Australian Open 2010

Every year at the Austrian Open there is a surprise player who gets deeper into the draw then expected. Last year it was Fernando Verdasco who lost to Nadal in an epic five hour five set battle in the semis. The year before that it was Tsonga, before Tsonga it was Gonzalez. Marin Cilic was the favorite surprise and he didn't disappoint, battling past Roddick and Del Potro in five sets to meet Murray in the semis. Unfortunately he was worn out and lost in four to an on-form Andy Murray. There were plenty of good matches in the tournament, notably Del Potro vs James Blake, the higher seed eventually beating the American 10-8 in the fifth. Micheal Youzhny vs Gasquet was an interesting match up with two of the best one handed backhands in the game going head to head, Youzhny prevailing in the fifth set, 6-4.

Nicolay Davydenko was a favourite going into the tournament, the Russian who is the defending Shanghai

masters shield holder as well as the world tour finals. The 28 year old Davydenko was on a two match winning

streak against Federer and Nadal and was looking to extend it in the quarter finals where he was

likely to meet the world number one. The Russian edged an inconsistent Verdasco in five sets to get through the

fourth round. Davedenko got off to a strong start taking the first set 6-3. But Federer seemed

determined to make his 23rd consecutive grand slam final (which is mind boggling especially when you

find out that Sampras only made 3 consecutively). Federer won the next three sets displaying some of his

best tennis so far in the Championship.

Nadal and Murray were scheduled to meet in the quarter finals in a match that was highly

anticipated. ( I missed it because I had to go to school but I managed to record it). The first two sets

were high quality but Nadal didn't seem to be playing as well as last year, he was a bit too

defensive, not playing the sublime counter-attacking tennis he is capable of. Jo-Wilfred Tsonga

the former finalist and possible dark horse of the tournament, played the first two five set matches

of his life. He won both of them defeating Almegro and Djokovic. But in the semi finals against

Federer, Tsonga was never really there. He lost in straight sets allowing Federer to get to his

remarkable 8th straight Grand Slam final.

On the other side of the draw Murray beat Marin Cilic who battled past Del Potro and Roddick in five to make the semis. He took the first set against Murray but had been on court

(throughout the championship) for 7 hours and just didn't have enough left in the tank to stop

Murray from making his second slam final.

Federer got off to a strong start, taking the opening set 6-2. The Scot pushed hard

in the second set but Federer was playing at a high level and he took the set 6-4. Murray

gave it everything - in the third set he forced a tie-break, which he lost despite winning 11 points. Federer lifted his arms in the air, which was probably his most controlled celebration.

He later said that he played some of the best tennis of his life and he thought that Murray would win a slam. It was an exciting championships, setting the bar high for the remaining slams.

See you at the French!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb_4Zzihtfk (Definitely worth waiting for the HD to buffer.)

US Open

Weeks before the 2009 US Open started, people started predicting who would become the champion. The most popular pick was the five time defending champion and fifteen time grand-slam winner Roger Federer. Nadal, although always a threat, wasn't really considered, this was because of his long term knee problems and more recent abdomen strains. Because of these problems he has pulled out of several tournaments (including Wimbledon) and hasn't had much recent world class match experience.

Murray was probably the second favourite and has being playing great tennis all year. The American Andy Roddick got to the Wimbledon finals and with the advantage of a home crowd and low bouncing fast hard courts, that should suit his powerful style of play and he was considered to be in with a chance. But it was none of the above who won, instead it was the twenty year old Argentinean who beat Federer in the five sets in the final. Here is how it happened!

Federer sailed through the earlier stages without any problems. In the semi-finals Federer beat the world number 4 Novak Djokovic in straight sets. In this match he hit what he said was his "greatest ever shot". Muarry lost in the quarter finals to Marian Cilic (Cilic would then lose to Del Potro), he didn't play his best and said after the match that he had a wrist injury. In the second semi-final Del Potro beat Nadal 6-2 6-2 6-2. It was one of Nadal's worst defeats in a grand slam tournament. He didn't play badly but he was just couldn't return Del Potro's powerful serve and forehands. At no point during the match did he look like he could win. But considering his injures get to the semifinals wasn't a bad achievement.

  

So what happened in the Final, how did someone who had the experience of being in twenty one finals lose to someone who was playing in his first? In the first set Federer got off to a good start. He broke Del Potro's serve twice. Del Potro seemed nervous and made a lot of mistakes. In the second set Federer broke serve again and was serving for a two set lead but he lost the game and then lost the set. He played well again in the third set and won it 6-4. But he would lose the fourth set despite being two points away from winning the championship. He would then fall apart in the final set. There are two reasons why he lost. The first is that he didn't serve as as well as he could have, he missed too many of his first serves. The second reason is that instead of hitting the ball into Del Potro's body he hit a few feet away. Which meant that Del Potro was able to consistently hit his forehands  at around one hundred miles an hour (he hit one at a hundred and thirteen!).  Del Potro has worked very hard on and off the tennis court all year and fully deserves winning the tournament.  He is only twenty and is steadily improving so who knows how many he is going to win. As for Federer it's been a great year for him and he said afterwards that he is tired, and isn't going to be too disappointed with the loss.

Although I was only planning to write about grand slam matches I will probably write something about the world tour finals which will be held in London in November.

See you then!

Wimbledon 2009

The first thing I want to write about is the 2009 Wimbledon Championships. I will write about the players who impressed me, and the players who didn't do as well as they could have. I will then write a bit about the Final.

So first of all the players who impressed me! Andy Roddick played much better this year then last year (he lost to Tipservic in the second round). This was probably due to a new couch( Larry Stafanki who decided that Andy needed to lose some weight, that mixed with some sublime game plans explains while he did so much better this year (the absence of Nadal probably helped as well).Although Roddick didn't play great in the quarter finals against Hewitt he caused an upset when he beat the home favourite and predicted finalist Andy Murray. Against Murray he employed different tactics then his usual big serve and then big forehand. His backhand slice floated very low over the net and was more effective then I have ever seen it before. He also came to the net more often and was successful their. His first serve percentage was about seventy five percent which would have been good if his average first serve speed was one hundred and twenty never mind mid to high one hundred and thirty's!Which meant as Murray pointed out and Federer later found out he was very difficult to break(more about the final later).




The thirty one year old German Tommy Hass was the biggest surprise of the tournament who on his way to the semi-finals beat the six foot six number 11 seed Marian Cilic in five sets. Although he lost to Federer in straight sets he played a solid match and should have been happy about how he has performed throughout the Championships. Lleyton Hewitt played like the Hewitt of old beating the number 5 see Del Potro and not coming to far off beating Roddick in the quarters. His mentally is similar to Nadals in the way that he will play each point like his life depends on it, maybe if he had done less double faults he could have gone one stage further in. Next up Andy Murray. After I had seen Murrays draw I predicted that he would get to the final and then loose to Federer. But I didn't think that Murray played his best at any time over the Wimbledon fortnight. Although his late night match with Stanislas Wawrinka was very exciting, if Murray had a higher first serve percentage and his his second server was better( it got as slow as seventy mph) then he would probably would have won the match in straight sets. He played better against Roddick but was a bit to defensive. He actually did more winners, less enforced errors and more aces then Roddick but in the end he lost out on the important points.


Federer played his usual high level of Tennis to get to the final without to many problems. I think that he must have been relieved to find out that he is playing Roddick, because of his excellent record against Roddick( out of their twenty meeting's Federer has one eighteen and all of them on grass. However I think he was like Muarray surprised at the level of tennis Roddick was able to play for the whole match. I think that if he had won the second set tie brake where he lost four set points, he could won the match. But Federer was just to good. He served almost twice as many aces as Roddick( fifty one) and patiently waited for the break in the fifth set eventually winning it 16-14 and getting his 15th grand slam. I think that the reason only two British people advanced to the 2nd is because of the lack of funding in tennis and because their aren't enough courts available for people to play in. If money was invested into making more courts and advertising tennis for children then hopefully the future generation of British tennis players will be more talented and successfully then the current.
See you at the US open
DJM

Hello and welcome to my tennis blog. I will write about mens singles professional tennis as well as my experiences playing club level tournaments. I hope you will find it enterresting.

DJM