Tennis

At first the final looked like it would be a remarkably short one. Del Potro looked a little rusty and quickly had to abandon his initial game plan: playing with his usual depth of shot, but with a lot more volume, forcing Nadal to play shoulder height forehand from a meter of two behind his baseline. It's an original strategy, because it's close to impossible to fire winners from there and it takes considerable energy to just be aggressive. If Del Potro could have kept it up, Nadal arm would have fallen off after a set. The flaw in this strategy is that Nadal kept being aggressive and refused to miss, resulting in a long rallies that forced Del Potro to run from left to right again and again. The tower of Tendil realized that with the heat of the day and his previous two matches, his lungs would give up before Nadal's arm. Having to find a new plan, the argentinian tried a little bit of everything and missed a lot. So yeah, at 3-0 for Nadal and 15-40 on the Del Potro serve it looked like it would be a remarkably short final.

At this point, Del Potro said "Fuck it! If my carefully planed Plan B did not work and the rest of the alphabet is even worse, let's go back to my usual Plan A and blow this guy out of the court with my heavy, pacy, flat forehand." And as the rust and the nerves of the beginning of the match had subsided, he did just that. That allowed him to save his serve and then win 5 of the 6 following games to bag the first set.

Nadal certainly did not expect this turnaround, and it was his time to be a bit confused and nervous, which often translates in his game with an overabundance of top spin, making his forehand land short when they actually pass the net. This allowed Del Potro to continue with his barrage of forehand and to get an early break in the second set. But just as the finish line was in sight for the argentinian, some nerves came back and the gas meter found itself in the red. Less effective serving, a little more unforced errors, some wrong choices, that was more than enough for a fighter like Nadal to claw his way back into the set and even leapfrog Del Potro to tie the match at one set all.

The trend continued in the third as Del Potro had to battle for more than 10 minutes to win the opening service game only to see Nadal blitz through his. The writing was on the wall and soon Nadal got the break he needed. Knowing that in the previous round Del Potro fought his way out a 0-3 deficit against the world N?1, his fans cheered him on in hope of such a second wind. They went from despair to elation as at 3-5 0-40 on his serve, he discarded three match point with as many forehands and then held to force Nadal to serve for the match. Loosing match points is the kind of stuff momentum switches are made of, but not on that day. A couple tight shots by Nadal were canceled by a couple unforced errors by Del Potro and the spaniard won a record breaking 22nd Master 1000 title (and his 3rd at Indian Wells, the only non-clay Master 1000 he won multiple times). This success also allows him to climb back to the Club's penthouse at N?4.



I guess two new Master 1000 winners in back to back tournament (as Ferrer won in Paris) would have been too much to ask, but with both Nadal and Federer skipping Miami next week (a combined 43 Master 1000 crowns !!) that mountain should be a tad easier to climb.

A week at a film festival followed by an hectic week and Miami almost went by without a word about it! Going from the dry heat of Indian Wells to the humidity and wind of Miami is always a challenge that gives a little edge to those who had an early exit in the first or had to play qualifiers at the second. That proves true once again as last week's finalist Del Potro had a very poor showing against german journeyman Kamke. That part of the draw opened up even more with Blake ousting Benneteau, Ramos upsetting Monaco and Melzer beating Grannollers. At this point I hoped Blake would make the most of this opportunity to reach the quarter final and face Ferrer against who he has a wining record! Sadly, the marvelous american veteran lost to Ramos in a tight match, leaving the red carpet all to another veteran: Meltzer. The austrian who had been a losing machine for months managed also to win the first set against Ferrer, but his good week stopped there.

Florida, home of the senior citizen? The main story of this past two weeks is the magnificent tennis displayed by a god amongst men: Tommy Haas. The german's home tourney (he lived most of his life in Florida training at the Bollettierri academy) showed him prevail after a rough start against a player on the rise, Sijsling, discard a confiremed young talent, Dolgopolov, following with a clinic of clean ball striking and astute shot selection to beat that young serbian guy known as Novak Djokovic (who never found his rhythm against Haas' variations and in the cold windy night). Why stop there? He allowed Simon to win a mere 4 games in the quarter final... by the way, in five days Tommy Motherfucking Haas will be 36, but before that he will face Ferrer in semi.

The marvel of seeing Haas play is that he is resolutely from another era. His tennis is made of variations, never giving you the same ball twice in order to get the short ball that will allow him to attack and transition to the net. He is not blowing the cover off of every ball, but he is also always looking to attack or to create an opportunity to attack. Smart, all court, offensive tennis. It is only now, with the experience resulting from his years on tour, the serenity provided by his wife and child and the humility of a man who spent enough time in surgery to know that every new day he can play tennis is a gift to savor, that he reached the maturity, the clearness of thoughts, that allows him to execute this game plan with the right balance of patience and aggressiveness. In his first career (that peeked at world N?2 still!) his fiery temper often held him back. In this 9087263rd career that showed him shoot from nowhere to the top 20 (and, at this pace, the top 10!), much less so.



On the other half of the draw, the usual suspect progressed, Murray being only tested for one set by Dimirov (a set the bulgarian served for before loosing it in a breaker). The fourth semi-finalist will be Gasquet though who upset in quarter final a Berdych who hemorrhaged unforced errors (the french avenging his defeat from two weeks ago).

Well, I have been a long time FoH'er and now a RR'er. So I was pleasantly surprised to see a few tennis followers here. I am currently in Charleston for the WTA Family Circle Cup. Watched Serena and Stosur practice this morning as well as others. Also saw a great match between Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Anastasia Rodinova.

It went 3 sets, Sands mixing it up with slices , drop shots and coming to the net, while Rodinova hits a hard, flat ball. The tennis was good, but the drama far better. Rodinova had the chair official come down at least 15 times to check obvious marks in the clay, she claimed the court was too wet after they watered the clay between sets and made the grounds crew come back out, and she tried to pull a " I am too hurt to play, but will try" routine by taking a full 10 minute off court medical timeout. She came back limping around like she couldn't walk, but amazingly still moved like a gazelle once play resumed. Sands won in a 3rd set breaker and gets Sloane Stevens in the Tuesday night match.

Will try to post pictures a bit later.

If Sharapova is known to have very few friends on the tour, Rodionova has the reputation to be detestable, almost insane and with an ego that has no relationship with her skills. She is playing a lot of double though, so I guess she is at the very least tolerable.


EDIT: Oh and Haas finally lost to Ferrer in three sets after leading twice by a break in the decider and Ferrer lost to Murray in three sets after a WTA style break-a-thon third set where Ferrer melted after incorrectly stopping a rally to challenge when he had a match point. To be fair, challenging was the right decision as Murray only had an easy put-away to play, but still... it played with Ferrer's mind. Next stop: Davis Cup Quarter Final and then the pseudo Master 1000 in Monte Carlo (non-mandatory, smaller draw, less top players attending).

Well... I have a subscription tohttp://www.tennistv.com/and I spend too much time playing with the data onhttp://www.atpworldtour.com/Other than that, I also read/watch the players' interviews that are often available on Tennis TV or the website of tournaments. I don't read any tennis blog / news sites. If I stumble upon a tennis related article in a newspaper/magazine, I'll read it though, but that does not happen too often.

So... Monte-Carlo came and went.Djokovicarrived there no knowing if he would play or not as he twisted his ankle in Davis Cup, hobbled through his first two matches and then mowed through the next two rounds (thanks to poor attendance and upsets, that meantNieminenandFognini) and started the final by breakingNadalthree times. The weather was terrible before the match though, so at first the clay was very heavy, giving very little bounce to Nadal's shots. As the sun dried it some, the match got a lot more balanced, but the world N?1 dominated the second set tie-break through and through.

Nadalfound some comfort in winning the ATP 500 of Barcelonna. The 250 in Bucarest was won byRosol(maiden title for the giant slayer), the one in Estoril byWawrinka(including a surprisingly one way final against World N?4Ferrer) and, last but not least, Munich was dominated byTommy 'God Amongst Men' Haas, pushing him up to the 13th spot on the ranking.

That brings us to the ATP Master 1000 of the week: Madrid. No slippery blue clay this year, just the regular red stuff with plenty of bad bounces (clay courts need to settle over time and that's the third built in five years). Two rounds have been played, here is the situation:

Dimitrovpulled the upset of the week in a dramatic match. The guy gave a Nadal a run for his money in Monte-Carlo, lost a close one to Murray in Miami and served for the first set against Djokovic in Indian Wells. Yesterday, against the World N?1, history seemgly repeated itself asDjokovic[1] broke Dimitrov at the end of the first set to force a tie-break, but this time Dimitrov won it and went on to take a lead in the second, playing confidently some brilliant attacking tennis with a lot of variations. Things cooled down for a bit has Djokovic almost ran over his ankle and had a medical time out. As it was more fear than pain, the serb went on, clawing his way back into the match with his typical never say die attitude. An attitude seen as a bit too feisty for a major favorite against a young underdog that rapidly turned the whole crowd against him. Drama reached new heights when Dimitrov started cramping (talent is not a substitute for fitness) and got dragged into another breaker. My gut feeling as it started was that Djokovic would wipe him out and that the bulgarian would then withdraw. The scenario proved very different as Dimitrov tried to hang tough and even managed to turn the tie-break around, earning match points as the whole Casa Magica was chanting "Dimitrov! Dimitrov!" A very pissed off Djokovic shut them up by winning the breaker 10-8 and returned to his chair vociferating and gesticulating against the public (not helping his case one bit). More surprisingly, Dimitrov did not call it quit. In fact, he hung tough, tried to play shorter points and even managed to break early. Even more surprising was that, at 5-3, Djokovic served to stay in the match and force the young bulgarian to close (which he failed to do in their previous three sets) and played a terrible, terrible game, much to the crowd and his opponent's delight.
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Wawrinka[15]. Not much to say here...

Verdascois playing better these days and managed to edge pastRaonic[12]. An interesting twist of fate as his downfall and Raonic's raise came as the canadian beat the spaniard twice back to back.
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Tsonga[7].

Murray[3] is not that great on clay so far, as he got properly slaughtered by Wawrinka in Monte-Carlo and he barely made it through against tricky customerFlorian Mayerher in Madrid.
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Simon[16] reached the third round after two good wins over dangerous compatriotsBenneteauandChardy.

AndersonupsetMonacowho himself had upsetTipsarevic[9].
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Berdych[6] prevailed in a very tough battle against big hitting (and drop shot lover!)Janowicz.



Nadal[5] got challenged byPairebut there was always an aura of inevitability in this one.
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Youzhny, believe it or not, won for a fifth straight time againstAlmagro[11]. I guess the russian has a way to get under the spaniard's skin and forces him to go for too much and make error. He'll also look for a fifth win over Nadal (for nine defeats), but I would not expect a repeat of the 2008 Chennai final (Nadal scored a single game that day... not too sure what happened!).

Haas[13] destroyed the very competent Seppi and managed to win in straight sets a pretty tricky match against fellow veteran Robredo.
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Ferrer[4] hung tough againstIstomin. Not sure what's up with Istomin by the way. I like his demeanor on court, he has a big game without going too crazy with it yet he win a lot les matches than he should. A confidence problem maybe.

Gimeno-Traver, a journeyman really, posted two solid wins againstLopezandGasquet[8] to reach the third round. A big opportunity considering his opponent.
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Andujar, a journeyman really, posted two huge wins againstCilic[10]andIsnerto reach the third round. A big opportunity considering his opponent. By the way, the organizers are not too cool, because they sent this all spanish underdog battle on an outside court.

Nishikori[14] is sneaky good. The guy just made light work of Melzer and Troicki. I am not sure how much he likes clay as he is a product of Florida, but he really has the tools to play a very good clay game with his footwork and great forehand.
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Federer[2] started his title defense by a convincing win in a relatively hard fought match againstStepanek. Nishikori could very well proved tricky, but if, he passes that hurdle, I don't see him go down to one of the two journeymen, which should give us a Nadal vs Federer semi even if Nadal has not his work cut out for him.



If one of the usual suspect is expected to reach the final in the bottom half (unless... TOMMY HAAS!), the top half is more intriguing with Djokovic out and Murray unconvincing. Wawrinka and Verdasco are the two players who enjoy clay the most, but a Tsonga or a Berdych will hit through you even if they don't like finding clay in their washing machine.

Great summary Szlia. I don't comment as much as I read since I am usually on my Ipad in bed and typing is annoying. But I wanted to say I really enjoy your commentary. What do you think of the woman's draw? Serena's tournament to lose?

I have not followed the WTA for a while so I am not sure who is in form and who is not at the moment. That said, Serena is the heavy favorite whenever she plays. Consider this, in 27 matches this year she lost just the two and one was the crazy upset against Sloane Stephens at the Australian Open (Stephens who lost six matches and won just the three since then...). Her other loss came to Azarenka who is no longer in the draw. Still in the draw though are quality players, including two Roland Garros winners in Sharapova and Ivanovic and a finalist in Errani. It should also be said that Serena is a very good front runner. The usual scenario of her matches is that she starts strong and just smothers and overpower her opponent. For her it's a virtuous circle of winners beget confidence begets more winners and for the opponent a vicious circle of despair begets unforced errors beget more despair. When the opponent manages to enter the match though, by breaking early or holding for two or three service games, it all becomes more competitive.

As I am writing this, it's 3-2 for Kirilenko in the first with no break. There could be a match.

So yeah... after I posted, Kirilenko won one of the following 11 games... Anyway: ATP.


Wawrinka[15] was keen to not be the other victim ofDimitrov, but the bulgarian started things just like he left them two days ago (but without the cramping!). Great variations off both wings, finding the right offensive balance, serving well: good stuff. Wawrinka was not ready for the level of play and you felt that at the start there was a bit of one-up-manship going on, both having a not too dissimilar sort of play. In the diagonal of the backhands, Dimitrov stood his ground more than well and was often the one dealing the blow down the line before the swiss. Dimitrov also dealt the first blow in the break department, but Wawrinka broke back, leveled things up, only to drop serve minutes later and see the giant slay bag the first set under the cheers of the bulgarian fans. Irritated by the turn of events, the somewhat undisciplined crowd and the umpire's inability to prevent cheers during the rallies, Wawrinka still managed to funnel his frustration into much better serving and the match turned into big boys warfare. These guys were throwing just about everything at each other short of the kitchen sink and both managed to defend so well that we witnessed in total awe grueling rally after grueling rally where the attacker tried desperately to put the ball away hitting harder and harder and the defender trying desperately to find length in his defensive shots to get a neutral shot in return allowing to become the aggressor. It was scary stuff and at this game Wawrinka proved the tougher of the two and bagged the second set. As the swiss took an early lead in the third, it became obvious that Dimitrov was paying the price of his heroics from two days prior. Unforced error came thick and fast, the head started to drop and Wawrinka ruthlessly thwarted any hint of a revolt. Dimitrov lost today, but he made it pretty clear that he will be a major threat sooner than later.
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Tsonga[7] also lost his first set toVerdascoand rallied back (in a match I did not see).

Murray[3] took the court with the attitude of someone ready to lose. Bothered by a stiff left hip, made to work hard bySimon's usual backboard strategy, making way too many unforced errors, he rapidly found himself a set and a break down. Maybe his hip loosened up a little, maybe he managed to find some of the proverbial fighting spirit he has often been accused of lacking, he managed to collect his mind, become patient and try to beat Simon at his own game. Rallies ensued. But if the rallies in the Wawrinka vs Dimitrov match were a high octane affair akin to a boxing match on cocaine, he it was more of a marathon, followed by a marathon, followed by another marathon. Consistency and cool mind are the keys here because the second time you make an unforced error on the 20th shot of a rally you are just about ready to eat your racket. Things got a lot tenser and a lot more competitive this way. Things even tipped in favor of Murray as he got a little more free points on serve and was a lot more aggressive returning the Simon's second offering. As Murray won the second set and rushed to a 3-0 lead in the decider, it seemed like a done deal, but Simon rallied back, putting a little more on his shot while still refusing to make the errors. The frenchman could not find a second break though, but managed to save a couple match point on the way to a breaker. Murray took the lead here only to see Simon save another couple match points. The irony of it all is that at 7-6 for Murray, Simon played a good point, moved Murray around and followed an excellent inside out forehand to the net, showing a commendable willingness to take matters in his own hand at such a critical juncture (much to the happiness of every tennis coach around the world), but he put the pretty trivial volley in the net.
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Berdych[6] spent the evening laughing at the Murray vs Simon match as he managed to narrowly edge pastAndersonat the end of both sets of his victory.


Nadal[5] was not overly challenged byYouzhny.
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Ferrer[4] found himself in a tough battle againstHaas. The spanish N?1 found an opening late in the first, but that just pissed off Haas who raised is already good level considerably to win the second set and take a lead in the third. The bulk of both the winners and the unforced errors came from Haas' racket as he tried to be the aggressor, but Ferrer relentlessly tried to make the german play another shot, ideally one where he would go for too much and miss or not enough and give the spaniard an opportunity to dictate play with his forehand. Haas lead 4-2, but Ferrer's rear guard action, carried by the Madrid crowd allowed the spaniard to prevail 6-4. Here is to hoping he manages to have the same never say die attitude when playing his next match, because if he just lies down waiting to get his head chopped off like he too often does on clay against Nadal, I'll certainly regret not seeing Haas in his stead.

Andujarbecame the beneficiary ofGimeno-Travermissfortune. A bit sad that the battle of the journeymen ended by a retirement at 5-5 in the first set. Really terrible for Gimeno-Traver as it is very unlikely he will ever have such a shot at a Master 1000 quarter finale. To add insult to injury, the draw opened up even more.
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Nishikori[14] won. More than that: he made it look like a routine win. In the first set,Federerhad trouble with all his shots. Making too many unforced errors, unable to find depth and penetration, returning very poorly... only the serve, firing on all cylinders, kept him afloat as Nishikori played a very clean game, taking on just about everything that landed short with his forehand. The thing with the Japanese N?1 is that he has a very good forehand. The amount of work he puts on the ball allows him to both find great depth with great net clearance or find short angles with fast shots. So basically, if you give him time to set his feet and hit a forehand, you'll run. One bad service game from Federer resulted in a set for Nishikori. In the second set, the title defender found a couple extra gears. He moved Nishikori from left to right but also from back to front with the spin variations that filled his trophy cabinet. As things became a lot less comfortable for the japanese player, Federer rushed through the second set. So, when Nishikori found himself 0-30 down on his serve at the beginning of the third, it almost felt like a done deal, but four missed returns later, it was the first set all over again. A flat Federer making errors against a Nishikori playing a clean game without having to do anything extraordinary. This resulted in a break for the japanese and, cherry on top, as Federer served to stay in the match and force Nishikori to close it on his delivery, the swiss played another poor and, more shockingly, tame service game to let Nishikori through. I guess two months off and a new surface is a bit too much to be able to compete well.



Very intriguing end of tournament here. You have a Wawrinka vs Tsonga which is the remake of a thriller from last year's French Open, you have a tired Murray who has to go from Simon to the polar opposite in Berdych, you have the two top spaniards going at it and then you have a very much in form journeyman who legitimately thinks he has a shot against Nishikori considering he beat Cilic and Isner.

Another day, another round.

Wawrinka[15] started the match just like he ended the previous one: hitting big on both wings and painting the lines. His meetings withTsongahave almost always been long and hard fought battles ending with Tsonga as the victor, but the swiss leading 5-0 after 20 minutes seemed to indicate it was exception night. Known for his offensive game and big serve, Tsonga was forced to do a lot of defending. To make it that much tougher, Wawrinka often forced him into backhand battles. A three way catch 22 for the frenchmen as he could try and go for the tougher shot down the line with his backhand, try to withstand Wawrinka's barrage and hope the swiss will miss or play short first or, last but not least, try the Hail Mary and run around the backhand to hit a forehand on Wawrinka's heavy and well angled shots. Near the end of the set though Wawrinka cooled off a little and Tsonga managed to set foot in the match by holding and then breaking the swiss. Not enough to save the first set, but planting the seed of a possible rebellion. Tsonga did not see the stats of the first set, but he certainly felt one them: 15 winners to 1 in favor of Wawrinka. He had to be more aggressive, to be the one striking first and moving the opponent around. Easier said than done, but with a Wawrinka missing a little more and Tsonga's will to stop getting bullied around, the match got a lot closer and it culminated in an epic tie-breaker where Tsonga had to pull rabbits out of hats on a match points to stay alive and force a decider. Full credit to Wawrinka, he did not blink despite his history of close loss to Tsonga. He broke early in the third and managed to keep just enough intensity to reach the finish line unscathed.
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Berdych[6] was known to be a bit of a head case, a guy that threw match away when things did not go his way. That's definitely a thing of the past and he proved it again today. He had to fight hard for every single of his service game against aMurraythat performed better than in his previous matches, but he hung tough, calmly looking forward instead of dwelling on the past. He played an excellent tie-breaker to bag the first set, broke early in the second, blinked, lost serve. but kept his cool. As the match went deep in the second set, Berdych's domination became clearer and clearer as Murray became more and more agitated. A break and a hold and Berdych was through. As I write this, he must be sleeping with the added comfort of knowing that Wawrinka and Tsonga stepped on court very late and he will certainly be in a good mood tomorrow morning when he'll learned they played until 1:30 am.


Nadal[5] pulled some Houdini trick today. He started the match playing very poorly. Unable to produce any depth or speed with his backhand,Ferrer'only' had to insist on it to get unforced errors or mid court balls to attack. Nadal tried to slice some, but here again his shots were lacking the bite of a good slice, allowing Ferrer to run around them and unleash his forehand. To make things even worse, the poor quality of Nadal's backhand on the day put inordinate pressure on his forehand and as a result he also missed a lot with that shot. Still the match was competitive. Why? Because Nadal was still able to have here and there flashes of brilliance and because his aura was still there, making Ferrer often second guess himself and make the most absurd shot selection. Still, Ferrer broke to take the first set and was in a good position through the second set. In fact, returning at 5-6 15-30 he played a brilliant point, got a floating ball from Nadal that he 'just' had to put away to get two match points, but he played to Nadal instead of to the open court and out of genius, instinct or good old fashioned luck, Nadal managed to produce a reflex half-volley lob that turned the point around. From then on, it was all Nadal. The boost in confidence allowed him to clean his act and Ferrer just could get over the fact that he was two point away and should have had match points. Nadal won the breaker 7-3 and the decider 6-0.
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Andujarhas a decent underdog game. By that I mean he defends well enough, has a good sense of the territorial battle that is a clay court tennis match, trying to push the opponent away from his line with deep bouncy shots and is not afraid to go for it when he has opportunities.Nishikori, possibly feeling some post giant-killing hangover, played an ok first set, but just could not string enough good points together to break Andujar or have easy service games. The opportunities were there, he got eight break points in the set, but he could not convert and payed the price: Andujar broke first and won the first set. Nishikori kept his cool, knowing that he had opportunities and that he had to be more forceful and execute better, but maybe he stayed a little too cool and expected things to fall into place naturally, maybe he fell into the classic 'I just beat the World N?2 so why I am not blowing the Word N?113 away?' mental trap. Anyway, as Andujar competed better, he broke again and later served for the match. Suddenly, Andujar seemingly realized the magnitude of the situation and could not find a first serve to save his life. Nishikori did not let this opportunity pass and broke to level things at 5-5. A cruel turn of events for Andujar who, earlier in the set, missed an easy smash to be two breaks up. At that point I thought:'Here we go! Nishikori will play better, win the second set and it will be a one man show in the third, just like Nadal earlier.' I was dead wrong. You now that kind of dip in tension some players get after winning a tough set that can cost them an early break? Nishikori just had that after managing to break back at the last possible moment. Result: a terribad game and a break for Andujar who could not beleive his luck to be gifted a second bite at the cherry. The guy took it and closed the match. Not bad for a guy who did not win two main draw match in a row since august of last year and in the last 12 months won just 10 of the 40 main draw matches he played!


It should be noted that the four quarter finals resulted in four upsets (even if the Nadal win over Ferrer is an upset on paper only).


Wawrinka vs Berdych is a tough one to call. I was surprised to see how well Berdych moved on clay and the quality of some of his defensive plays. This newfound clay flair coupled with his offensive arsenal make him a tough nut to crack. Let's hope Wawrinka will recover well so we get a good match. As for the other semi, it will be interesting to see the attitude of Andujar. Will he be able to go on with his positive mind set or will he freeze in front of the King of Clay and get annihilated? His brilliant run deserves a better reward than two bagels.

On the WTA side of things, the semi are Williams (former French Open winner) vs Errani (last French Open finalist) and Sharapova (French Open title holder) vs Ivanovic (former French Open winner). Not bad!

Martina Hingis needs to unretire again.

She is coaching now! I saw her working for Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova the other day. Hingis' mother is also still coaching, she is trying to turn a talented swiss teenager called Belinda Bencic into a pro.

Hey things did not end past midnight this time, so we already know who will be the finalists.

Wawrinka[15] somehow prevailed. He jumped onBerdychfrom the get go to break and managed to defend somewhat laboriously his own deal, well helped by a Berdych making a number of unforced errors and just unable to capitalize on Wawrinka's low first serve percentage. To make things worse, the world N?6 played a poor game at 5-3, surrendering his deal and the first set with a double fault. Both players were far from the best they displayed during the week and, on both sides, unforced errors were aplenty. Wawrinka's intensity dropped somewhat in the second, maybe paying the price for the amount of tennis he played as of late, and this allowed Berdych to make more inroads when returning. Since the czech also served more efficiently, the balance decidedly tipped in his favor which materialism in a break and a match leveled at one set all. Wawrinka was really threading on ice with his service games in the beginning of the third, missing a lot of first serves and having trouble dealing with his opponent's deep returns. He conceded a break early and found himself 2-4 15-40 down. So really, almost as good as two match points for Berdych. Was the Wawrinka Syndrom (playing tight matches against top players and losing in the end) back? Nope. Wawrinka found a second wind, a spark, and not only did he save his game, but he broke and held again to lead 5-4. Even the mentally improved Berdych was a bit shaken by this turn of event. Serving to stay in the match, the titan crumbled. Wawrinka astutely went to the Berdych forehand, a powerful but somewhat unreliable shot under pressure and milked errors from it to break and win. Stan The Man. A big big disappointment for Berdych through as he had a foot in Sunday's final when he tripped.
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Nadal[5], as expected, made light work ofAndujar.


Much to my surprise, not only did Nadal win all his eight matches against Wawrinka, but he also did so without losing a single of the 17 sets they played. If you take a closer look though, you notice that five of them are 7-6 or 7-5 sets and there are also a bunch of 6-4. The thing is that, looking at the stats of their recent matches, Wawrinka seems to have a lot of trouble getting break points. The silver lining for the swiss though is that for his previous matches against Nadal, it hardly ever was with the kind of form and confidence he is having currently. In the 'pro' column is also the fact it is not his first Master 1000 final as he already reached this stage of the competition in Rome in 2008 (lost to Djokovic in three sets). As far as match-up go, you can argue that Nadal can make it tough for Wawrinka if he plays high bouncing balls on the swiss single handed backhand (I can think of another swiss guy who does not enjoy that too much), but Wawrinka also has in his arsenal a shot that works well against Nadal: the flat, deep, pacy backhand cross court, the anti-Nadal strategy being to neutralize him on his backhand side and then attack cross court. The spaniard being always ready to dance around his backhand to hit a forehand and also having a big swing with this shot is often in trouble when he has to rush to the forehand corner of the court to defend. Djokovic has that shot, Federer, with the low indoor bounce, also has that shot. The countermeasure that Nadal put in place is being more aggressive with his backhand, but, as seen against Ferrer this week, Nadal's backhand is currently not exactly where he wants it to be, so there might be room here for Wawrinka to exploit this chink in the armor.


On the WTA side of things, Williams overpowered Errani (even if the diminutive clay-courter put up a good fight) and Sharapova was just a little more opportunistic to prevail against Ivanovic. Fun fact: if Sharapova wins she is back to world N?1. Not so fun fact for her: her recent record against Williams is not good at all.

Wawrinka started his final poorly, immediately giving good looks to a Nadal that was much sharper than in his previous matches. The spaniard still made some uncharacteristic errors, but it was more than evened out by the number of unforced errors and the bad shot selections of the swiss. Not only did Wawrinka lost his serve twice, but he did not even get crumbs during Nadal's service games. It felt like we would be in for a very short final, but lead 4-0 a pissed off Wawrinka just fired four winners in quick succession to hold in less than a minute. From then on, the match was slightly more competitive, but still leaning in Nadal's favor, mostly because of his domination in his service games and of Wawrinka's inconsistency, constructing points brilliantly here only to miss routine shots there. A break in the middle of the second set was all it took for a too routine 6-2 6-4 victory, pushing Nadal two units ahead of Federer in the 'most Masters 1000 / Master Serie / Super 9' category with 23.

No rest for the braves as the Master 1000 in Rome began today. Nadal has a first round bye, so will probably not play before Wednesday, but Wawrinka has no such luxury, so it's Tuesday for him at the very best. In his stead, I would drop out of the event and use the two weeks until the French Open to rest and make myself 100% healthy.



As for the WTA, the usual suspect, Williams, prevailed 6-1 6-4 over Sharapova, but the World N?1 had to fight from a break down in the second set.

Yep... Wawrinka drudged through his first round match in Rome, won, but withdrew before the 2nd round because of a thigh bothering him.

Watching Murray at the moment and he is still bothered by his hip/lower back on the left side and is on the path of defeat against Granollers who is playing a very clean, smart, offensive match. Murray's situation is different than Wawrinka's because the swiss played a lot of clay court tennis (the flip side of success), so he will (hopefully) be fit and ready for the French. Murray started the european clay court swing somewhat injured and as a result could not play well and as a result did not play a lot of matches. A catch 22 really: should he have taken full rest and arrived at the French with little to no clay court preparation? He chose to try to play, but now he'll arrive at the French with few clay court matches, an injury that is worse than a month ago and really nothing to draw confidence on...

As I write that, Murray fought back from two breaks down in the second.... an I have to go!

So: let's take a quick look at Rome's draw now that the first two rounds are done.

Djokovic [1]
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Dolopolovbenefited fromWawrinka's withdrawal (seeing the draw, now it makes even more sense, you don't want to play Djokovic when not 100% fit, especially if you know that you have a shot when fit and that you may play him in a couple weeks at the French).

The ukrainian is too up and down to be a real threat. He has weapons though, but he would need a full match of top drawer stuff to win and he has not delivered that in a while.

Andersonblew awayMelzerand edged pastCilic [11].
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Berdych [6]

The guys played seven times in the last two years and Berdych always won, but there are a number of tie-break sets and matches going the distance in there. Berdych is probably a little better, a little more consistent and that little bit more confident in the end of sets and matches. That's why he is in the Top 10 and Anderson 'only' in the Top 30.


Ferrer [4]had to go the distance againstVerdasco.
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KohlschreiberbeatRaonic [14]in the first round. It shows you how brutal the Master 1000 events are. With only 16 seeds there are some top quality players that go unseeded.

Ferrer is the heavy favorite here, but Kohlschreiber is having a good clay court swing so it could be fun to watch.


Gulbisemerged from a part of the draw where the seed had been replaced by a lucky loser (when a seed withdraw after the draw is made, he is replaced by a player who lost in the final qualifying round - a lucky loser) by somehow finding a way to beatNieminenwhile playing poorly and then he trashedTroickiwho is going through a crisis these days.
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Nadal [5]was untroubled by italian mad manFognini.

Gulbis is playing well this year. In fact he went from 130ish to 46 and he only lost to Top 20 players. He won the first set when he faced Nadal in Indian Wells earlier in the year and they played a semi final that went the distance in Rome in 2010. Here again, Nadal is the heavy favorite, but it will be fun to see I am sure (win or lose, all matches involving Gulbis are fun, because you know you will see outrageous winners, crazy shot selection, funny banter, temper tantrum... entertainment!).



Del Potro [7]is back.
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PairebeatMonacoandBenneteauwho beatAlmagro [12].

Two good wins for Paire who is on the rise in the rankings. His strange mix of power and finesse could cause Del Potro problems. We know the argentinian is not too happy when he has to move up and down the court and Paire is a member of the crazy drop shot club.


Chardymanaged to beat bothLopezandNishikori [16]. Considering the guy is usually the artisant of his own downfall, him winning against two quality players in a row must mean he is feeling the ball well and has both his serve and forehand firing. In the rare moments it happens, he is very tough to play.
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Granollersfinally lost the second set in a breaker toMurray [3]after being two breaks up, but the World N?2 called it quit after that.

Murray injured or not, Granollers played a seriously good first set and also a good second set until the medical time-out that made him lose his focus somewhat. I am sure both players will relish the opportunity to reach the fourth round, especially to play against Del Potro, who, since his early march heroics in Indian Wells (beat Haas, Murray and Djokovic and pushed Nadal to a decider in the final), played only four matches and won just the two.


Janowiczstunned the tennis world at the end of last year by reaching the final of Paris' Master 1000., but in 2013 he had a pretty tame 6 wins for 9 losses record, with no good scalp to show. He pushed it to 7 wins in his first round against Giraldo, a solid clay-courter, and to 8 wins after beatingTsonga [8]in a solid match where he converted his only break opportunity, did not let his opponent into any of his service games and played a rock solid tie-breaker to seal the deal.
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Gasquet [9]wins a lot of matches these days. He posted some good wins in 2013, but he still can play the odd bad match. In the second round he disposed ofDimitrovin a business-like 6-4 6-4.

These two played in Indian Wells and Janowicz got spanked, but with the confidence boost that is the Tsonga win, this could be a lot more competitive this time around.


Simonafter a poor start, managed to turn the table onYouzhnywho played a 'walking on water' match againstHaas [13]in the first round.
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Federer [2]was sluggish in Madrid against Nishikori, but really pump'ed up againstStaraceand he really mowed through his opponent.

Simon is actually one of Federer's Nemeses. The french lead 2-0 in their head to head and the swiss brought that to 2-2 with a five setter at the AO in 2011 and a retirement. It's really the style of Simon that rubs Federer the wrong way. The GOAT rushes his opponents by taking the ball early and redirecting the pace sent at him. Since Simon gives no pace to the ball, Federer has to generate his own pace to try and rush Simon and in the process makes more errors. Another source of points for Federer is his variations that put players out of their comfort zone and make them miss when they try to go for too much in not good enough of a position. This also does not work with Simon, because he is very patient and very conservative in his shot selection. You will not draw an unforced error out of Simon with variations, his very mechanical shot production allows for extreme consistency and he does not mind playing long rallies: he does that all year long. The clay tends to make defending easier too, so it should be a nail-biter.




As you can see, there has been a 'seedicide' in Rome as only 7 of the 16 seeds made it through to the third round and there is not a single part of the draw where both seeds made it through to the third round! My (pretty safe) bet is that we will still have at least 5 seeds in the next round.

So... Gulbis is destroying Nadal at the moment. 5-0 in 19 min of insane first strike tennis. Can he keep it up?

What's in store for the quarter finals:

Djokovic[1]was not troubled by Dolgopolov.
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Berdych[6]once again proved that he is just a little better than Anderson.

Court surface (clay) and past meetings (13-1 for Djokovic) put the serb as the heavy favorite on paper. In fact, beating Berdych is always tough. You have to hope he is not in a great day or that, should he take a lead in the match, he gets nervous. I expect a competitive match, no matter the outcome.


Ferrer[4]won without playing as Kohlschreiber was ill (symptom: vertigo).
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Nadal[5]dodged a latvian bullet. At some point in the first set, Nadal was serving 0-5 0-30 down and had won a total of 8 (eight!) of the 30 points played. If you count on your finger you'll notice that, at this stage, Nadal had yet to get a game point or even reach a deuce! Gulbis was just turning just about every shot into winners or putting so much pressure on Nadal he would draw a fault or a short ball to dispatch. At around this point though Gulbis turned back into his human form and made some errors. This allowed Nadal to step into the match and put a foot in the door so to speak. Still, for the bulk of the two sets that followed, Gulbis was the one making the points and the mistakes. Here and there, Nadal managed to pin Gulbis back and make him play defensively, but even there, even if this pattern that Nadal enjoys (dictating with the forehand as the opponent runs), Gulbis proved a tough nut to crack, moving well, chasing down balls and managing to produce depth, pace and/or angles to turn the tides of some of these rallies (the backhand cross court was astonishing in that regard). In tennis, there are good errors and bad errors. A good error is when you take a risk at the right time, but miss long. Bad errors are when shot selection is poor or when balls that just wait to get dispatched are not dealt with. The problem with Gulbis was not the number of errors he made, but the number and timing of the bad errors he made. Clusters of those cost him games in the middle of both the second and third sets. Both time he managed to break back and both times another poor game caused is downfall. In the end, he hit a massive 59 winners (many bludgeoning blows, but also a number of clean volleys, deft drop shots or acutely angled groundstrokes) for 50 unforced errors (+9). Nadal had 13 winners and 19 unforced errors (-6) but still won in the end. Credit to him for just surviving the barrage of winners, keep his spirit up and just try to make things as tricky as possible for Gulbis. Late in the match, he had some success drawing errors by returning high, deep, loopy balls with no pace, not only tempting Gulbis to go for too much too soon and miss, but also giving himself some time to move up from is extraordinarily deep return position.

I am not too sure what the story is, but I think it ends with Nadal winning.


Pairewon a badge of honor from the crazy drop shot club by using the shot over and over and then playing long slices mascarading as drop shots, making Del Potro's life miserable. The guy must be looking forward to the end of the clay court season.
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Granollerswas a break behind in the third set, but he still managed to prevail through a clever mix of clay court tennis (moving the opponent around, pushing him back with top spin) and double expertise (transitioning well to the net, hitting tough volleys for winners) that proved too hot to handle for Chardy's monolithic 'see ball - hit hard' strategy.

Granollers' no-nonsense approach to the game and his good net abilities (not only the execution of the shots, but also the selection of the shots and the net position to take after hitting the shots) can match up well against Paire's lack of consistency and his drop shot that will bring Granollers to the net. The frenchman has more weapons, but will he use them well enough? Who will handle the pressure of the opportunity better?


Janowiczlooked down and out early in the second set when he got broken by Gasquet... he argued the line call in pure form, the umpire went to check the mark and... decided Gasquet's volley was out. The frenchman could not believe it and, seeing the replay, it seemed like he had a case (the umpire probably misread the mark or got the wrong one). This gave a serious second wind to Janowicz and a serious blow on the head of Gasquet. Losing the second set in a tie-break did not help and losing the match in the decider certainly will encourage him to mail a DVD of the match to the umpire! Note that later in the match, the man in the chair also missed an obvious double bounce which favored Gasquet, so the frenchman will need to cut that before sending the DVD!
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Federer[2]blitzed through Simon. We talked about the consistency of Simon, the long rallies he forces onto the opponents... well... Simon was a little off today and Federer was in a killer mood so we did not see that many rallies in the 6-1 6-2 victory!

I think this one is hanging on very few parameters that have a high variance, making the outcome difficult to predict. How will they serve? How will they return? How consistent will they be? I can see this match turning into a festival of unreturned serves with the outcome determined by a couple loose games. Janowicz is more likely to be the one serving the loose games, but again, maybe he'll have two in the same set and Federer will have a couple loose points on serve in two tie-breakers... the absolute reference being Karlovic beating Federer in a third set by winning a single point on the swiss' serve! Maybe we'll have this time the nail-biter I predicted for the previous round?

So:

Berdych[6]was down and out. He played some clean service games to love, played some decent return games, but every time Djokovic [1] managed to bring a game to 30-30 or deuce, every time it became a battle, Djokovic won. Defending better, returning better, more consistent... basically doing everything a little better than Berdych. When you win all the battles there is a good chance you will win the war so we relatively quickly managed to find ourselves at 6-2 5-2 for the World N?1. Berdych won his serve to get to 5-3. Berdych explained in the post match interview that something amusing happened at that point. It was time for the new balls, which most players use to also change their racket (the idea being that the tighter strings help control the livelier balls), and Berdych almost did not change racket, not wanting to bother for the one game remaining... and did it anyway, thinking 'one never knows, maybe an opportunity will arise.' It did. Djokovic, a bit bothered by the uneven ground at the spot he uses to serve lost a little bit of focus and out of nowhere found himself broken. Worse: from then on, surfing a wave of confidence, Berdych became the one winning all the battles. That translated into a 7-5 set for Berdych. Things got a little more balanced in the third, but after Berdych manufactured an early break and this time he did not get Wawrinka'ed and closed it.
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Nadal[5]against Ferrer in one statistic: break point conversion in the first set. Ferrer: 0/6. Nadal: 1/1. Seriously? It seemed Ferrer would build great points, get an opportunity and then miss or have Nadal produce a miraculous shot (with a variable quantity of luck involved). Once again, the whole strategy was to force Nadal to defend with the forehand and attack with the backhand (making him significantly worse than when he does the opposite) and Ferrer executed it better in the second set, winning it 6-4 (with a very WTA-ish five breaks of serve), but then faded. I mean he still fought, but the door closed all the same.

Berdych has the power to take it to Nadal, but his relatively flat shots could prove too much of a liability if he has to hit three or four great shots in a row to go through the spaniard.


Paireonly left Granollers crumbs in a 6-1 6-1 trashing (that I did not see).
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Federer[2]said after the match that since there must be a winner in a tennis match, the outcome can become close to random if both players play well, giving credit to the quality of play and high spirit Janowicz brought to the court (in stark contrast with Nadal commenting after his win over Gulbis that being the best is not about hitting 165 km/h winners, but about finding a way to win, concluding that the best player won...). The polish sensation indeed went for his shots from the get go and was the first to have opportunities to break. Refusing to move back and serving very well (he out-aced Janowicz by a huge margin and in the process became the first player to serve more than 8000 aces in his career), Federer saved his neck and later managed to make the most of a sloppy game at 5-4 to win the opening set. Janowicz was not phased and fired a cluster of winners to break in the first return game of the second set. The underdog managed to keep his nose in front through the set until 5-4, but a topsy-turvy game, filled with great serves, double faults, brilliant returns by Federer and some serious slices of luck brought the match to 5-5. Two games and a one-sided tie-breaker later, Federer was through.

I am always worried when Federer plays against talented but somewhat crazy guys, because the match can turn into an exhibition where the swiss tries to prove he can play even crazier shots than his opponent. The worst is when he plays Malice and Paire has a somewhat similar profile (a lanky figure and a mix of power and finesse). That said, they faced each other twice and Paire has yet to break Federer once.


A Federer vs Nadal final seems a lot more likely than a Berdych vs Paire one.