Tennis

No Rain! We have our semi finals!

DJOKOVIC[1] sprinted to win the first set 6-1, but then things got complicated. Cilic served well, played well, proved more reliable than Djokovic on the backhand side and the serb had a lot of trouble with his footing. The cost: 6-3 7-6 for a pumped up croatian. Djokovic changed shoes early in the fourth and also a rumor came from center court, soon confirmed by the info board during the following change of ends. After that, the agitated Djokovic became serene and bagged the fourth and fifth sets 6-2 6-2.
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DIMITROV[11] also sprinted to win the first set 6-1 against a very flat Murray. Everytime it seemed the scott was finally getting his teeth into the match, playing a brilliant shot or a great rally, he followed it by a couple inexplicable unforced errors. He still managed to recover from a break down in the second set (helped by a very poor Dimitrov service game), but he lost it in the tie breaker. Dimitrov kept his focus, continued to fight on every point and did not drop from his high standard of play, allowing him to get rid of the defending champion with a final 6-2. In the post match interview the bulgarian said that during the warm up he felt that Murray was not at his best and it gace him hope and confidence!

Djokovic is very much aware of the thread that Dimitrov represents, having lost to him last year on clay. On top of that, Dimitrov is a much fitter and stronger player now than he was last year, thanks to the good hard work done with Roger Rasheed and he is a tougher proposition on grass than on clay. Should be a good one!


FEDERER[4] did not have the best of starts against Wawrinka as the better ranked underdog broke early and managed to defend his own deal despite a very low first serve percentage. The servers reigned supreme in the second set, but Federer managed to prevail in a tense and possibly vital breaker. This did not sit so well with Wawrinka in more ways than one as he had to call for the doctor. No doubt that leveling the match and seeing his opponent of the day possibly struggle physically boosted Federer's confidence. He continued with his serving clinic, and broke Wawrinka in both following sets. Closing the match was a bit of a struggle, Wawrinka even getting a break point to level the fourth at 5 all, but a confident one-two punch followed by a winning volley snuffed that hope and soon after Federer reached his 9th Wimbeldon semi-final.
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RAONIC[8] was not interested in getting surprised by Kyrgios. After losing the first set in a breaker he found a way to avoid this scenario in the second and third sets. Visibly tired, the young australian was no longer able to make any impression in his return games (not like he was able to do much of one in the first place), but the crowd helped him defend his service games and force a breaker. This time though it was all Raonic who raced to a 6-1 lead. Kyrgios took care of his own two serves, managed to steal one of the minibreak back, but, fittingly, Raonic ended the charade with one of his many aces down the T.

I would like to think that Federer has enough tools in his arsenal to defend his serve consistently and get into two or three Raonic service games per set. That being said, if Raonic serves well and there is no break in sight, it puts you under tremendous pressure and a couple untimely errors on grass, be it in a tie-break or a service game, can cost a set. Should be a nerve-wracking one.


Fun WB fact of the day: In 1904 Frank Riesley and Sydney Smith faced each other in the semi-final, but, when the match reached two sets all, they chose the winner with a coin toss! Riesley and Smith were playing in double together and wanted to save some energy for the final they had to play! This kinda paid off as they won the double's final and Riesley also crushed his opponent in the single's final. In that era though the tournament was only a mean to determine the challenger that could then defy the title holder and our crafty coin tossers lost both the challenge matches!

Nadal might have been a little bitter after his defeat but he pointed several things in interview that are not untrue:

- It's a lot easier for Kyrgios to play the way he did as the youngster with no pressure enjoying the big stage. Can he play through a season like that and know similar success? Can he do it on the third court of an ATP 250? Will he be able to do it next year when he will have to defend his Wimbledon points? Kyrgios is also a guy who lost in the first round of a challenger three weeks ago.

- Nadal notes that this type of super aggressive game plans, hitting big every ground strokes, serving 130 mph second serves in breakers, can only be played by people who want to win a single match and not the tournament. The play styles needed to win tournaments require consistency. There is always the risk in the early rounds of tournaments to face a Rosol, a Brown, a Kygrios that will blow you out, but in the later stages only the reasonable people are left and Nadal feels a lot stronger and in control against reasonable people.

- A lot has been said about Kyrgios' youth, but Hewitt won the US Open at 20, Becker won Wimbledon at 17, Nadal won the French at 19, Federer Wimbledon at 21, Sampras the US Open at 19, Change the French at 17, etc. The real odd thing is that there is not more youngsters in the mix, not that Kygrios is 19 and having success at a tournament.

Maybe because the current top players are so dominant, that the a youngster doesn't just have 1 mammoth task but several. It would take one of those young stars to mature to beyond 22-24 (Dimitrov?) before they finally get that level of consistency. Whilst those other stars may not have had the same consistency, they had less people that it mattered against.

I watched a Women's Tennis match that didn't have moaning today!

Exciting stuff, Dimitrov going beast mode.
Aw. Didn't break through in the end, iron mentality from the Serb.

We have our final. The old generation is not old enough or the new generation still too young.


DJOKOVICmanaged to do just enough against an inspired but ultimately too generous Dimitrov. The Bulgarian served brilliantly through the first set... only to gift a break to his opponent with four unforced errors. And really unforced errors too. We are talking double fault, regulation backhand ending in the middle of the net, that kind of stuff. Mind boggling. This is even more frustrating when you consider he managed to play brilliantly for the second half of the second set, recovering from a break down to bag it 6-3 and then forced breakers in the third and fourth set with a mix of good serving, surprisingly efficient net play and relentless defending, sliding around the court like it was Holiday On Ice. On that note, both players really had trouble moving properly on the court. Way too aggressive with their footwork, they slipped and tumbled again and again, some rallies even ending without both guys flat on their belly! Anyway, Dimitrov played a poor 3rd set breaker and made a mess of his lead in the fourth set breaker. Djokovic only impressed with the quality of his serving in the match (notably an absurd 20 1st serve out of 24 service points in the first set!), but he was very passive in the rallies, made a number of uncharacteristic errors and had a tough time trying to pass Dimitrov at the net.
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FEDERERfaced a very dangerous opponent in Raonic today in a Grand Slam semi-final, yet he made it look like a routine win with a business like 6-4 6-4 6-4. A break in each set (early in the first thanks to early nerves and late in the two others thanks to scoreboard pressure) and almost total domination on is own delivery (a single break point to save in the match). Raonic was probably too nervous, too impressed by a first match on center court, too caught up in the magnitude of the occasion to produce the kind of a high standard performance that was needed today and he also lacked the weapons to deal with Federer's variations and inspirations.

These two only met once on grass, at Wimbledon in 2012. Djokovic then had recently beaten Federer in straight sets at the French, but on the grass of SW19 the swiss won in four sets, losing serve just the once and the score line could have been even more in his favor when you consider Djokovic managed to fend off 8 of 11 break points! Unless Djokovic offers a stellar performance or Federer shakes in his boots because of the magnitude of the opportunity (how many more time will he be in a Slam final?), I expect something not unlike the 2012 match.


WB not fun fact of the day: US tennis hope Victoria Duval (18) announced that she will stop playing for a while because she has a cancer: Hodgkin's lymphoma. Luckily, it was detected early and it's a type of cancer that responds well to treatment. Duval got the diagnostic after the first round of the Wimbledon qualies and still managed to win another two rounds to reach the main draw and beat Cirstea the 29th seed!

Didn't catch the womens, it was only on for less than an hour. Easy to miss. 6-0 win is a bit of a joke?
Caught the Mens doubles, last 3 sets. Now that was some great doubles! Best in a long while. 5 sets, Bryans on the ropes. Great breaks and match point saves.
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I did not watch the final, but 6-0 sets are not uncommon in women tennis because the serve/return equilibrium is, generally, slightly in favor of the return, while it is firmly in favor of the serve in men's tennis.

LOL at Pospisil and Sock winning the double though! That's so far out of left field...

I am not too sure what happened in the final because I had a heart attack mid way through... just kidding but it could have been the case!

We more or less got the match we expected as far as what the two players produced, but the dramaturgy of it all was unexpected. Federer tried to be aggressive and find his way to the net to finish points, failing to do that (read: forced to play too many backhands), he tried to mix things up from the back of the court playing deep floaty slices, angled biting slices, short slices down the line and top spin shots of volume and direction. Djokovic tried to stay close to his base line, to be rock solid on his ground strokes, to make a lot of deep returns, to move Federer around, to force him to play one more ball, to find great passing shots even under pressure and to be ready to close points at the net should a defending Federer provide him with a floaty short ball. That, and serving well, both of them.

That was their plan and from the get go both executed their plan almost flawlessly. A tie breaker was almost inevitable and it happened and Federer won it. Like the newbie he is though, he had a slight slump in focus, a decompression of sorts after such a tight affair... or because Djokovic had an heavy fall at the back of the court from which he stood up all gingerly. Anyway, the swiss dodged a bullet on his first service game and got broken on the second, not helped by an untimely double fault. The servers dominate from there and Federer fans only get a glimmer of hope when the swiss optains his first break point of the match at 5-4. Djokovic does not flinch though. A forehand winner, an ace a well constriucted rally concluded by a smash and it's one set all!

In the third set, Federer's serving becomes kind of ridiculous, averaging 2 aces a game! The serb makes the most of what crumbs are left though, winning the lion's share of the second service points, but the lion's share of crumbs is not much. Federer's problem though is that, while he was very competitive in the rallies at the start of the match, it stopped being true mid way through the 2nd set. For some unkown reason, the variation that served him well is replaced by all top spin all the time, trying to play past Djokovic, instead of trying to play around him and make things awkward for him with a broad array of shots. Very difficult to break in these conditions and also very difficult to win a breaker. Proof: the set went to a breaker and Djokovic won it. Two sets to one Djokovic!

At this point things smell pretty bad for Federer. He is down two sets to one, he has not managed to break Djokovic (who plays a very clean match) and he is extremely dependent on his serve to win points. The upside is that he himself is playing a high quality match and has been broken just the once. Well... make that two times because Djokovic, putting more and more return in play with an alarming depth broke early in the fourth to lead 3-1! The combined effect of Djokovic seeing the finish line and Federer turning his aggressiveness to 11 results in a immediate debreak by Federer! 3-2! Sadly, that does not change the fact Djokovic his now making tons of deep return and playing very clean rallies, puting tremedous pressure on the swiss... so the serb breaks right back! 4-2! And holds! 5-2! At this point it's no longer smell bad for the World N?4: it reeks! Federer stays focused and composed like it's 2-2 in the first set and hold to love for 5-3 against a Djokovic who might be pacing himself to close the match on his serve. As a rule of the thumb, it's a silly idea to disregard current points because you expect to win future points. Djokovic is brutally reminded of the fact when he finds himself at 0-30 on his serve after two unforced errors. Two good serves help him back to 30-30, but then two gigantic rallies go the way of the swiss for 5-4! What the fuck is going on in this match! You don't have the time to answer this question that it's match point Djokovic on the Federer serve! Ace! No! Out! Challenge! It's In! Ace! Djokovic is disgusted! 5-5!

At this point, it should be mentioned that Federer often tried to put some pressure on Djokovic by chipping the return and following it to the net. He probably did it 5 or 6 times in the match sofar and ate a passing shot precisely as often.

Well it's 5-5, Djokovic serves and... here comes the chip and charge and... the passing shot lands in the double's alley! Tension? Double fault! Tension! An horrible rally and that's three break point for the swiss! What. The. Fuck. Is. Going. On. In. This. Match. Djokovic saves the first break point, but another big rally goes the way of Federer and it's a break. The fifth of the set for 6-5. Djokovic is interested of manufacturing a 6th break of serve and throw the kitchen sink at Federer. A wide first serve on the line is returned with interest stright on the baseline. The swiss half-volley it down the line (and on the side line), but Djokovic covers the ground fires a backhand cross court that is also on the line that Federer half-volley into the open court for a winner. At that very moment Djokovic was dangerously close from eating his racket. Nevertheless, Federer holds and forces a fifth set out of literally nowhere.

Sadly, the fifth set ended being a lot less intense. Federer played with confidence and authority, finding back the effectiveness on his serve that had been lacking in the fourth and Djokovic managed to have no hangover from a fourth sets that slipped between his finger. We quickly reached 3-3, Djokovic then saved a break point on a very well constructed point to reach 4-3 and at this point the standard of play droped slightly. In a match that had been dominated by the winners so far in an almost 3/1 ratio to unforced errors (which is insane), errors crept in, probably helped by the ability of Djokovic to make a lot of quality returns which is draining on the servers. Federer had trouble to hold for 4-4, missed some half-chances on the Djokovic serve (including a somewhat difficult smash that ended in the net - but we expect him and he expects himself to make those) and finally played a loose service game with his back against the wall to give Djokovic the title. A bit of an anticlimatic ending for a very high quality match.

Credit to both players for the quality on display with a special mention for the mental resilience of Djokovic as many would have crumbled in the fifth given the scenario of the fourth. A second Wimbledon crown for him, his 7th Grand Slam title.

As a Federer fan I am obviously disappointed, especially because winning in 5 sets after having been 5-2 down in the fourth would have been nothing short of glorious. On the up side, he is showing this year that he is absolutely in the mix. There was a good article about Federer on the WB site saying that mentioning Federer as a potential winner before events almost started to feel like a courtesy because of his illustrious career, something you say without really believing in it. These two weeks he showed that he, in fact, is still in contention for the titles when he is healthy. It may be that he will never win another grand slam or maybe never play another final, but he certainly showed that he still can. Only the future will answer. Next step: US Open!

They're the ones who have maintained a consistent high level of play over the past decade+ and you want them out?

I can understand the feeling: it's not a question of quality but of variation.

The domination of the members of the club has been outrageous, unlike anything ever seen before in the sport and it does not exactly look like it's going to stop just yet. I made that point several times already, but as months pass it becomes more and more potent: From 2005 to today, there have been 134 big tennis events (Grand Slam, Master 1000, World Tour Final) and 116 of them have been won by 4 people. More: out of the 12 other people who won big events during that time span, many have retired. Those who are not (along with a couple who won before that span and have not yet retired) are 30 or close to it (Ferrer, Wawrinka, Robredo, Berdych, Tsonga, Hewitt) and/or lost in injury limbo (Soderling, Del Potro, Davydenko, Haas).

There is a whole generation of tennis players that never managed to break the insane stranglehold of the Top 4 guys and the new crop of player does not exactly look like they are about to.

If you've ever played anything on a more-than-casual level you pretty quickly run into players that are strong. So strong that they can destroy all your months of practice without any effort whatsoever. And that's smallest, local glimpse of competition. Every subsequent level gets bigger and faster, all the way up to the professional ranks. You might feel like the local hotshot is great, but I guarantee you he feels the same way about the guy that's a few levels above him. It's the "there's always someone better than you" principle in action.

But for some reason, that principle doesn't apply to these guys like it does to the rest of us. For the big four to be so thoroughly dominant at an international level of a popular sport for such a long period of time is nothing short of astounding to me. Everyone brings their A-Game against these guys. The best players in the world, where winning would be the highlight of theirentire career. Yet they fail almost every time. 20 times a year, year in, year out. That makes no sense to me, but apparently it keeps happening. It's like a tear in the fabric of sensical reality.

I wondered something the other day: when Nadal, Djokovic and a little later Murray burst into the scene, they knew that if they wanted to get anything out of this tennis career their were starting they had to become better than Federer and the swiss knew that to stay at the top he would need to work hard to contain that new crop of players. For players that came later though, some might have thought: "I don't need to be better than these guys, nature will run its course and, when I'll be 23 or 24, Federer will be retired, Nadal will be in a wheelchair and Murray and Djokovic will be the shadow of their former self. I just need to be the best of my age group and sooner rather than later I'll be the World N?1 and rake in titles." It's not panning out so far for the Dimitrov and the Raonic.

A quote from a post-Wimbledon interview of Federer (I don't have the source, so it might suffer from a double translation):

How do you rate the new crop of players that made wave during this fortnight?

I don't consider them as a threat. If we compare them to Rafa, Novak or Murray, we all bursted through a lot earlier. I started to play my best tennis at 20. Them they are already 22 or 23. There are a lot of very good players between the sixth and the 20th spot. Very strong. But between the 30th and the 40th, they are all a bit interchangeable. So yeah, there is a lot of dangerous players, but if I am in form I have the feeling I can be in control of the match. Even if nothing is written in advance, I think we know who the best players are and it is still tham that we will see in the finals of the Masters 1000 and the Grand Slams.

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He might have been a little pissed off after his defeat though!

Wimbledon.com posted the transcript of the english press conference with Federer. I suspect the french newspaper used a bit of it and a bit of the french part of the event (that has no transcript).

Q. It was a high-quality match. Maybe men's tennis is getting better and better. What do you think is the resemblance of those new guys coming compared to the four of you that have been there for so long?

ROGER FEDERER: The resemblance?

Q. Maybe I am saying the wrong word. How can you describe the up-and-coming guys compared to the four of you that are up there now?

ROGER FEDERER: We all made the breakthrough much earlier than most of the guys. Not just a match here or there. I mean, I can't put myself in the league of Rafa because he was one of the best teenagers we ever had besides Bjorn Borg. I wasn't that guy. I was, I guess, better at 21, 22 or 20. That's when I started to make my rise. So there's not that many young guys. There's really only one teenager in the top 100 and we wish we had more. The other guys we're talking about are all 22, 23 and have been already on tour for five years. Nevertheless, it's exciting. But you cannot compare them to Rafa, Novak, or Murray, who were incredibly good already at a young age.

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A bit of tennis history happened today as Hewitt beat Karlovic in the final of Newport's Hall of Fame Championship: That's the australian's 30th title (and the second this year!), but, more importantly, at 68 years and 10 months between the two, that was the oldest tour level final since 1977! Sign of the times, it was also the fourth final of the year seeing two 30+ players facing each other.

Maria Sharapova + Floyd Mayweather at the ESPY awards: