While the upsets continue in London, the bleeding seems to have finally ended in Halle, as Federer and Hewitt have moved through to the semifinals with little difficulty. They'll face a pair of Germans for the chance to meet in the final - Petzschner and Becker, who really don't have much realistic expectation of staging an upset, either one. Hewitt and Federer are two of the last three people to win Wimbledon, and it would be perfect to see them facing off in the final of a grass-court warm-up event. I'm sure the organizers would like to see that take place, as well. But there's one more round to go before that happens...
In Queen's, like I said, the upset bug is back. Murray ended up losing to Fish when the match resumed, going down in a third set tiebreak. Fish then came back and beat Michael Llodra later in the day. Very impressive display from the American, who started the year strong but stumbled during the clay season. He'll be glad to be back in a semifinal, and rather than facing Rafael Nadal, he'll get another Spaniard - Feliciano Lopez! F-Lo managed the biggest upset in a week of upsets by beating Nadal, who was on a 24-match win streak and a huge winning streak on grass as well! Big win for Lopez, who has twice been a Wimbledon quarterfinalist. Unlike most Spaniards, I believe that grass is his favorite surface. Not the best way for Nadal to start off his new reign as world number one, but still - very impressive.
The other half of the draw is just about as surprising. Dudi Sela couldn't follow up his win over Andy Roddick and lost to Rainer Schuettler. The veteran German gets American Sam Querry in the semis, as Querrey ousted Xavier Malisse, who toppled Novak Djokovic. Anybody who picked Querrey and Fish into the semifinals here without having Roddick make it that far deserves to win their pool. It seems very likely at this point that we'll have at least one American in the final, and there's not a bad chance of having two.
Put that together with Blake coming back into action next week, and you might even forget how perilously close we are to not having an American in the top ten for the first time in who knows how long. In any case, it's a good weekend of tennis, in Halle and in London.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Friday, June 11, 2010
Week 23 Quarterfinals
We're most of the way through the first week of the grass court season, and things are pretty bizarre. In Halle, six of the eight seeds are already out of action. The only players remaining are Roger Federer and Lleyton Hewitt. Five of the remaining eight players are actually German, if you can believe that. Considering that there were only eight Germans in the draw to begin with, that's a pretty impressive line-up. That said, I think the odds of a German taking home the Halle title are pretty small, since Federer is still there. I was wrong when I mentioned that Haas beat Fed here last year - Federer didn't play Halle after he won the French Open. Haas beat Djokovic to win the title.
So that means that Federer is riding a ridiculous winning streak in Halle - it's got to be one of the longest winning streaks of any player at any tournament, if not the longest. I don't know who's going to beat him. Kohlschreiber is 0-4 against Federer, and he's really the toughest competition remaining, with the exception of Hewitt. It would be a pretty intense meltdown from Fed if he fails to break his title-less streak and continue his unbeaten run in Halle.
In Queens, things were rolling along as one might expect until today, when everything went to hell. There was some trouble with rain, and here are the casualties: Gasquet withdrew with a back injury, Roddick lost to Dudi Sela, Djokovic lost to Xavier Malisse, Cilic lost to Llodra, and Andy Murray was tied 3-all in the third against Mardy Fish when the match was called on account of darkness. And Nadal nearly lost to Denis Istomin of all people. Sometimes, unusual weather can be a real leveler.
A lot of the players who lost were really hoping to get some match practice in before Wimbledon, so expect a few players to start angling for wildcards to next week's tournament, which usually has a lack of top players. Andy Roddick in particular has won three matches in the last two and a half months. That's not the kind of preparation he wants heading into Wimbledon. Sam Querrey, on the other hand, seems to have recovered from the ennui that plagued him at the French and has a real shot of making the final here. We'll see how the weekend plays out, and if the big upsets are already past, or if they might continue.
So that means that Federer is riding a ridiculous winning streak in Halle - it's got to be one of the longest winning streaks of any player at any tournament, if not the longest. I don't know who's going to beat him. Kohlschreiber is 0-4 against Federer, and he's really the toughest competition remaining, with the exception of Hewitt. It would be a pretty intense meltdown from Fed if he fails to break his title-less streak and continue his unbeaten run in Halle.
In Queens, things were rolling along as one might expect until today, when everything went to hell. There was some trouble with rain, and here are the casualties: Gasquet withdrew with a back injury, Roddick lost to Dudi Sela, Djokovic lost to Xavier Malisse, Cilic lost to Llodra, and Andy Murray was tied 3-all in the third against Mardy Fish when the match was called on account of darkness. And Nadal nearly lost to Denis Istomin of all people. Sometimes, unusual weather can be a real leveler.
A lot of the players who lost were really hoping to get some match practice in before Wimbledon, so expect a few players to start angling for wildcards to next week's tournament, which usually has a lack of top players. Andy Roddick in particular has won three matches in the last two and a half months. That's not the kind of preparation he wants heading into Wimbledon. Sam Querrey, on the other hand, seems to have recovered from the ennui that plagued him at the French and has a real shot of making the final here. We'll see how the weekend plays out, and if the big upsets are already past, or if they might continue.
Monday, June 7, 2010
French Open Wrap-up and Week 23 Preview
So the French Open is now done and dusted. Now that it's over, it almost seems like the outcome was never in doubt. Nadal won the tournament for the fifth time - and for the second time without losing a set in 7 matches. Soderling could not maintain the level of play he had last year when he beat Nadal or this year when he beat Federer. It may have been the pressure of the moment, but Nadal never had to find his top gear to win comfortably. If Soderling could play at that level more consistently, there's no reason he couldn't be in the very top tier of players on tour, but he can't. He hasn't shown the ability to in the past, and I don't expect he ever will.
But he's still an amazing player and should be in the top ten for several more years, assuming he avoids injury. I just don't see him winning a grand slam any time soon until he can work on his consistency.
As for Nadal, order is restored. He demolished the field and showed that he is healthy. He played a smarter clay court season, and maintained his health through it all as a result. Nobody had won all three clay masters tournaments and the French Open before, so that's another record Nadal owns. His prowess on the surface is almost difficult to believe. Tomorrow, when the rankings are out, I should have more to say on that. But for now, let's see how well he adjusts to the grass season, which starts this week and ends in a month.
The two tournaments taking place this week are in London (which I will refer to as Queens Club in the tags for this post, to distinguish it from London's year end championships) and in Halle, Germany. Both tournaments are fairly well stacked, since this is the only lead-up to Wimbledon, except for the (relatively few) players who don't want to take next week off. Soderling is - understandably - sitting the week our, and Del Potro is still injured. Tsonga and Verdasco are also sitting out, but everyone else in the top ten is in action.
The tournaments are actually very lopsided. Federer and Davydenko are in Halle, while Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, and Roddick are all at Queens Club. I'll take a look at Halle first, since it should go quicker.
In Halle, Federer is the top seed and massive favorite. The player who beat him here last year, Tommy Haas, is not in the draw, and only two other people have ever beaten Federer in his eight appearances here. Pat Rafter obviously won't be showing, and even though Nicolas Kiefer got a wildcard, he isn't playing at the level he had reached back in 2003. Federer does have a moderately difficult opener, against the Finn Jarkko Nieminen, but he has been struggling with getting his game back together after missing most of last year with injury. After that, Federer could get Kohlschreiber, Stepanek, Rochus, or Chiudinelli in the third round, which is a pretty tough part of the draw. His opponent in the semifinals will likely be Marcos Baghdatis or Juan Carlos Ferrero, but Jeremy Chardy and Viktor Troicki are potential darkhorses in that section.
The other half of the draw also has tough customers. In addition to second seed Davydenko, Jurgen Melzer is here, whose net-rushing strategy should serve him well on grass. And despite the fact that he's a four-time champion at Queens, Lleyton Hewitt is here. He has a tough opener against fellow Aussie Peter Luczak. The other players to watch in that half of the draw are Mikhail Youzhny, the afore-mentioned Nicolas Kiefer, and Thiemo De Bakker, who prefers clay, but should be able to adapt his game for grass, eventually. Look for some more exciting matches starting in the third round.
Queens is a bigger tournament, so the top eight seeds get first-round byes. Nadal is - of course - the top seed here, and he was the champion back in 2008. Murray won here last year, and he ended up in Nadal's half of the draw. The other two top seeds are Djokovic and Roddick, who get the other half.
Nadal really got a cupcake of a draw, which he deserves after winning in Paris, and I would be shocked if anyone beat him before the semifinals. The other seeds in his section are Denis Istomin, Julien Benneteau, and Feliciano Lopez, who is actually the best grass-courter of the bunch. Other than that, he has the Canadian number one and the Jamaican number one in his quarter, and they play each other in the first round! I like both of those players (Dancevic and Brown) but I don't think they're ever going to be top-level guys. Taylor Dent is there, and I'm sure he's thrilled that the grass-court season is finally underway. And in one of the first-round matches I'm most excited about, Grigor Dimitrov (one of the excellent wildcards the tournament gave out) plays British qualifier Bogdanovic. Still, I don't see anyone getting to Nadal out of that group.
Murray's quarter is not a lot tougher, at least until the quarterfinal. The only other contender in this section is Marin Cilic, as the other seeded players are Giraldo and Llodra. Murray-Cilic would be a good match in the quarters, but the other players in the way are less likely to pose as threats. Mardy Fish is there, as well as one of the other great wildcards, Ryan Harrison, who opens against another American, Jesse Levine. Frenchman Nicolas Mahut also really likes grass, and Mardy Fish could do well here. It's no guarantee that Murray will come through, but he's definitely the favorite.
Andy Roddick, in the third quarter, has won this tournament four times. He'll have his hands full trying to get a fifth win, though. His quarter has some tricky customers, as well as the best opening round match: Kei Nishikori against Richard Gasquet. That should be fun to see. That section also has Dudi Sela and Gael Monfils, who I hope is injury-free. I see Roddick making it through to the quarters for sure, though. He may not be exactly match-tough, considering how little he's played in the last few months, but he's one of the best grass-court players of this generation, so he's going to be happy to be back on the surface.
I'm not sure what to expect from Novak Djokovic, the second seed and top player in his quarter of the draw. The way he bowed at the French Open was really discouraging. He just hasn't been the same this year since the first round of the Davis Cup. His section of the draw has some potentially tricky players, but he should be able to make it through to the quarters. Sam Querrey would be his opponent there, and I'm hoping that Sam has gotten his focus back after some time at home. Djokovic could also have to go through Janko Tipsarevic and Andreas Seppi, the other seeds. That section also has Robbie Ginepri, Michael Russell, Dmitry Tursunov, and the third excellent wildcard recipient, Bernard Tomic. It should be Querrey-Djokovic in the quarters, all the same.
It's always fun to see the transition from clay to grass. It's so sudden, and the reactions are so varied. Some players are absolutely thrilled, while others wish the clay season lasted all year. The contrast in playing styles and effective strategies gets drawn into sharp relief, and it's another of my favorite moments in the tennis calendar.
But he's still an amazing player and should be in the top ten for several more years, assuming he avoids injury. I just don't see him winning a grand slam any time soon until he can work on his consistency.
As for Nadal, order is restored. He demolished the field and showed that he is healthy. He played a smarter clay court season, and maintained his health through it all as a result. Nobody had won all three clay masters tournaments and the French Open before, so that's another record Nadal owns. His prowess on the surface is almost difficult to believe. Tomorrow, when the rankings are out, I should have more to say on that. But for now, let's see how well he adjusts to the grass season, which starts this week and ends in a month.
The two tournaments taking place this week are in London (which I will refer to as Queens Club in the tags for this post, to distinguish it from London's year end championships) and in Halle, Germany. Both tournaments are fairly well stacked, since this is the only lead-up to Wimbledon, except for the (relatively few) players who don't want to take next week off. Soderling is - understandably - sitting the week our, and Del Potro is still injured. Tsonga and Verdasco are also sitting out, but everyone else in the top ten is in action.
The tournaments are actually very lopsided. Federer and Davydenko are in Halle, while Nadal, Murray, Djokovic, and Roddick are all at Queens Club. I'll take a look at Halle first, since it should go quicker.
In Halle, Federer is the top seed and massive favorite. The player who beat him here last year, Tommy Haas, is not in the draw, and only two other people have ever beaten Federer in his eight appearances here. Pat Rafter obviously won't be showing, and even though Nicolas Kiefer got a wildcard, he isn't playing at the level he had reached back in 2003. Federer does have a moderately difficult opener, against the Finn Jarkko Nieminen, but he has been struggling with getting his game back together after missing most of last year with injury. After that, Federer could get Kohlschreiber, Stepanek, Rochus, or Chiudinelli in the third round, which is a pretty tough part of the draw. His opponent in the semifinals will likely be Marcos Baghdatis or Juan Carlos Ferrero, but Jeremy Chardy and Viktor Troicki are potential darkhorses in that section.
The other half of the draw also has tough customers. In addition to second seed Davydenko, Jurgen Melzer is here, whose net-rushing strategy should serve him well on grass. And despite the fact that he's a four-time champion at Queens, Lleyton Hewitt is here. He has a tough opener against fellow Aussie Peter Luczak. The other players to watch in that half of the draw are Mikhail Youzhny, the afore-mentioned Nicolas Kiefer, and Thiemo De Bakker, who prefers clay, but should be able to adapt his game for grass, eventually. Look for some more exciting matches starting in the third round.
Queens is a bigger tournament, so the top eight seeds get first-round byes. Nadal is - of course - the top seed here, and he was the champion back in 2008. Murray won here last year, and he ended up in Nadal's half of the draw. The other two top seeds are Djokovic and Roddick, who get the other half.
Nadal really got a cupcake of a draw, which he deserves after winning in Paris, and I would be shocked if anyone beat him before the semifinals. The other seeds in his section are Denis Istomin, Julien Benneteau, and Feliciano Lopez, who is actually the best grass-courter of the bunch. Other than that, he has the Canadian number one and the Jamaican number one in his quarter, and they play each other in the first round! I like both of those players (Dancevic and Brown) but I don't think they're ever going to be top-level guys. Taylor Dent is there, and I'm sure he's thrilled that the grass-court season is finally underway. And in one of the first-round matches I'm most excited about, Grigor Dimitrov (one of the excellent wildcards the tournament gave out) plays British qualifier Bogdanovic. Still, I don't see anyone getting to Nadal out of that group.
Murray's quarter is not a lot tougher, at least until the quarterfinal. The only other contender in this section is Marin Cilic, as the other seeded players are Giraldo and Llodra. Murray-Cilic would be a good match in the quarters, but the other players in the way are less likely to pose as threats. Mardy Fish is there, as well as one of the other great wildcards, Ryan Harrison, who opens against another American, Jesse Levine. Frenchman Nicolas Mahut also really likes grass, and Mardy Fish could do well here. It's no guarantee that Murray will come through, but he's definitely the favorite.
Andy Roddick, in the third quarter, has won this tournament four times. He'll have his hands full trying to get a fifth win, though. His quarter has some tricky customers, as well as the best opening round match: Kei Nishikori against Richard Gasquet. That should be fun to see. That section also has Dudi Sela and Gael Monfils, who I hope is injury-free. I see Roddick making it through to the quarters for sure, though. He may not be exactly match-tough, considering how little he's played in the last few months, but he's one of the best grass-court players of this generation, so he's going to be happy to be back on the surface.
I'm not sure what to expect from Novak Djokovic, the second seed and top player in his quarter of the draw. The way he bowed at the French Open was really discouraging. He just hasn't been the same this year since the first round of the Davis Cup. His section of the draw has some potentially tricky players, but he should be able to make it through to the quarters. Sam Querrey would be his opponent there, and I'm hoping that Sam has gotten his focus back after some time at home. Djokovic could also have to go through Janko Tipsarevic and Andreas Seppi, the other seeds. That section also has Robbie Ginepri, Michael Russell, Dmitry Tursunov, and the third excellent wildcard recipient, Bernard Tomic. It should be Querrey-Djokovic in the quarters, all the same.
It's always fun to see the transition from clay to grass. It's so sudden, and the reactions are so varied. Some players are absolutely thrilled, while others wish the clay season lasted all year. The contrast in playing styles and effective strategies gets drawn into sharp relief, and it's another of my favorite moments in the tennis calendar.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Women's Final Wrap-up and Men's Final Preview
The women's final was something of a letdown. I think it's fair to say that Sam Stosur was overwhelmed by the occasion. Her forehand was not on at all. That shot was hitting winner after winner in her matches against Henin, Williams, and Jankovic, and when she tried to hit through it today, she couldn't keep it in the court. She wasn't serving as well as she had been, either. And the real killer was that she couldn't volley to save her life. Stosur, who used to be a doubles specialist, was incredibly heavy-handed at net.
On the other hand, Schiavone absolute rose to the occasion. She played as well as she had all week, and it was more than enough to handle a very tight Sam Stosur. Kudos to the Italian, who pulled off an amazing run this week. This is probably the most surprising Grand Slam winner on either the men's or women's side in many years. Schiavone played amazingly in Fed Cup last year, but her performance in the Grand Slams had been mostly unremarkable. Prior to this, she'd made only three quarterfinals since 2000. Really great win for the veteran player, and she no doubt deserved it.
Looking ahead to tomorrow's final between Robin Soderling and Rafael Nadal - it's probably the most exciting final which wasn't between Federer and Nadal in the better part of a decade. Nadal leads the head to head 3-2, including a fairly one-sided match at Roland Garros in 2006, an animosity-fueled Wimbledon match in 2007, and a brutal drubbing at a Masters event on clay in 2009. But Soderling has won the last two, including last year's stunning upset at the French Open, which Soderling followed up with a very one-sided victory at the year-end championships.
Nadal says that this isn't about revenge, and that may be true. But if there's any player that a guy as mellow and friendly as Nadal might bear some ill-will against, it would be Soderling. Here's my impression of how the match will play out. If Soderling plays as well as he did against Federer, Nadal will have to play his best tennis - a level of tennis he hasn't really shown so far this fortnight - in order to win. But if both players play as well as they did in their semifinal matches, Nadal will win. If both players are firing on all cylinders, Nadal's going to win. Soderling has shown some amazing skill here at Roland Garros, but when he beat Nadal, the Spaniard wasn't at his best.
And it's worth repeating how much is riding on this match. If Nadal wins, he gets back to number one in the world, bumping Federer to number two while the Swiss is just one week shy of matching Pete Sampras's record for weeks at the number one ranking. And since Nadal has almost no points to defend over the course of the summer - it would be difficult for Federer to get that ranking back for the foreseeable future. It also would mark the end of Federer's streak of either winning a tournament or losing to the eventual winner. So there is a great deal at stake tomorrow involving players who aren't even setting foot on court.
I think that Soderling will come to play tomorrow. He wasn't really in the final last year at any point, and I think that was all due to his attitude. But I expect that - since he's been to a final before, he'll be more able to adapt to the situation. He'll be fired up, but not nervous. I like to think that the Swede has ice in his veins. On the other hand, Nadal is going to incredibly eager. He knows that Soderling is a threat, unlike Melzer was in the semifinals. And I think Nadal benefited from a relatively easy semifinal match, where Soderling had to toil on court for five sets.
I think that this match could go either way, but Soderling will have to play at an incredibly high level for a very long time in order to beat Nadal. He won't have as easy a time of it as he did last year, even if he plays that well. I'm really looking forward it, to see how the players handle the pressure.
On the other hand, Schiavone absolute rose to the occasion. She played as well as she had all week, and it was more than enough to handle a very tight Sam Stosur. Kudos to the Italian, who pulled off an amazing run this week. This is probably the most surprising Grand Slam winner on either the men's or women's side in many years. Schiavone played amazingly in Fed Cup last year, but her performance in the Grand Slams had been mostly unremarkable. Prior to this, she'd made only three quarterfinals since 2000. Really great win for the veteran player, and she no doubt deserved it.
Looking ahead to tomorrow's final between Robin Soderling and Rafael Nadal - it's probably the most exciting final which wasn't between Federer and Nadal in the better part of a decade. Nadal leads the head to head 3-2, including a fairly one-sided match at Roland Garros in 2006, an animosity-fueled Wimbledon match in 2007, and a brutal drubbing at a Masters event on clay in 2009. But Soderling has won the last two, including last year's stunning upset at the French Open, which Soderling followed up with a very one-sided victory at the year-end championships.
Nadal says that this isn't about revenge, and that may be true. But if there's any player that a guy as mellow and friendly as Nadal might bear some ill-will against, it would be Soderling. Here's my impression of how the match will play out. If Soderling plays as well as he did against Federer, Nadal will have to play his best tennis - a level of tennis he hasn't really shown so far this fortnight - in order to win. But if both players play as well as they did in their semifinal matches, Nadal will win. If both players are firing on all cylinders, Nadal's going to win. Soderling has shown some amazing skill here at Roland Garros, but when he beat Nadal, the Spaniard wasn't at his best.
And it's worth repeating how much is riding on this match. If Nadal wins, he gets back to number one in the world, bumping Federer to number two while the Swiss is just one week shy of matching Pete Sampras's record for weeks at the number one ranking. And since Nadal has almost no points to defend over the course of the summer - it would be difficult for Federer to get that ranking back for the foreseeable future. It also would mark the end of Federer's streak of either winning a tournament or losing to the eventual winner. So there is a great deal at stake tomorrow involving players who aren't even setting foot on court.
I think that Soderling will come to play tomorrow. He wasn't really in the final last year at any point, and I think that was all due to his attitude. But I expect that - since he's been to a final before, he'll be more able to adapt to the situation. He'll be fired up, but not nervous. I like to think that the Swede has ice in his veins. On the other hand, Nadal is going to incredibly eager. He knows that Soderling is a threat, unlike Melzer was in the semifinals. And I think Nadal benefited from a relatively easy semifinal match, where Soderling had to toil on court for five sets.
I think that this match could go either way, but Soderling will have to play at an incredibly high level for a very long time in order to beat Nadal. He won't have as easy a time of it as he did last year, even if he plays that well. I'm really looking forward it, to see how the players handle the pressure.
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