Given how often Rafa and Novak were competing against each other, they seemed so far ahead of everyone that no one would catch them, but Federer had an outstanding end of the year where he won Basel, Paris, and the year-end championship. Federer continued to have a solid 2012, starting off better than he has
Rome is the last big tournament where many of the names expecting to contend for honors at Roland Garros will play. Let's just say that 2012 is significantly different from 2011. 2011 was the year of Novak, and the question then was "Can Novak win on clay?", and the answer was yes, but. He beat
It wasn't a pretty match, by any means. There seemed to be a lack of rhythm and flow, and thus, it was one player striking the ball well, and the other not as well, and vice versa. Berdych started off the match strong with an early break and rode that break to a 7=5 first
With the favorites, Nadal and Djokovic, out of the tournament (Murray opted to skip due to injury), it was up to Federer to rescue the tournament. Federer had an easy win over Tipsarevic, relying once again on some aggressive net-charging, a strategy he seemed to abandon when serve-and-volley fell out of style. While he wasn't
Tournament organizers must have crossed their fingers for a Djokovic-Nadal final. When Nadal fell to countryman, FernandoVerdasco, organizers must have hoped that the Federer-Djokovic semi would have to do. Only Djokovic didn't accommodate. Like Nadal, Djokovic had complained about the surface. And like Nadal, who lost to a countryman, Djokovic also lost to a countryman
There was a brief period, sometime around 2003, when Andy Roddick must have felt he was escaping from Pete Sampras's long shadow, that he would be the American heir apparent, the next in a long line of American tennis players that had dominated world tennis since the early 1990s. Little would he know that this
The score says 63 64. This would show a comfortable win over a difficult opponent. It looks like one break a set, but it was actually four breaks, two in the first, two in the second, with Rafa getting one break back in each set. The match was delayed a few hours because of rain
Rewind the clock back to 2001, in the fourth round of Wimbledon, and you may recall a match between Pete Sampras and Roger Federer. By today's standards, it was a strange match. Both men served and volleyed extensively. Pete did so because his body couldn't take the pounding of playing at the baseline for any
Of the top four, Nadal has looked the most solid. In three matches, he has not dropped a set, and most of the wins have been comfortable. Dolgopolov was expected to be a tough guy to play. With his change of pace and big forehand, Dolgopolov troubles many opponents. But he produced too many errors
With a bug going around at Indian Wells, players are trying to stay healthy. Federer apparently has some combination of a cold and flu, but it didn't affect the results against rising talent, Denis Kudla, who he beat 64 61. Kudla is a contemporary of Jack Sock (the two played as juniors). This was his
