Even though many have said Djokovic-Nadal or even Djokovic-Murray has replaced the rivalry of Federer-Nadal, people still get excited about the prospect of the two meeting. Admittedly, clay is Rafa's best surface, having lost fewer matches on the surface than anyone who has played as long as Rafa has played. The rivalry has lost its
There's no particular reason why Murray or Simon can't be better on clay. Simon, at the very least, has won tournaments on clay, despite a style that is relatively flat. One reason Simon has won titles on the red dirt--he plays the smaller events. Murray's clay season is 4 titles long. Once Wimbledon is over,
Baby anything is a hard thing to live up to. Baby Jordan? Remember him? Harold Miner. Yeah, not much of a career. Certainly not even close to Baby Jordan. You could put 100 players between Harold Miner and Michael Jordan and that wouldn't scratch the surface of how far apart these two players were. Grigor
It just goes to show you how dominant the top 8 players are in the world. Basically, it's Djokovic and Nadal at the top (despite rankings) and Federer and Murray behind them (despite Murray's breakthrough). Tsonga, Berdych, and del Potro show they are tough to beat by anyone not ranked in the top 5. The
Ernests Gulbis entered this match with a 13 match win streak over two tournaments including qualies in both rounds. He felt confident he could play with Rafa despite Rafa being able to claim 2 titles and 1 final on the "golden swing". That was clay, however, and this is hard courts. Here, Rafa is more
Before we get to Federer, let's hit some of the upsets of the day. The biggest upset of the day was David Ferrer losing to Kevin Anderson, 36 64 63. Ferrer had chances to break in the second set, but didn't while Anderson did break. The match was a combination of Anderson being aggressive off
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
After posting how consistent Federer is, Federer apparently has a bad day where nothing is working well, and loses to Julien Benneteau. Benneteau is one of those veteran French players who has played solid over the years, but has never won an ATP title. Federer and Benneteau are roughly the same age. Both knew each
Comparisons are always made between Federer and Nadal. Federer is fluid, graceful. Nadal is bullish, strong. Federer's lithe movements lead to a long career. Nadal's grinding style will lead to an early retirement. Few make the key observation between the two. That observation can be found in a hilarious skit as Janko Tipsarevic plays Novak
Andy Murray has a pretty good record against Roger Federer, a slight winning record. But he had been 0-3 in their Slam encounters. The first was understandable. It was Murray's first encounter with Federer at a Slam back in the 2008 US Open. In the second encounter, the 2010 Australian Open final, Murray tried to
