I guess it's safe to say that Nadal is back, at least on clay. Nadal has been called the king of clay with good reason. He's lost only 20 matches on clay in his entire career, and in the past few years, with the odd exception of his recent loss to Horatio Zeballos, he's never
The semifinals had to be all the tournament organizers could hope for. Federer, Djokovic, Berdych, and del Potro all made the semis as if they had a plane to catch. They won efficiently. That left the semis. On one half, there was 3-time champ, Novak Djokovic facing Juan Martin del Potro. On the other, there
Fans love the best of the best. They want to see Federer. They want to see Nadal. They want to see Djokovic. They want to see them face each other. But the tour is more than the top few players, and sometimes, in the smallest of matches, there are stories behind the match. John Isner
Kei Nishikori, Japan's best player, played a good amount of tennis in the US training at Nick Bolletieri's during his formative years, so in a way, the US is his home away from home. Nishikori won the biggest title of his career by winning Tokyo on home soil over Milos Raonic. This event is an
The semifinals on Saturday were mostly meh. Berdych crushed Tursunov in one semi. Anytime he went for a big shot, Tursunov made an error or couldn't reach the shot. Gilles Simon didn't fare much better against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga making more errors than usual. Neither loser won more than 4 games. The final, by contrast, was
Bernard Tomic almost didn't get out of the first round, facing one of last year's new upstart, Martin Klizan, but he managed a third set win. He had a comfortable win against Somdev Devvarman in the second round. But his big challenge was the top-ranked Frenchman, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. Last year, Tomic showed a great deal
Most people figured Novak Djokovic was the man to beat heading into the Australian Open. While Djokovic struggled some during the summer, especially with losses at Wimbledon to Federer in the semis, and to Murray and del Potro in the semis and bronze medal round at the Olympics. But, he regained his form heading into
When you see Almagro in person, you wonder why he hasn't won more. He has a huge serve, that is often competing with Isner and Querrey and Raonic for most aces in a year. He has a big forehand. His backhand, these days, may be the hardest struck one-handed backhand on tour, better than Wawrinka,
Now that week 1 is over, this is a good time to review the top players plus a few more things. Novak Djokovic Through the first three rounds, Djokovic has looked the most solid. His strokes always looks pristine. Admittedly, he played a resurgent Paul-Henri Mathieu who, nonetheless, hasn't worked his ranking up to its
This is the kind of match that the Australian Open epic. Wawrinka has been around 20s his entire career peaking briefly in the top 10. With all players coming back from training, it's time for players in that next tier to make that push. When the draw came out, everyone looked at Murray on Federer's
