Early in the second set, after a dominant first set, and with chances to break Berrer, Murray was chasing a drop shot down. As he approached, he twisted his right ankle and managed to hit a good down-the-line shot as he came up hopping on his left leg. Berrer seemed to notice something from the
As the hour headed to about 7 PM, there was a battle brewing on Court Philippe Chatrier. The ESPN announcers astutely observed that if Tsonga didn't win the match in straight sets, he would lose in 5 sets. The reason? Stamina. Tsonga, like his countryman Monfils, is susceptible to injury. When you're injured, it can
Before I talk about today's early results, I want to talk about yesterday's results. Tennis really needs a better way to report its scores. Scores are fine, but they really don't tell you the story. I'll give you three examples from yesterday, two from women's matches. Maria Sharapova is down 6-3, 4-1 down, double-break. It
Nadal is the kind of player that generally doesn't play two bad matches in a row. It happened at Wimbledon last year when he was taken to five sets by unheralded Robin Haase and Philipp Petzschner. But it rarely happens on clay. Indeed, Nadal had never been taken to five sets at the French Open
It's rare for this to happen. Roger Federer was scheduled to meet the winner of two wildcards. Normally, wildcards are ranked too low to get into the main draw. If this were Wimbledon, the wildcards could easily be ranked 300 or worse since UK has a dearth of quality players. However, France has a plethora
OK, this is a theory and may not be completely valid, but I think Djokovic's transformation comes partly from learning how Davydenko beat Nadal. (For the curious, this was last year in London after a round-robin match. They swapped shirts like soccer teams often do). Up to Davydenko, the way to beat Nadal was to
It's hard to believe, but over the 6 years that Nadal has played the French Open, he's never played a 5-setter. They don't call Nadal the king of clay for nothing. He has played two French Opens without dropping a set. It's perhaps not surprising that John Isner might be the kind of guy that
Because of the Sunday start, the French Open's first round lasts 3 days. Wimbledon typically moves at a faster clip so they can give the middle Sunday as a break. Let's take a look at the seeds that have fallen. The top seed to lose was last year's semifinalist, Tomas Berdych. Although this is surprising,
Link to Chris Chase's article on Novak Djokovic In this link, Chris Chase talks about the Novak Djokovic streak. He mentions two issues in this streak. Should it include Davis Cup, yes or no. I'm not sure what to think about this either. Here's the problem with Davis Cup. It has history. Players like John
Perhaps one player Roger Federer didn't want to see in the first round was Feliciano Lopez. Lopez pushed Federer to 3 tiebreaks in Madrid to win. Federer did have a break opportunity to take it in straight sets. Despite this, I figured Federer would feel more confident playing Lopez and not be as vulnerable to
