Wednesday 25 June 2008

Day 3

Part of the beauty of tennis is that it is a game of small margins. A
match can turn on a single, pivotal point or game.

We saw it today with Ivanovic v Dechy. Having won the first set Dechy
had two match points in the second. One of which ended with a shot
from Ivanovic hitting the net cord.

The ball could have dropped either side of the net. Ivanovic got
lucky. The ball just made it over and she won the point. And then went
on to win the set and the deciding set (although she was less than
convincing.)

She could have so easily been sharing a cab to the airport with
Djokovic, who earlier of course, was blown off court as Safin wound
back the years and served up the biggest shock of the tournament so far.

As Safin said himself in the post match interview its just getting
harder for him as he comes up against the new generation of younger,
hungrier players.

But he reminded us today not just why he is a two time grand slam
winner, but that he also has the unique status as the only player to
have beaten both Sampras and Federer in Grand Slam tournaments, and
then go onto win the events.

He's never liked grass but now its a bit slower and the draw is
opening up a bit who knows he may go deep.

Hewitt is looking good, comfortably beating Montanes. And Serena is
through but her opponent Urszula Radwanska showed enough to justify
the suggestions that she is a future grand slam champion.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I saw some of Ana's match today and thought her backhand was dreadful. She will have to improve it a lot if she wants to win Wimbledon.

Anonymous said...

Steve, you brought up a great point that I didn't even think about, even though I've been complaining about it for what seems like forever now: The grass is slower. This could be a near-perfect surface for Safin to play on.

I really wouldn't mind seeing him make a deep run here.

freakyfrites said...

Marat brought that up, too - when someone at ESPN asked him why grass was suddenly working for his game. He said something like "It's not the same grass it used to be." That's why the Spaniards can win on this stuff, all of the sudden.

I LOVE Marat and he did play great today. However, I really do think that Novak was waaaaay flat. Like in last November's masters, his tank was on E for Empty.

Can't wait for Janko - Roddick tomorrow!