You'd like a semifinal to be about great tennis, each player summoning reserves they never knew they had, making incredible shots. But tennis is such a solitary sport, and with such isolation, you have to deal with confidence. A 5 set match gives you time to work out some of those issues, and so there
This is why it's difficult to predict who will do well at a Slam. The semifinalists are: Robin Soderling, Tomas Berdych, Rafael Nadal, and Jurgen Melzer. Raise your hand if you have more than 2 of 4 correct. Based on past history, you would surely have put Roger Federer instead of Robin Soderling. Berdych would
Not nearly the huge upset that knocked Nadal out of the French last year, this was still an amazing performance by Robin Soderling to prevent Roger from getting to his 24th consecutive semifinal at a Slam. It didn't end the way it started. Roger was comfortably holding serve, then managed a break, and won the
I was at the Essential Tennis Clinic, Day 2, in Baltimore (it's really closer to Towson, but good enough), so most of what I'm going to cover is just reaction from hearing the scores. The only matches (or parts of) was the Sharapova-Henin third set. Since there weren't that many matches, let's go over each
With all the rain that affected play on Wednesday and Thursday, matches were backlogged. Matches that were supposed to be played Thursday were pushed into today. In an effort to catch up, matches that were originally planned for today, i.e. 3rd round matches, were played today. All top 5 seeds play Friday which include Federer,
One wonders where this Roger Federer was a few weeks ago with backhand flying out and losing early. It seems Roger's priorities are to win Slams and that early losses are not bothersome to Roger, or for the conspiracy-minded, Roger selectively loses so as not to tempt injury or to keep some of what he
Robin Soderling played a French wildcard and, as expected, didn't have too many issues. He beat Laurent Recouderc 6-0, 6-2, 6-3. Although his results in the clay season have not been exceptional (he reached the finals of Barcelona, but has lost early in other tournaments), Soderling feels he has trained well. Marin Cilic had a
I don't plan on doing too many previews, but here's the first. The French Open unlike other tournaments opens play on a Sunday. This allows them to schedule their rounds better and to have 3 Sundays, presumably to make more money. Let's look at a few key matches. I'll follow the convention that Wikipedia sets.
It used to be a spring ritual. When the tour headed to Europe on a 7 week clay excursion, most players were playing for second place. Rafael Nadal would typically play four clay events heading into the French: Monte Carlo (an optional Masters 1000), Barcelona, Rome, and Madrid (this used to be Hamburg, until Hamburg
Fernando Verdasco, who reached his first Master 1000 semis last week in Monte Carlo, continues to play well in Barcelona. Verdasco, apparently, had not planned to play Barcelona but was given a wildcard. He faced talented but erratic, Ernests Gulbis, in the quarter finals and won, 6-2, 7-6(4). Gulbis has been having a solid, if
