Now that the first Masters 1000 event is concluded, I thought I'd spend a little time to talk about how the top players are faring. This changes from month to month. Shortly after Wimbledon, everyone thought Federer was done and Nadal would steamroll. Just as the US Open started, the opinion was Nadal was ready
Andy Murray is a chameleon. Most of the times, he plays a steady form of tennis, getting crosscourt angles. Early in his career, he fell in love with the drop shot and his slices and his change of pace and incredible speed and anticipation made for a deadly combination. Players would find themselves making errors
Last year, tennis was starting to get interesting at the end of the year. Juan Martin del Potro had become the second player in recent memory that had won a Slam who wasn't named Nadal or Federer (the other was Novak Djokovic in the 2008 Australian Open). Nikolay Davydenko was having a resurgence late in
Both men's semifinals were played today and both were somewhat easier than expected. Well, OK, most folks probably gave Monaco little chance to beat Andy Murray. Murray got an early break against Monaco and was threatening a second break. However, it never came and indeed, Monaco broke Murray to tie the match up, but Murray
Robin Soderling has a peculiar kind of game. The rangy Swede doesn't have a lot of variety in his game. He hits some of the hardest shots in the game. He doesn't play the ball to conventional spots on the court. He's got a huge serve. He's not fast, but he's not exactly slow. If
It's almost unheard of. Nadal is almost always good to the quarterfinals of every event he plays. Hot off the heels of his win in Tokyo, Nadal faced veteran Jurgen Melzer, a lefty that Nadal last beat at Roland Garros. One could argue that Nadal's toughest match came against Melzer who pushed him to a
What a difference a few months make. Nikolay Davydenko, the defending champ at Shanghai, has been out of sorts ever since his return to tour. Last year, in 2009, Davydenko had injury issues. He returned just before the French Open, and lost to Robin Soderling. Davydenko hit his stride just after the US Open winning
Djokovic had to wait a day to beat David Ferrer as rain washed out Sunday's play, with Djokovic up a break and 3-1 in the first. The extra day didn't do the Spaniard much good as he won only one more game in the first set, to lose 6-2. Djokovic then won the second set,
Nadal, it seems, doesn't like it when he plays poorly. If he plays a match, and it's as close as his near-loss to Victor Troicki, he gets upset, and sometimes, the next opponent pays the price. That opponent was Gael Monfils. Sporting mini-dreads, Monfils had few answers for Nadal in the first set as Nadal
When the temperature starts dipping from the infernal heat and humidity of summer, when American collegiates put on football helmets on and their professional counterparts do the same, the American tennis-watching public tunes off tennis and turn their attentions elsewhere. It's the post-season in baseball. College and pro (American) football is starting up. Basketball and
