Quite simply the biggest R4 match up you’ll likely see at any Slam this year.
No really. When was the last time two reigning Grand Slam Champions met this early at any Slam?
I’ve not been able to find out. Seems to me this is kind of a big deal.
Anyone?
What might we rightly infer based on all of the 4 days we’ve had of 2012?
1) Ana’s still struggling. [Please don’t change your coach]
2) Bartoli’s still not shy of almost double bagelling those that are still struggling (no sadz Jarmila, it’s a Marion thing – she did the exactly the same to Safina this time last year). Still, nice reaction.
3) Kim’s still taking three to do what should rightly be done in two.
Rust, yes? She’s played next to nothing since early last year. Except I’m not completely convinced she wouldn’t have found a way of playing three sets anyway.
4) Gael Monfils is still inventing new ways of incorporating muscle (he didn't even know he had) into set-motions it had NO BUSINESS being part of.
5) Sam Stosur is still losing matches she has NO BUSINESS losing. [Can’t see her or Li repeating last year. Happy to be proved wrong]
6) Serena Williams is still getting headlines for all the wrong reasons.
Well that didn’t take long, did it?
For the record, I dislike it intensely when people give her a free pass for indefensible conduct and, even worse, try and depict even the mildest criticism of that indefensible conduct as a uniquely conspiratorial witch hunt.
I’ll continue to dislike it in 2012, because, being honest, I don’t expect it to go away.
I also don’t expect to see the back of its flipside: that (very mainstream) injury cynicism some are ideologically hell-bent on (we’re calling it “karma” now?) – cynicism that persists even in the face of video evidence (2:27), and even when a subsequent MRI scan confirms the injury:
The ‘Free-Passers’ inspire revulsion, which in turn bolsters the repellent views of the Injury Cynics and vice versa. It’s very obvious the two polarised trends are designed to feed off one another in a deadly embrace from which there can be no escape – my guess is they don’t want to escape.
Sometimes bad conduct is simply bad conduct, which Serena, like many, many before (and I daresay after) her, is neither immune to nor irreproachable for. Sometimes, dearest trolls, it’s not a conspiracy.
And sometimes, dearest hobgoblins, an injury is just an injury – nothing more, nothing less. Not an occasion to use as a cathartic vehicle to air distaste, vendettas, your very personal dislike (or another word some venture that you’d hope shouldn’t be part of this discussion) of Serena, the way some air their soiled undies.
Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised, then, that this, too, hasn’t changed in 2012. Trolls are still trolls whatever the Gregorian Calendar might have to say about it.
Only Rafa’s unveiling of his new top-heavy frame, and of course Murray’s announcement of what he hopes will be a game-changing (and perhaps shape-shifting) partnership with Ivan Lendl (Murr-dl?) buck this trend of same-iness, but of course neither count as both were announced in 2011.
Either the tennis season’s pulling one hell of a fast one and intends to unleash a seismic gamechanger later this year (which, being honest, would have to be at least as seismic as Novak or even Petra’s year to count), or the season really will prove to be that trite and that unconvincing…
Rus d. Clijsters 3-6, 7-5, 6-1
1) We KNOW Kim is prone (more than most) to occasional bouts of catastrophically abhorrent play. The stench can be positively sulphuric. This isn’t the first time and certainly won’t be the last.
2) She hasn’t played in two months. Competitive match play is kind of a big deal. Even for multi-Slammin’ Super Moms.
3) Arantxa Rus came to PLAY. And, as I hope we saw, she happens to play rather well.
4) Clay hasn’t ever been Kim’s surface of choice. Winning all the hard court Slams in the world won’t change that. She was only ever a “contender” in so far as her undoubted elite status as a player, and the aura that inspires, carried her through enough wins in one of the most open FO draw of recent history.
5) It was windy out there today. Wind tends to be unforgiving at the best of times. Kim was both far from her best and (worse) didn’t seem bothered (or yielding) enough to reign it in.
Perhaps the real shocker was how many respected commentators were falling over each other in their attempts to explain the loss away as a consequence of Kim’s (supposedly still injured) ankle.
Really? Did she confirm the ankle was a problem at the start of the week? Was it a problem in any of her previous matches? Would it have been a problem if she’d breezed through Rus the way everyone expected to?
[Sorry, but petulant lines of enquiry are a two-way street]
I have no reason to be sceptical of the story of how she rolled her ankle (apparently dancing barefoot at her cousin’s wedding). If that’s what she says, let’s take it at face value without figuratively rolling our eyes, or engaging in other unnecessary innuendo.
But if she turns up to play, apparently healthy, then that’s exactly and precisely what I’ll assume her to be. There’s really no occasion to be speaking of supposed “injuries” whilst a match is still in progress – not unless and until the player concerned has taken an MTO.
Why, in any case, is it so very difficult to wait for her to bring it up herself, either in the post-match presser or any other subsequent interview?
Which, as it happens, is exactly what she did: she admitted to frustration in not being able to execute, she expressed a desire to return to the practice court – no mention was made of any injury (to the ankle or otherwise), not until she was explicitly prompted to do so, when she denied it was an issue.
In other words, she admitted that (for whatever reason) she wasn’t good enough on the day. Again, I take her word for it.
Here we all so wonderfully are at the first post-Oz event of the year that actually amounts to something. I expect electricity, I expect sociopathic levels of belief (and denial), I expect the feeding frenzy that results when those, like myself, with the predictive capacity of mucus, indulge in a little quantum-bracketology of their own. I also expect some very poor trash-talk between Nole and Fed.
Maybe I’m just half a wavelength behind everyone, but it doesn’t quite feel like that just yet.
What it actually feels like is a benign form of stasis in which all the best stories are yet to develop, or haven’t yet acquired the momentum necessary to elicit the type of considered tennis reaction that goes beyond sticking bubble gum in your detractors’ hair, or breaking wind and running away– not that either of those isn’t an entirely sensible way of settling tennis disputes.
I’ve got some strong feelings on why I don’t think winning here would strongly benefit all but a handful of the top players. Woz, for example, is darned either way: Win, and face all those malignant, ‘Slamless’, ranking-related questions again. Lose, and any pretensions she might entertain of being mentioned in the same breath as Clijsters evaporate into thin air.
Muzz occupies a similar role – winning would certainly go a long way to snapping him out of his (now traditional) post-Oz runners-up stupor; and yet he owns 6 of these things already. The lack of that other more crucial “thing” is what’s causing the psychosis.
What would a win really do for Kim or for Fed’s legacy (other than, in his case, dispelling that grim and quite inexplicable fog of “dysfunktion” that’s loomed over him both here and at Miami for the last 4 years)?
Can Rafa really care all that much knowing he can safely look forward to claiming 4, if not 5, out of the 5 clay court events he’ll likely enter this year?
Wish all of them well, but here’s what will really light my fire:
1) Bepa: The best WTA performer right now (and playing as well as she’s ever likely to ) – that single title she’s won at this level (at this venue in fact) is beginning to smack more and more of underperformance.
3) Sveta: see above comments about Bepa’s “underperformance” and then multiply by 50.
4) Delpo: Two consecutive semis and an entirely commendable mickey-mouse title. A Masters title makes the comeback official. Somewhat ludicrously, it would be his first.
5) Any one of a gang of bright (and entirely ruthless) young things like Dolgo, Milos, Petra or even Kanepi to bring about a bloody coup – a killing spree that results in the partial reconfiguration of the rankings and ownership of the tour’s main titles.
I’m entirely serious. I’m not normally one for “next big things”, but it seems to me we’ve faffed around with Grigor and Ernie for long enough – conditions seem ripe as they’ve ever been for something a little different.
And because, they’re worth it. All of them.
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Delpo on the brink of making his first final since his injury comeback….Dolgo on the verge of winning his first ATP title….with Sod/Tsonga and Petra/Kim still to look forward to. That’s how I left it on Saturday night.
It’s not often I ask for EVERYTHING. I’m usually open to a watering down of at least some of my dreams – such flexibility is an essential coping mechanism for life itself.
But then the stakes aren’t usually this high, are they?
Dolgo has “arrived”, now, I would imagine, by anyone’s reckoning – a first ATP title would have accorded perfectly with his gung-ho, indie, all-court narrative. (Aside: Truly astonishing anyone thought he’d find the nickname ‘Dog’ either cute, funny or a term of endearment – he doesn’t)
And I’m guessing friends, fans, frenemies and foe alike are all united in wishing Delpo the best as he makes his precarious comeback – if only (in the case of the latter) so they may feel free to root against him again.
Those particular narratives will have to wait.
1) Soderling over Tsonga 6-3 3-6 6-3
Perhaps the wrong narrative altogether, because I’m afraid the stakes, in this instance, are no longer very high at all.
The most visceral, charged narratives often involve those who stand to lose or gain everything - a remote, anachronistic existence in which ‘anything can happen’ and ‘impossible is nothing’. It seems to me we’ve already had the first act of this with Sod upsetting two of the best players ever.
Always great seeing him come through of course – even a piddly 500 event reminds us why he’s here to stay, and defending a title definitely lends itself to a certain truculence which is, by the way, completely in keeping with his narrative and station.
The very last thing I want to see, however, is this coming at the expense of bigger and better things – or worse, seeing him get comfortable as the “Andy Murray” of the 500 or even the Masters-1000 level. As good as it is, a title like this should, now, mean less to him than it does to someone like Jo-Wills (his first final in 16 months).
There be bigger fish to fry out there Robin. Classical form would now demand that you go fry them.
2) Petra over Kim 64 63.
Voluntary disclosure of rooting interests for 2011: As many as half of my WTA eggs are in Petra’s basket.
Was Kim not at her best? Perhaps. This certainly wasn’t the officially endorsed narrative for the newly crowned world #1 (Update: Neither is Petra’s 76 76 loss to Morita in Dubai earlier today)
What I do know is that Petra’s serve out wide might just be the best shot in women's tennis right now. Unreadable pace. The worst kind.
Oh sure, ‘one win does not a champ make’ and all that, but it’s not just been about the one win has it? This is her second title in 6 weeks which, taken together with her QF run at Oz and SF at Wimbledon last year, simply demands that we take note. (Two Slam fourth rounds in her late teens isn’t too shoddy either)
Perhaps most convincingly of all, it’s the way in which she outplayed rather than outlasted Kim. Ask yourself whether the narrative of the timid counterpuncher is nearly as compelling as that of the audacious upstart.
Timely too – with a whole raft of retirements imminent in 2012, I have an opening in my tennis pool. Maybe even a number of them.
Yes I’m on board, but don’t think for a minute that the decision has been taken lightly:
-- She’s a lefty. Not the philosophical solution to life it’s sometimes made out to be, but the different look does, nevertheless, throw many players (more than you’d think) out of their rigidly defined comfort zones.
-- She’s daring and/or unhinged enough to imagine winners where none exist. True that this can sometimes prove counterproductive (if you saw her match against Woz in Beijing last year you’ll know just how counterproductive) – it’s also a necessary mind-set for anyone with an eye on the big stuff.
Put simply, you have to have it within you to be just a little suicidal against the best players. Both classical form and the big occasion demand it. The timid counterpuncher would never even conceive of blitzing the world #1 and winner of the last two Slams in straights.
-- She has all of the big weapons necessary to pull off an upset at the highest of levels unlike say a MJMS, yet remains far more nuanced than a Rezai – both of whom won Premier events last year. Why should we expect any less of Petra?
-- Best of all, the braces are a feint echo of Sveta’s 2004 USO run. Detail like this is at least as important as any of the above if you’re in the business of narrative.
Nothing is certain of course (whole matches can turn, have turned, round very fast when she loses focus the way she did after Wimbledon last year), but consider all of the above points my “due diligence”.
3) Confession: I still haven’t seen Milos play
I’m hearing the dubious Pete Sampras comparisons. I’m hearing utterly terrifying ice hockey jokes. I’m even hearing some doubts being expressed over the prevailing (overwhelmingly stark) opinion about the future of non-European tennis.
Listen carefully and you might even hear the wind carrying the sound of Dancevic cursing into his glass.
I’m yet to see him hit a ball. Laughable I know. But that’s just the way it panned out with timezones being what they are. All of which means I’m not in a position to weigh up any of the above.
I aim to rectify this before he, you know, wins a Slam or something.
From what little I have gathered, he seems (in common with Dolgo) to have the makings of an all-courter and is not afraid to have a crack at the ball – both of which bode well for the future. Being 6’5 can’t hurt very much either.
If I had it my way, Delpo would have made the final and Dolgo would have won in Brazil. And yet all this talk of “narrative” and “destiny” is of course all utterly preposterous. Smug, self-satisfied spiritualist nonsense – a little too full of its elemental self.
What makes one narrative more compelling than any other lies not always in its strict conformance with classical form. But rather in its audacity.
And more often than not, the more audacious narratives are forged through what seem like mere random inflections at the time.
Like Hantuchova winning her first title since 2007 for instance.
Ask yourself whether Delpos comeback would be nearly as gripping if he won his 2nd event back.
Ask yourself whether Sod winning a Slam (should it happen) would be nearly as compelling if he hadn’t pulled off what he pulled off in 2009.
Nestled deeply somewhere in the swinging, conflicted narratives of Dolgo’s floating hair, Petra’s shining braces and Milos’s scrawny 6’5 frame lies a future threatening to be as uplifting as anything we’ve seen.
Don’t let’s forestall it by being that twat sitting directly in front of you that always gets up and starts clapping before the credits have even started rolling.
For my part, I thought the way Li Na played the final was a mirror of the way she played her semi final versus Caro….but just like the mirror everything appeared inverted.
She started off rip-roaring well and seemed to be up a set before my eyes had adjusted to the morning light (8am on a Sat morning…a little understanding, please) – not that different to the way she closed out Caro.
Kim, all the while, seemed thrown off, jittery, confused.
And then midway through the second set – just two or three games away from the biggest win of her life and actually making history – Li started to give way. Not all at once, but with subtlety, piece by piece, layer by layer, it all unravelled leaving a completely different flavour of match.
Most of the dysfunction began with her volleying – or to be clear her drive-volleying.
To be fair, I actually think Li volleys, not completely adeptly, but well enough. And she’s at her best when she doesn’t think. She said so herself. That probably flies in the face of convention – but it seems to work for her.
Which makes it all the more surprising, that she seemed almost to be overthinking some of those drive-volleys: it got to the point where you’d find yourself pleading for her to put away a conventional volley badly, rather than her preferred drive-volley right back in the path of Kim who didn’t need a second invite.
No secret it’s not the result I was looking for (certainly not the bigger story), but is on some level at least, the right result.
Kim came into the event being touted the favourite (rightly). And once it all began, was, like Djokovic, the best player in the draw.
Within minutes of her win, there was talk of her already being halfway to a Rafa-Slam (far be it for them to be dissuaded by inconvenient facts like that not actually having happened yet) – talk which I’m finding all rather difficult.
Leaving aside the fact that neither of the Williamses are done just yet, for all her gifts, Kim is still prone to inexplicable episodes of jitteriness – it was there in a lesser form this fortnight with seemingly spontaneous mini-streaks of double faults and UFEs. Not all that sure that translates to winning 7 out of 7 matches on either grass or clay – not her most effective surfaces as the best of times.
Earlier in the week, she signalled this might be her last full year on tour: that doesn’t give her many more chances.
For now however, she’s rightfully (Serena’s injury not withstanding) considered the best player on the planet and will, in all likelihood, capture the #1 ranking at some point this year.
Something tells me that might be enough for her.
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1 day…..20 hrs…….32 mins…….43 seconds.
THAT……is when this Slam……..will end.
126 matches of professional tennis, most of which you won’t ever see, can’t ever prove were even played out, and for all you know probably only existed in a transient tangential Donnie-Darko type corrective universe.
One that will cease to exist the second after Li Na and Andy Murray fulfil their destiny.
I never did get round to blogging that Li/Caro match. It made for difficult viewing. It also made for incredibly inspiring viewing once Li came alive in the closing moments of that 2nd set.
Li’s groundies are dynamite. Technically perfect dynamite. Caro still struggles to keep the ball in court on the rare occasion she tries to crack a winner. Tell me something new.
My own little theory for why she was in Murray’s box during his semi final today:
Muzz: “So, I saw you in my players’ box today [grins dorkishly] - it felt cool.”
*steamy music*
Caro: “Well….[breaths deeply]….I’m not normally the kind of girl that does this sort of thing…”
Muzz: “Go on….”
Caro: "[sighs]…even now I’m not comfortable asking you this [flutters eyelashes]…”
Muzz: “GO ON…”
*record scratching noise*
Caro[deadpan]: “For a guy that isn’t [airquotes with fingers] ‘about the winners’, you win, like, a lot of matches – I need to know how that works…”
Muzz: …
Caro’ll never be “all about the winners” the way Li and other WTA big guns are – that’ll never be “her thing”.
But with a retirement bloodbath less than 20 months away (Venus, Serena, Roger, ARod, Kolya, Kim, amongst others – I’m doing ‘denial’ right now so I’m at ‘acceptance/hope’ in time for the 2012 Olympics) and with the players left to fill the void, you’ve got to think “her thing” will probably be enough to win a Slam….at some point.
I can see I’d better define what precisely“her thing” is: quite simply, being the best defender in the game (JJ used to be that once remember? That didn’t stop us from predicting a Slam for her).
And even though that’s (clearly) not quite what we expect or even desire from a world #1, it’s not half bad an asset. Besides, I’m kinda tired of the grinder storyline. She is what she is.
But back to Li.
Let there be no illusions about just how big this would be if she does manage to pull this off. Your expression tells me you already know that. Ok then.
And yeeaaahhh, alright – she’s probably not playing for “king and country” in much the same way as Muzz is claiming it to be more of a “personal glory” thing too. (Good luck selling that to the papers)
I have to say, I don’t completely believe either of them. Not that they haven’t likely successfully convinced themselves of what they’re saying.
I just don’t think you can, in Li’s case at least, completely blot out the hopes, desires and fears of 1.3 billion people that have never had a player even contest the finals of one of these gigs before.
We already know something of her love for them with the charity work she does – that has to leave some kinda carbon footprint on your psyche.
You can try and play it down, you can try and shake it off. You can’t pretend it’s not there.
Glass half empty:
If she plays as dissolute a match as she played against Caro in the semis, Kim mows her, or rather she mows herself down. In straights.
Glass half full:
Li’s been astonishingly accurate since the season began which, as we all know, is astonishingly out of character for her. Maybe this really does have a sense of “destiny” to it the way Fran did at RG last year – I have to say I didn’t really see it when people were suggesting it earlier on this week.
Maybe a more contained, less error-prone version of Li will only continue to exist for the span of time it takes to win this thing before collapsing in on itself the way Donnie’s tangential universe did – but only after allowing him to set things right for everyone (assuming at least some of you have seen the film?), in this case over 1.3 BILLION PEOPLE.
If the Caro semi-final was her one dud – then I’d say she’s got it out of her system.
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I don’t know which I find worse: the judgmental, reactionary tut-tutting over Ana “choking” being emitted from the direction of people that didn’t even see the match.
Or those that are (still now) continuing to pretend that Ana’s loss is wholly inexplicable.
Makarova d. Ivanovic 3-6 6-4 10-8
First the good part: we got one heck of a match from both women.
Ana came into this on the back of some sound, genuine, tactile form. This was not one of the very many false-starts we’ve seen from her that usually begin and end in a rash of corrupt ball tosses.
We always knew she had some of the most technically-sound, incendiary stroke production this side of Li Na – today we saw her gutsily serve her way out of the agonising despair of being 3 MPs down.
That she ended up on the losing end of the best match she’s played in over two years – one in which she saved a whopping 5 MPs – is of course gut-wrenching for her fans, but also speaks to the most encouraging, unmistakably healthy signs of life since her turnaround began.
I get that her fans will find little comfort in this, but that’s no reason to pretend that she had no business losing to “a mere top 50 player” that left a trail of top ten wreckage in Eastbourne last year.
Ana simply got a rough draw. That is all.
Heartbreaking? Yes. “Inexplicable”, No.
I get that personalities, work-ethic and the exhaustive, organic buzz of following your favourite player through their best and darkest moments all year long very often transcends all of that. The trouble is, it's no different for other players who, by the way, go through all the same struggles, week-in week out, sometimes with not even a fraction of the fanbase, limelight or lucrative endorsements at their disposal.
Irrespective of whether you’re a fan or not, it’s completely outrageous not to give a player as unassuming as Makarova her due when they come through on the back of their undeniable talent, as she did in Eastbourne last year, or here this time round.
And if it’s still all too much, then spare a though for Dinara.
However bad things might get, there’s always someone who’s had a shitter night than you or your player have.
I don't know. I didn't know how to win a point. Basically came to this thing. I didn't know. I was sitting in the changeover and I was like, okay, at least how can I get a chance to hurt her? There was nothing that I could hurt her.
Embarrassing.
…
I had the same feeling last week when I won one game. This week I didn't win not even one game.
…
No, I mean, of course I have motivation. I've been doing two months of pre season. I'm fully motivated. I practiced hard. I cannot say that I didn't practice hard.
But I guess something was not right. I don't know. I have to figure out the answers.…to lose two tournaments in a row 6 Love, 6 1, 6 Love, 6 Love. It's really to scratch the head and to think what the hell I'm doing. It's not that I don't want. I want. There's no doubt about. I want to come back and I want to play better. But now to find answers how I can come back.
And of course someone thought it would be "funny" to ask her whether or not she even remembers last time she played well
I don’t wanna hate you Kim, but for now I'm proposing you be exiled to a Siberian gulag or whatever it is they do with REMORSELESS BULLIES these days.
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Heck….has it actually been one month?
I don’t tend to do that good a job of staying away during the off-season, but the truth is that this year, I really needed some time apart.
I’d love to say this has something to do with my flamboyant Howard Hughes lifestyle – the truth is I’d simply had enough.
Confession #1: You really can have too much of a good thing (That’s right, I said it).
The Fedal charity gig (raising over $5M in various fine causes – nice work gents) was particularly excruciating – sitting through three engineered sets of pseudo-tennis twice, after a well-rounded, fulfilling season that actually ended on a good note smacks of the type of gluttony that leaves you feeling bloated, gaseous and in my case, nauseous.
Only when the start of the official season barely registered, did I sense something might be drastically wrong. Fortunately tennis-rehab came in the form of one of last years best WTA matches (Henin v ElenaD in R2 of Aus) – that’s right, it took a replay of a match that was played 12 months ago to reignite my interest in a sport I’m meant to enjoy enough to spend a criminal amount of time writing about.
Do a youtube search and you’ll find reams and reams of highlight reels – that’s no mistake: almost every other point was a highlight.
It was “only” two sets of tennis – but those two sets were uncontaminated, crystallised excellence.
All of which isn’t just a very long way of telling you how scandalous I find it that it didn’t even feature as a nominee for match of the year on any 2010 poll anywhere (not once). But rather to highlight that things rather faltered for the WTA from that point on - I’d go as far as to say that all of the best women’s tennis of 2010 was played in its first month.
And that’s only the start of it, because I’m afraid:
Confession #2: I don’t consider 2010 to have been a vintage year of tennis.
I don’t expect Rafaelites to agree of course – come to think of it, I don’t “expect” anyone to.
It’s all subjective after all and I’m even willing to concede I might be wrong.
Even so, that many false starts, failed deliveries & soggy reams of disappointment (often from the highest of levels) speaks more of “fug” than it does “vintage”.
And besides, I figure we’re done pontificating on how great it all was.
1) All the best women’s tennis was played in its first month.
See above. ElenaD/Henin (Aus - R2) remains my personal fave, though the Serena/Henin final and the Brisbane final between Henin & Kim weren’t far behind.
The French Open final, perhaps, may have recaptured something of the drama but it remains the case that nothing came close in quality to what we saw in that very promising start to the season.
2) Men’s Grand Slam finals (and two of the women’s) were strictly one-sided affairs – only of any lasting interest to those strongly invested in Rafa or Fed.
Not that there's anything wrong with that and both the Aus & USO men’s finals were spellbinding if only in a torturously one-sided way.
Doesn’t stop a season devoid of a competitive (if not a five set) men’s Slam final from being, well…just a wittle-bit rubbish.
3) The Spectre of Delpo
Only including this for the sake of completeness, because as far as I’m concerned he could have taken off the entire year to recover from what can, after all, turn into a career-ending injury(history is full of the stinking carcasses of careers blighted by an ill-conceived desire to return too soon).
Even so, that didn’t stop me feeling twitchy when he (those two matches towards the end of the year not withstanding) went and did just that.
4) Muzz won another seventy billion Masters titles….and still less than precisely one Slam.
Seen it, been there, done that. NEXT.
5) Henin’s comeback miscarriage
Justine probably deserves more generosity on my part considering she gave us some of the best matches of this year and spent much of its second half with a fractured elbow.
All the same, I’m calling fug on a year in which she plays her best three matches in its opening month – one of which was in the opening week of the season.
Harsh, I know – fracturing her arm is hardly her fault though I’m not sure her win in Stuttgart was terribly convincing either.
6) Player of the year: Kim Clijsters…WTF result of the year Petrova d. Clijsters 60 61.
Its been almost 12 months yet no one’s come up with any more cogent an explanation for what’s unanimously held to be the single most WTF result of the year, than that Kim can be both alarmingly good and unnervingly bad – both it seems in equally disturbing measure.
I’ve mostly given up trying, yet what's remained overlooked is that Petrova played an exceptional match – something that got drowned out by the pitch-black humour surrounding Kim’s performance.
I don’t have a problem with Kim being voted POY – in fact I was rather grossed out by the redundant groans of disgust at Serena being passed over.
Newsflash: Serena stepped on a shard of glass and it ended her year after playing all of six events. Sad, but that precludes her from POY contention (YES even if the two events she won were Slams). Sometimes it’s not a conspiracy.
Contrast that with Kim winning the USO, the SEC, Miami, Cincy AND Brisbane – a title at every level. She’s not my favourite player but arguing against those numbers is futile and smacks of sour grapes.
Despite all of that, Kim still has a certain ‘transient’ quality to her game that no one’s quite been able to put their finger on - who’s completely convinced we won’t see more WTF results from the Player of 2010? I know I'm not.
7) Djoko’s Title “Tally”
Remember when Djoko won Dubai early on last year?
It would be one of only two singles titles he would win in 2010 – both of them ATP 500s.
To put this into perspective, Djoko won a Masters title and reached the final of four others in 2009. He also won two Masters titles in each of the two years preceding that, which makes this the first time since 2006 that he’s not won a single Masters title.
Disappointing for a season in which he played some of the best tennis we’ve seen from him in over two years – though admittedly most of it was towards its back end.
8) Rafa’s clay-court clean sweep
Rafa’s clay seasons are always laughably one-sided but this year he won all three Masters and RG – all for the loss of only two sets. That would be two sets over the entire clay season.
That’s not domination, that’s tennis sacrilege.
As pleased as I was for him, that stat also speaks of underperformance from the rest of the tour (especially the top guys).
It’s ok, we can say that now. The dust has settled on Rafa’s year.
9) Greatest “Diss-appointment of” 2010?
Whither comeback queens Masha, Henin? Whither Sveta? Marin?? Those last two, in particular, have a lot to answer for.
Not according to tennis.com, who pronounced Dinara, who spent the better part of the year out with a bad back, their “Biggest Disappointment of 2010”.
They took the edge off it by noting that “few believe Dinara belongs outside the top 50”, but that headline is plain irresponsible.
Call me cynical, but if Serena isn’t POY because she only played six events then Dinara’s not DOY for precisely the same reason.
10) When is a scandal not a scandal?
Hey psssst! Have a hot tip for ya.
You ready? Get this – Rafael Nadal has just expressed a desire to win the Australian Open.
[furious scribbling noises]
Got that? Not only that [breathless] ….not only that….he’s even said he intends to try his level best to defeat whomsoever he should face in the final.
There’s more where that came from: next week I’ll be revealing how the UK’s most savage spending cuts since the 1920s are likely to prove “deeply unpopular” and how all 33 of the freed Chilean miners were said to be “happy to be reunited with their loved ones”.
More of an off-court disappointment this one.
From what I can tell, if Fed passed on any “inside information” at all, it’s that he allegedly intimated to “someone” (we don’t even know this was Forstmann) that he intended to try and defeat Rafael Nadal in the 2007 RG final.
That’s about as “shady” as the Mercurian stratosphere and about as “scandalous” as Rupert Everett in drag.
If there’s a story here at all, it’s how easy it is to drag a high profile name into what seems to be nothing more than litigious hustling between the IMG kingpin and an estranged former business associate.
And how willingly irresponsible members of the media lapped it all up.
11) Demmie’s Retirement
The good news: I’m no longer in denial about this.
***
Still largely playing catch-up tennis-wise.
Normal service will resumptionalise in due course.
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Was I the only one that thought Kim was spectacularly under par in Doha?
And I don’t just mean the double faults, entertaining though they were.
There was simply no continuity to this final however you choose to spin it.
The most frightening demonstration of this was in the way Woz was allowed to claw her way back into the match from a set and 4-1 down – credit to Woz for seeing it through, but it’s something that should never have been allowed to happen.
All the same, kinda difficult to complain when the best player in the world right now (please note the bold font before excommunicating me from your rss reader) caps off the year without playing her best tennis - in a way which, to my mind, puts an end to the question of who the ‘player of the year’ is (see below).
Fact: Caz hit 35 winners in the final – only one less than Kim Clijsters.
Fact: The day before in the semis, she came out all guns blazing.
Fact: Caz hit forehand winners throughout the week.
(In other news, Yvgeny-Unicorn won a pot of gold in a Challenger event held at the other end of the rainbow. Delegates from Mars and Lilliput expressed an interest in hosting similar events in their home nations.)
It wasn’t always pretty, it didn’t always work – but it’s yet more evidence of the growth in her game. And of the awareness of the need for such growth.
Belly-Flop of of the Week.
Bepa’s second set bagel against Caz. I’m almost not in favour of the “keeping-the-emotions-in-check” approach anymore– which, to be fair, got her to where she is today, but has now, one feels, run its course.
Not that she should return to being ‘Crazy-Bepa’.
But I really can’t see there being that much wrong with breaking a racquet or two occasionally (and to then move on, rather than letting it fester in the way she used to before), if that’s what it takes to avert these horrendous beatdowns we still occasionally get.
Some people just aren’t built to “button it up” – and it’s as wrong to expect them to do that, as it is for them to fly off the handle once too often.
Weaka-Vika
I really hope I’m wrong about this, but it seems to me that Vika joins a growing line of upcoming Slam contenders upended by breathing problems, heat and fatigue.
More Demmie.
Not over it. :((
There’s a small chance I may have shed non-virtual tears over this one. ACTUALLY THEY WERE GREAT BIG “MAN” TEARS.
It would probably have been the same for any player (even one I wasn’t as emotionally invested in) if they went so abruptly.
You have to be a very special, well-loved player to warrant and to then carry off a farewell tour – which is why I’m not, in general, a fan of them.
On the other hand, I’m pretty sure I’m not a fan of the emotional whiplash I’ve suffered over the past few days – a direct consequence of being forced to go ‘cold turkey’.
Can we agree on a more manageable, staged withdrawal strategy – a kind of halfway house – for when, say, Venus retires? The way Amelie cautiously signalled her intent a few months before making it official?
Player of the Year?
Has there ever been such intense speculation over this issue before? Probably not.
It’s easy to see why of course: never have such conflicting notions of consistency, quality, Slams and rankings points come to a head so acutely - nor grated against one another so viciously.
It’s as if Serena, Kim and Woz deliberately set out to demonstrate the three prevailing attitudes to the tour that may as well represent the Bolshy left, centre-right and far right of rankings system politics.
Woz is the young wannabe-opinion-maker eager to make a name for herself by being seen with all the right people at all the right parties – only one that hasn’t yet quite learnt the perils of overexposure.
Kim’s the former tree hugging liberal that has seen fit to drop her most provocative opinions as the demands (and comforts) of family life and the pragmatism of tennis-middle-age kick in.
Serena’s the eccentric aristocrat that expects the ‘National Trust’ to foot the bill for an extension to her country house; that is when she’s not shooting down ramblers exercising their right of way on her land.
Can you be player of the year having only made one Slam semi? I don’t think so.
Can you be player of the year having only played six events, all of which took place in it’s first half? Winning two Slams helps your cause as the best player in the world – but that’s not quite the same as ‘player of the year’.
Kim certainly wouldn’t be my centre-right WTA presidential candidate of choice in any other year – but she’s won a Slam, the WTA Championships, a premier mandatory (Miami), a premier 5 (Cincy) and an International event in Brisbane – that’s one event at every WTA tier.
If that doesn’t make you player of this (not especially representative) year, then I’m not sure what does.
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My loyalties were split 51/49 in Djoko’s favour.
Rafa, playing as he was for a place in history, seemed to me to have more to lose – and a heck of a lot more to gain.
Djoko, playing in his first Slam final since Aus 2008, seemed too talented to have won only one Slam – the consummate underachiever.
Only after it was all over did I realise how glaringly obvious it was.
Inevitable, even.
“Hear that Mr Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability.”
-- Agent Smith, see ‘Matrix, The’
It was inevitable, really, that Rafa would one day complete his box set.
It was inevitable that he’d be driven enough to make the necessary adjustments that would tend toward making this the most natural of conclusions.
It was inevitable that he’d learn to play closer to the baseline and improve his volleying sufficiently to win on grass.
It was inevitable that he’d flatten out his forehand, adding both the pace and depth needed to shorten points on fast hard courts.
It was inevitable that he’d curtail his schedule to give his knees the rest they are now literally crying out for, enabling him to remain effective through to the seasons last Slam – the one they said he couldn’t win.
It was inevitable that his inherently open disposition would lend itself to this degree of reinvention.
So when he unveiled his new-fangled 135mph serve souped up to the point of delirium early on this event, a serve which remained unbroken until the semis, there was an inevitability about that too.
And yet, it is inevitable that this victory will be lauded as one of of “heart”, “spirit”, “determination”,”energy”,“fitness”…..but not sadly of talent, that is surely the precursor to that reinvention.
Inevitable, that essential vitality that drove such improvements would be held against him simply because it doesn’t conform to an exotic strain of tennis neoclassicism that probably doesn’t even exist.
Perhaps knowing all this, it was inevitable that Djoko would sell his own soul to ensure he didn’t go down early in the first set.
Inevitable too, how panic-stricken, desperate and “conflustered” he looked when things didn’t go to plan: someone walking in might have thought he was down a couple of breaks deep in the fourth set.
Inevitable also, how Djoko would bounce back in the second with the type of form he had brought only48 hours earlier, before the timeliest rain delay there ever was, against arguably his greatest ever adversary – he hadn’t come this far just to pull a Bepa now had he?
Inevitable then, that some of this spirit, at least, would carry over into this match and prevent Rafa from converting any more than a measly 6 out of a staggering 26 break points. (Perhaps this was Rafa’s “Roger moment” too – I’m thinking it was all Djoko)
And yet, it was inevitable too, that Rafa would choose 5-4 15-30 down in the third set to return the favour by unveiling three of the biggest serves of his career. Arguably the event’s biggest story.
For sure was a little bit nervous for me, because especially on the 5 4 I have 15 30. So that was a very important moment, and at that moment I did something that I never did: three serves, one ace and two service winners. So that's the big experience for me, and believe me, that's good.
It is, then, inevitable to me that he will, one day, win indoors at the Tennis Masters Cup – the only major title missing from his résumé.
Meanwhile, we will inevitably be drawn to talk of naturally homogenised milk-giving creatures, whilst simultaneously railing against the practice as “pointless”, “vulgar” and “populist”.
…and if he ever finishes up with more Slams than Fed, then…well, that will have been inevitable too.
***
-- “It’s better to burn out than to fade away.” (But it’s even better not to burn out at all)
Back to that match against Fed.
Everyone remembers the gutsy way Djoko saved those two match points.
I’d argue the way he bounced back after losing the 3rd set was just as important, if not more so.
Fed had just broken Djoko’s serve in a way which should also have broken his spirit, with two of his best winners of the match: exactly the kind of timely, intimidating death blows designed to vaporise your morale (and usually your soul) that Fed specialises in - sheer rock and roll.
Anyone not named Rafa, now 2 sets to 1 down and with Fed seemingly in the ascendancy, would have taken it as their cue to fade away .
Djoko picked up from exactly where he had left off – with the same unflinching, gutsy refusal to miss that’s probably the second biggest story of the event.
And that, perhaps more than anything else, captures where this match was won and lost.
Rail against Fed’s passive play, the UFEs, the missed match points if you must…..but if you can’t bring yourself to credit that sort of play I’d argue you’re exactly the kind of “fan” Fed can do without.
-- Feeling bad for Fed, giving credit where it’s due…yes both are possible.
One of the best experiences of the Federer/Djoko match was hearing Fed fans give due recognition to Djoko having won this match rather than Fed having lost it.
I confess I went back and reviewed those match points that Djoko saved and the last couple of games again.
And yes, Fed was passive…..far too passive. And those last two games were a mess.
There were also an astonishingly large number of high quality rallies played under pressure from the back of the court. Almost a shame one guy had to emerge the loser in these rallies – and Djoko simply wasn’t missing.
Only a buffoon would pretend that any match in which Fed dishes up 66 UFEs and barely serves at 50% throughout is his best performance. But only a grumpy, wanton twat would choose to believe that every match Fed plays is “on his racquet” (ghastly expression by the way) or that Fed’s loss had little to do with the relentless nature of Djoko’s returns.
As for the stat of 66 UFEs, well that can be misleading too. There’s a shank that’s hit on the third ball of a rally and there’s one that follows a 36-ball exchange. Both are recorded as UFEs and yet the latter is a breakdown of performance born of the length of the exchange. Elicited if not forced.
The good news is that Fed is prepared to acknowledge all this, even if an irritating element of his fanbase isn’t.
Sure, now looking back I missed a few too many forehands at the very end, but the match won't be decided on winners only. You can also see mistakes, and he pushed me to make those. Credit to him.
…
…it was not like the guy can't play under pressure. He's proven his point, and time and time again. I knew he was gonna be a really tough opponent. The guys who overlooked him don't know anything about tennis, unfortunately.
He also (quite rightly) suggested that a tight match like this wasn’t simply about Djoko making winners or he himself playing his best tennis – not that different, if you remember, from Djoko intimating that a high quality encounter like his would be decided by only a few points.
Still my favourite quote of the event.
-- Liking, Likeability and the Like.
I get that some people will never like Nole. I myself suffer a similar ailment with Kim Clijsters.
You should know that you have my full leave to exercise your right not to like him, or indeed anyone of your choosing.
But let it, at least, now be for personal reasons alone and not for the accusations once levelled against him which simply don’t hold true anymore (many never did).
Gone is the irritating bravado …and in it’s place an unaffected quiet dignity.
Gone are the try-hard ingratiatory theatrics…and in it’s place an easy charm that doesn’t give a fig about whether you like him or not.
The maturity and depth of character he showed in defeat ranks alongside the best I’ve ever seen – perhaps not surprising that Rafa chose to publicly point that out.
Oh, and his tennis is back too. Shame Marian Vajda wasn’t around to see it.
Are we really going to continue to sneer after ringing endorsements from the best two players of the last decade?
The kids grown up. I suggest we do to.
-- Ditto Camp Djoko.
However garish you might have found Srdjans shirt (I personally found it as sweet as it was tacky) they too displayed a quiet dignity in defeat that’s wholly at odds with the whole “Be Quiet” thing from two years back. Fantastic to see.
-- I clearly need no excuses to talk about Rafa’s serve.
The volleying, the slice, the flattening out were more about optimisation and incremental development – the serve seems more akin to a mutant gene. Easily the most improved stroke of 2010.
-- “Ye old faithful”
For all the improvements, nice too, to see Rafa’s old stalwart pass: it’s hit under pressure, from deep behind the baseline, stretched out wide, and on the run.
And you know what else? He never misses it. In my book, that makes it a candidate for the best shot in tennis right now.
-- Idle observation: Rafa’s lost much (though not all) of his boyish charm.
Not that there’s anything wrong with the dignified Spaniard that now stands in his place. It’s time. That is all.
-- From the “Dept. of the Wacky, Wild and Wonderful”.
Wait….did Fed subconsciously lose this match in order to avoid playing Nadal, thereby preventing further damage to that H2H and to his legacy in general?
Leaving aside for the moment how driven a champion Federer is and the slim possibility that he might actually have beaten a Rafa in this form (still a fast hard court people), are we really going to suggest Roger prefers going down to Nole, who – and I’m pretty sure this isn’t from The Twilight Zone – he’s not the best of chums with?
-- The best player in the womens draw won. And it’s hard to hate on that.
Although if you’ve been paying attention you’ll know that I’ve never actually hated on Kim at all. You’ll also know that I’ve broken new ground and that although she may never be a player I like, I won’t be virulently rooting against her either.
You’ve got Bopanna and Qureshi and the good will they generated to thank for that.
She didn’t have it all her own way of course. And I daresay the wobbles we saw against Stosur and Venus will continue to plague her from time to time.
Even so, it’s worth remembering that she beat both Serena and Venus last year and a self-destructive Venus again this time round, so it’s really not fair to suggest that she only won this because of Serena’s absence.
One last thing. And I realise this probably puts me in the tiniest minority imaginable.
I’m not a great fan of the second trophy presentation that takes place whenever she wins one of these things – and you’ve got to think she might win a few more.
The first trophy presentation is what you think it is. The second one is where Jada gets presented to the world.
She’s cute. Too cute for words even (kids often are). You’re a great mum with a healthy work/life balance. We get it.
It was great to see the first time round, perhaps even necessary given she’d packed up her first career to go and have a family.
All the same, I don’t think we need to see that every year. And I’m not sure it’s doing her any favours either. There, I said it.
Bepa….dunno what to say. Which is kinda appropriate coz there plainly wasn’t much of a final to speak of.
And after championing your cause I do feel you at least owe me a hanky to wipe some of that egg dripping down my face.
Still, two consecutive Slam finals ain’t half bad considering who you were up against. Neither is a #4 ranking.
To put it bluntly you were never going to go through a Kim performing at 95%. And performing at 45% yourself it’s surprising it took as long as 59 mins.
Now go and put that #4 ranking to good use.
-- Guilty Pleasures: The Hoofed issue everyone loves to pretend they hate talking about.
So long as Rafa continues to rack up titles there’ll be bleating noises from farmyards up and down the country.
You can choose to partake in it or you can sit back like some stuffy codger railing against popular science.
My own view is that it’s a completely flawed, wholly objectionable undertaking that can, nevertheless, yield a few useful insights.
I’ll try and keep it short.
So that 5-2 H2H? Completely misleading - Rafa has never reached as many hard court Slam finals as Fed reached RG finals – if he did the score might have been very different. That’s just fact.
But you know what the flipside of that argument is?
That had Rafa made more of those hard court finals….he might actually won them. It is possible. Then where would that H2H be?
Perhaps that is a little fanciful, though I suspect that Brad Gilbert and others who now give the nod to Rafa are going on a hunch that, considering what we know about how fast Rafa learns and how well Fed’s game matches up with his, that had they played more hard court Slam matches, Rafa would have won a handful of those too.
Consider the non Slam hard court matches they played during 2005-2007. There was that win he had over Fed in Dubai(2006), that five set war they had in Miami when Fed came back from two sets down (2005) and two other straight sets wins for Fed at the Tennis Masters Cup (2006, 2007).
If we use that to extrapolate a set of fictitious hard court Slam results we might rule 3-1 in Fed’s favour. Still only bringing the total to 6-5 in Rafa’s favour. Only if we skew it 4-1 or 3-0 in Fed’s favour do we finish up even. Which would seem to give Rafa the upper hand.
Complete codswallop of course. Fanciful codswallop. But food for thought nevertheless.
Speaking of fanciful, isn’t it a stretch to suggest he might have beaten Fed at a time when he was losing on hard courts to Youznhy, Blake and Ferrer?
Yes it is. What those losses demonstrate is that Rafa’s game hadn’t at that stage matured sufficiently to translate effectively to hard courts. All at a time, remember, when Fed was in his prime and playing arguably the best tennis of his career (his game now is arguably more complete but he can’t perhaps compete as well with Rafa over five sets now as he might have then).
Also worth noting that Misha and Blake have, wait for it……single handed backhands…….which, contrary to the conventional wisdom that purports single-handed backhands go up in smoke against Rafa, actually suggests Fed might have had the upper hand after all.
Personally, 16 Slams and 23 straight semis (arguably the most impressive stat ever) settles it for me.
Though, and this is important, the opinion that Rafa might already belong in GOAT contention is no longer as ridiculous as it once was…and Brad Gilbert or anyone else ought not to be stomped on for simply expressing it.
(Images: Getty)
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