Perhaps no one knows what Gasquet's life is like as much as, oh, maybe Venus Williams. Touted as the new superstar of the projects, Venus was expected to do well even at the ripe young age of 12. France, similarly, thought Richard Gasquet would be the new French superstar. Until, that is, the fateful day
Right now, Nadal is number 1 with 12470 points. Djokovic is number 2 at 10665 points. 1805 points separate the two. There is a slim chance Djokovic could become number 1 at the end of Rome. A Masters 1000 event awards 1000 points to the winner. Normally, a player doesn't get the full 1000 points
While the top 3 were making the semifinals of Madrid last week, the conspicuous missing fourth is Andy Murray. To be sure, Murray's weakest surface is clay. Murray's flatter style often leads to more errors. His opponent's high kicking spin can give him trouble. Still, he reached the semis of Monte Carlo after a slumping
Lopez seems like a poor man's Verdasco. He's a lefty, but hits his a one-hander to Verdasco's two-hander. He has a big forehand, but probably not bigger than Verdasco. He relies on the slice. He might have a bigger serve than Verdasco, but not by much. In any case, he had never beaten Roger Federer,
When racquets were tiny, and the ability to hit a good shot merely meant to keep the ball in play, the ultimate in strategy was pure steadiness. Before Nadal was king of clay, there was Bjorn Borg. Thin, wiry, iconically Swedish, Borg was the stoic player. When the world was playing slice and Continental grips,
The match almost didn't start at all. An announcement was made at the start that Murray wasn't ready to play right away due to a possible injury and it would start 15 minutes late, if at all. But Murray did show up, and the question became, what's his health like. Murray immediately opened with a
It was said, when you had a player that scored as much as Michael Jordan, that he would get his. You just hoped to contain everyone else. When Nadal is on clay, he generally gets his. You have to be playing some amazing dirt ball, and then, you have to hope he's injured. If you
Gilles Simon was expected to give Murray a tough test. He is very steady player, The French do, as a group, tend to perform better on faster surfaces. However, given they are the home of clay tennis, they do know how to play on the stuff. Gilles Simon was at his best in late 2008
For all the talk of Novak Djokovic's amazing 2011 run, still undefeated with 3 wins over Federer and 2 wins over Nadal, the missing man has been Andy Murray. When Andy Murray put in a less than stellar effort in the finals of Melbourne, it was thought that he choked another final. While that may
My thinking was, despite Djokovic's win-streak, Nadal gave him all he could handle in Indian Wells. If Nadal's serve hadn't given out on him, Djokovic's streak might already have ended. To counter Djokovic, Nadal went for big serves and big groundies in the first set and it worked. Djokovic struggled to keep up. But, by
