Gulbis reached a turning point in his career. Back in Rome in 2010, he upset Roger Federer in the second round. He reached the semifinals where he took one of two sets that anyone had taken off him in the clay season (the other player to take a set was Nicolas Almagro). But he got
Before we talk about Federer, let's review the late matches yesterday. Yesterday afternoon, it began to rain and this cancelled all play except Centre Court which has, surprise, a roof! When the roof was ready to go in Wimbledon 2009, there was very little rain. Andy Murray played a 5-setter against Stan Wawrinka, and was
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
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 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
The first two Masters 1000 events of the year are held in the US, first in Indian Wells, then in Miami. Both are week and a half events. After that, every Masters 1000 event is played in a one week tournament. We move to the clay of Europe and the opening tournament is Monte Carlo,
Still the early rounds going on. Nadal, who rarely loses to fellow Spaniards (although he did lose to Lopez at Queen's last year and to Garcia-Lopez in Bangkok--something about that Lopez name, I guess) faced fellow lefty, Feliciano Lopez. This was a routine 6-3, 6-3 win. Federer had a tougher match, requiring a 6-4, 7-6
This year, the top singles players came out in force to play doubles. Rafael Nadal and Marc Lopez were the defending champs and came back to defend. Roger Federer was teamed up with Stan Wawrinka for the first time in a tournament setting since they won the Olympics in 2008. Novak Djokovic paired up with
For a few years, Devvarman was at the top of the game. The college game, that is. The star player at the University of Virginia, Devvarman reached the finals of the NCAA Division 1 Men's Championship, and won it two years in a row including a win over John Isner. Since then, Devvarman has been
Robin Soderling, ranked number 4 in the world, reached that rank by playing consistently well in Slams and Masters 1000 events. He hasn't, however, won that many tournaments. Last year, he won Rotterdam (over Youzhny) and he won Paris. That was it. This year, barely a month into the new year, Soderling has won two
