to do my very own medal count of the ...
Are you currently also fascinated (or disgusted) by the Olympic Games? This posting is about cool sports - even though ...
During the later phases of the Covid-19 lock-downs in Germany, I had the idea to that posting. Maybe just because ...
I studied maths. This almost certainly means that I am weird. Or, at least, that I tend to have weird ...
I got introduced to Smooth McGroove by a friend some half a year ago. At that time, the YouTube music ...
At first sight, this is rather a blog posting for people outside Germany. At the time of reading, German residents ...
Covid-19 has influenced our lifestyle in a historic way, indeed. A lot of things we did love to do are ...
During a dinner concert in June 2020 of a Cologne local band, Cat Ballou (who will be part of my selection), I ...
It started on 27th July 2018 with Talk of This Town by Catherine McGrath. Last weekend, I reached another milestone: with Immortal ...
If you are on a city trip, you likely fancy to buy a multi-attraction ticket. There are global companies like ...
I already introduced you to Feli, the German Girl in America, now Feli from Germany, in my Flyctory.com posting about her ...
I am back. After five days in the United Arab Emirates metropolis, I came back to Germany. My Covid-19 test ...
After praising my favorite songs of 2020 and the favorite albums and EPs in 2020, the final posting to do ...
292 Media Review postings - looking into new music (and a few other) releases was definitely some sort of core ...
2020 is about to come to an end - and the last three posting of the years re about to ...
The critics hated the movie - the cinemas loved it (as it really cashed in a bunch). As a sequel ...
Weird Al Yankovic is not only one of my most favorite artists, who I follow for some twenty years now ...
While I have a couple of "PCR professionals" in my circle of contacts, it took me until December 2020 until ...
In addition to the very personal new Songs of My Life category, I feel like having a bit more blogging contents on ...
Just about one month left until we are facing our very first socially distanced Christmas. Especially after hard times in ...
A typical scene at the bett1HULKS tennis tournament during the last two weeks at Cologne's LANXESSarena: Alexander Zverev (who swept ...
During the last years, October has been one of the big months for European country music fans: being already "traditional" ...
Starting Flyctory.com as a travel and sports blog some 30 months ago, I wouldn't have imagined at its beginning how ...
After Novak Djokovic won the Australian Open 2020, charts like the one by below by the German Data Journalist Felix ...
2020 is just halfway done - but if I was to choose a German person of the year, regardless whether ...
I was originally working on a posting about key challenges that Nashville and the country music industry will face in ...
I absolutely loved to follow Olivia Lane on social media and listen to her music after I happened to run ...
Country music rarely makes it to German media - especially the major US acts, which are typically rather unknown in ...
Many Germans did it - and I did it as well: travelling again. The Whitsun weekend was not only a ...
They did it: the German Women Soccer Bundesliga (Flyeralarm Frauen-Bundesliga) re-started a few days ago, on 29th May 2020. I ...
Covid-19 has a huge impact on the music industry. My home town Cologne's local country music heroes, Mrs. Greenbird, were ...
Saturday, 16th May 2020, 15:30 hrs German time. The point in time at which the German Soccer Bundesliga was intended ...
Kenny Foster, one of the Featured Artists of Flyctory.com and one of the most friendly people I met in the ...
A friend of mine recently asked me how the current Covid-19 situation is affecting myself personally and of course also ...
My Country Music Playlists on Amazon Music and Spotify are one of the most popular elements of the Flyctory.com music ...
Mlada Bolesav - a 44,000 people city in Czech Repiblic, some 65 kilometers Northeast of Prague. Though the city's history ...
Due to the late cancellation of the C2C festivals in London, Dublin and Glasgow and all the organizational trouble caused ...
While I am writing this blog posting, I am sitting in London. The C2C: Country to Country has been cancelled ...
My third and final issue of stories around the C2C in Berlin - time to finish the days of country ...
Saturday in Berlin is over. A lot of good music has been played on several stages - but some stories ...
The German Country Music Scene is having their highest holidays - The C2C in Berlin started on 6th March 2020 ...
While I so far made an semi-annual look back in time, the "Very Important Postings", I decided something with my ...
Due to my passion for Weird Al Yankovic, I know Jim "Kimo" West for a couple of years now. Kimo ...
I decided to split the "Best music" postings of 2019 into two parts: while I already published my personal Best ...
2019 has come to an end - and music has been one of the key topics of Flyctory.com in 2019 ...
You may have visited Flyctory.com the last days hoping to have some coverage of the Neuchatel World Floorball Championships this ...
I am constantly aiming to improve your user experience on the website. I always felt that drilling down the list ...
Usually, I am reviewing albums at the time of release. Luke Combs This One's For You has been released on 2nd ...
Leo Moracchioli sounds very Italian, but in fact, the metal musician and producer is Norwegian citiizen. Despite his Youtube has ...
Some ten weeks weeks ago, I added another feature to Flyctory.com: the Country Music Playlists on Amazon and Spotify allows ...
During the London Country Music Week, Country 2 Country traditionally presented the lineup for the festival. Every year, fans pray ...
Quite surprisingly, there seems to be a quite sudden competition about the promotion and management of country music concerts in ...
I try to improve Flyctory.com steadily and enlarge your visitor's experience. I felt that there is so much music on ...
After my posting in April, which was already speculating about a country music boom in Germany and Central Europe, a ...
June 2019, time for the third semiannual summary of the website. Quite a lot has changed and improved compared to ...
During the CMA Fest 2019 in Nashville, I did quite a lot of Meet & Greets. I just felt it ...
The beginning of June was a very flattering moment to me. After I got more and more into country music ...
CMA Fest 2019 was just massive to me. So many artists, so many new people - I was just overwhelmed! ...
Facebook, Instagram and all other kinds of internet sources nowadays allow you to (sometimes by chance) find, follow and support ...
The closer CMA Fest 2019 came, the more I became aware of all the side events, which are not happening ...
Country music in Germany has a hard standing. It is still not played in most radio stations - or declared ...
I have to admit that Germany is likely the largest music market, in which the amazing duet "Shallow" of Lady ...
The beginning of March 2019 was a country music powerhouse to me. The Country 2 Country (C2C) debut in Berlin, ...
The "Road to Neuchatel 2019" - as only the Swiss team is qualified for their home World Floorball Championships in ...
You have them on almost every flight. They are located in the seat in front you? The airlines try to ...
No floorball competition is changing that frequently like the Champions Cup. While previous season, six men and women teams each ...
Another six months have passed - the first full half year of Flyctory.com's existance. After I did the Very Important ...
As blogging on music became a quite frequent category at Flyctory.com, I felt to look back to 2018 and introduce ...
Similar to frequent flying, there is a straightforward option to become a status member in all major hotel chains: frequent ...
Though I am a huge opponent of the Davis Cup reformations becoming active in 2019, I have to give in ...
1st July 2018 - we start counting down the days to christmas already. In this posting I resume about what ...
With Miles & More, Lufthansa Group's widely used loyality programme, introducing the concept of Mileage Pooling to their program just ...
There have been so many discussions about Rio 2016. Not just about whether the country itself is able to stand ...
Tianjin, China. Tennis Davis Cup, one of my most beloved sports competitions. He was intended to be the hero, the ...
As you might have seen in the other blog entries, I have been attending Europe's major country music festival, the ...
I typically have some notes of the major currencies I am frequently using at home. I just feel it is ...
Yeah, I have to give in: as a German, you just hated when there has been a race with our ...
Some of you may ask: Why did I choose Wordpress for this site? First of all, my wife Sarah had ...