Of course, no one expected Isner-Mahut to run 5 sets and last 3 days. Both players were probably relieved that there wouldn't be a marathon match. They played on a different court (Court 1) with a different umpire (Lars Graff instead of Mohamed Lahyani) and a different outcome. Isner was favored, although his ranking had
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
When Wimbledon made its draw last Friday, two names appeared near one another: John Isner and Nicolas Mahut. What were the odds of that? Roughly speaking, less than 1%, but not much less. There were accusations that Wimbledon organizers rigged this, even though the draw was conducted in public (which would require some sleight of
So the last person to beat Novak Djokovic just became the last person to beat Novak Djokovic. In a surprising turn of events, Federer took the first set, 7-6 and the second set, 6-3. He had numerous break opportunities numbering over 20, but only converted a handful. Djokovic then cleaned up his game and took
It's probably been since 2006 French Open that the top four seeds in a men's Slam have met in the semifinals. Back then, it was Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, David Nalbandian, and Ivan Ljubicic. You might point to this year's Australian Open, but Andy Murray's rank had slipped enough and Robin Soderling had performed well
It was thought that the powerful Soderling would have a chance against Nadal. Nadal had yet to play anyone that hit as hard as Soderling. Nadal would have to up his game to face the one man that had beaten him on clay. But Nadal had done it twice before in Slams, once last year
Everyone's asking whether Roger Federer has lost it. But, to me, he's like Chris Evert when Steffi Graf rose to the top spot. Martina was number 1 or 2 and Graf was behind her. However, Evert had been champ for years and years. The women's game still resembled Evert more than it resembled Graf and
Fognini must have channeled the spirit of Andy Murray. Perhaps it was a cramp, but it seems like it was a muscle pull. Whatever it was, late in the third set, Fognini was struck with something that impaired his movement. He went to the only strategy that's available if you want to keep playing. Go
Before we talk about "the streak", let's talk about a smaller match. Fabio Fognini vs. Albert Montanes. Both made some news last year in the clay season. Fognini was in a prolonged evening match with Monfils well past ten when neither player could see well, but Monfils was hoping for a pro-Monfils support to help
It's just about halfway through the French Open. The men have completed the third round matches. The fourth round begins on Sunday. Let's see how all the seeds are doing. Rafael Nadal Rafa started off the tournament in a new situation: a five setter at Paris. He played nervous in the two tiebreaks he lost,
