Tag Archives: Maria Sharapova

the semis

Posted on July 1, 2011 | Leave a comment

The semifinals at Wimbledon are matches almost in a category of their own.  It’s rarefied air, but not quite the experience of a final.  Where you might have a one-sided final, you’re more likely to have great battles in the semis.  And in its own distinct way, the psychology is different as well.  This is where nerves and experience really enter into the equation and affect success.

Yesterday the four women semifinalists took the court.  First up were Victoria Azarenka and Petra Kvitova.  This one could have gone either way and it did go the distance.  Kvitova dominated the first set and took it 6-1.  She doesn’t move as well as Azarenka but she has even more power, on average hitting the ball ten miles faster than her opponent.  And Vica hits the ball hard.

The second set was the inverse, with Azarenka dominating as Kvitova started to feel the occasion and make more errors, especially off the forehand side.  But she learned her lesson from Paris just last month, where she imploded in her fourth round match against Li Na, which she should have won.

This time she didn’t melt down.  She came back in the third set, composed and playing her game.  When all was said and done, she took the last set 6-2, and won the match.   Petra Kvitova, who played in her first Wimbledon semifinal last year, now does herself one better.  On Saturday, she will play in her first Wimbledon final.  So there.

The other semi between Maria Sharapova and Sabine Lisicki played out a little differently.  Lisicki came out gangbusters and went up for a 3-0 lead.  But Maria, being Maria, fought back and evened things at 3-3.   Even though she was having a very rough service day, dumping in more than ten double faults, the combination of her spot on return to serve and her legendary tenacity took her to the victory.

She won the first set 6-4 and then the second 6-3.  After a strong start, Lisicki began to look like the newbie she is.  Her own serve let her down and after awhile she resembled the proverbial deer in the headlights.  As John McEnroe said at one point, she didn’t know what hit her.   Maria is a force to be reckoned with, as we all know and surely Sabine knew it, but it’s one thing to know it and another to face it.

Apparently, when Maria walks from the locker room to Centre Court, the famous walk down the long hall and then down the interior steps to the double doors beneath the Royal Box area of the the court, she is now accompanied by her fiance, NBA basketball star Sasha Vujacic, a fellow Russian; he walks a few feet behind and waves and says hello to everyone while Maria acknowledges no one, keeps her fist clenched and her eyes straight ahead.  You almost never see Maria smile during a match.

Everyone was pumped to see the two men’s semis today.  Djokovic against Tsonga to begin, followed by hometown boy Murray against Rafa.

Novak came out a bit nervous and the first set was settled by a tiebreak which he won.  As he worked his way into the match, becoming more and more comfortable, it looked like it was going to be a three and out.  But at the end of the third set, Novak served for the match and couldn’t close the door.  The set went to a tiebreak, a wonderful, entertaining affair where match points and set points alternated until finally Tsonga took the set 11-9.

But Novak broke Tsonga in the second game of the fourth set and that was all it took.   The 35 minute set went quickly and at the end, with so much on the line, Novak fell to the grass, legs splayed.  As he got up, he pivoted and shared the moment with his box.  A look of disbelief and relief, and you could see the four year old boy who began to play tennis, saw his first Wimbledon on television in Serbia, and has been dreaming ever since of being just where he is today, all these years later.    Winning this match not only meant he was into the finals on Sunday, it insures his status on Monday as the number one player in the world.   After shaking hands with Tsonga and embracing him, he fell to the ground again and kissed the grass.

It’s hard to imagine exactly how all that would feel but you know it’s fantastic and satisfying, deeply.

When Rafa and Murray took the court for the second match, it was time for yet another tennis experience.  Murray played the best he has ever played and won the first set, an amazing start.  But it’s just too hard to do that for a second and third set, and who can fault the guy?  Rafa is the freak he’s always been.  I just heard Mary Carillo quote Jimmy Connors who described Rafa’s game this way:  he plays like he’s broke!

Too true.  He does spend a small portion of his vast bank account on a new Play Station wherever he goes, but Connors could not have stated it better.  However this man is put together inside, I think it’s safe to say none of his motivation is dampened by the fact that he has enough money to retire for a couple hundred years.

So the final on Sunday will be between Novak and Rafa and Novak has beaten him four times this year.  I’m all in on Novak this time, not only because he was my pick before play began to win the tournament, but because I’d like to see him win Wimbledon.  Rafa’s done it, gloriously and repeatedly.  Let this be Novak Djokovic’s time.

Enjoy breakfast at Wimbledon the next two days.  Is there a better way to spend the holiday weekend?

Thanks for reading Cupcakes and Tennis, the tennis blog with a sweet spot.  Cheers.

 

PS – I’m watching the Nadal Murray match again, always interesting to hear both the NBC commentary and ESPN.  A few more words about Murray’s performance today.  Sometimes there is a definite turning point in a match and today that was the case.  After winning the first set and striking the ball so well, and serving well, the score was 2-1, Murray up, on serve.  Rafa was serving and went down love-15, then love-30.  On the next point, Andy had an easy forehand that would have given him three break points and he missed it long.

He lost the game and then on his own serve in the next game made two forehand errors and missed an overhead, basically donating the break and the lead to Nadal.  Nothing was ever the same after that.  Even Nadal termed it the turning point in his post match comments.

What Murray doesn’t quite have is belief.  And though he has changed things significantly in terms of his on court attitude, he doesn’t have that mental fortitude and positiveness that you need to work your way through a difficult match, especially five setters.  In a word, Murray needs to play as if he’s broke.

That said, Rafa was the most gracious of critics.  When asked what Murray needs to do to win a Slam, he said really nothing more, that he needs a little luck.  (And it’s true, luck enters into it and Andy hasn’t been that lucky.)

You have to feel for Murray, Rafa certainly did.  Three times he has made it to the semis in his homeland, three times the country has rallied behind him.  Three times he has bounced.  It must be dispiriting.

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finally the women’s final

Posted on June 4, 2011 | Leave a comment

Two weeks ago as the tournament got underway, the women’s field was as wide open as it ever has been.  No Serena or Venus, no Justine, Kim bounced out early.  Any one of a dozen or more players could have won and we all just had to watch the action unfold and see which way the wind eventually blew.

Few thought Francesca Schiavone, the defending champion, would get to the final today or hoist the trophy for a second year.  Few thought she’d ever win it once, or any other Grand Slam.  She nearly didn’t make it as she looked down the long lonely barrel of the rifle in her quarterfinal match against Pavlyuchenkova, down a set and 4-1.  So for her to take the court today was at least a little surprising and a testament to her clay court skills and fighting spirit.

Across the net, a woman no one thought could play on clay, including her.  Growing up in China, her parents didn’t even know what tennis was and there weren’t any clay courts, that’s for sure.  Today at least 30 million Chinese watched at 9 PM Beijing time as Li Na took the court for the final of the French Open.

Li has a new coach and he has encouraged her in this direction.  He must have known something because Li has done well in Madrid and Rome before coming to Paris.  Her former coach left her to work with Maria Sharapova, so it had to feel just a little extra good when she beat her the other day.  Li Na’s husband was her coach until recently but after the Australian Open she fired him and that seems to have been a good decision.  Now he can just be a husband.  Much better.

Li reached the finals of the Australian Open end of January and she played a three setter against Kim Cliijsters.  It was her first Grand Slam final, she lost, but she learned.  Today she knew how to be, how to play, and as it turned out, how to win.

You could learn a lot about tennis from the match they played.  Li’s game is a power game, she’s strong off both wings and she hits flat and hard deep into the court, often the corners.  Francesca’s game is to get to net as much as possible, where she is very adept at put away shots, and to throw out a variety of shots and spins to keep her opponent guessing, and, importantly, running.  Li was so dialed into her game for the first set, she utterly deprived Francesca of the chance to play hers.  Most of the set, and most of the match, Li dictated while Francesca reacted.

Li never seemed nervous.  She was ready for the stage and for the win.  In the second set she had chances to go up a double break practically insuring the victory, but Francesca fought back and started to be able to play her game as Li started to miss and began to feel nerves.

It was great to see Francesca come to life.  She very nearly got back into the match and if she had won the second set, who knows what a one set winner takes all scenario would have looked like.  But in the tiebreak that decided the second set, Li just played brilliantly, shots with depth but also cat and mouse encounters and odd shots that required improvisation.  She played like a clay courter a bit, and she won the tiebreak without giving away a single point, 7-0.

As Francesca’s shot went long on the last point, Li slid and fell to the clay.  It was over.  She was and is the new champion, the first Chinese person, man or woman, to win a Grand Slam title.

You think they’re going to build clay courts in China now?  People have talked for awhile about an imminent explosion of interest in tennis in China and surely that’s here now.  Ten years from now all the kids who are going to start playing in China these days because they are inspired by Li Na, we’ll be seeing their names at the top of the game.  If you sell tennis racquets and have an entree into the Chinese market, chances are good you’re going to take some very nice vacations very soon.

Both of these players are likeable, so whichever of them had won it, it was going to be a happy thing.  After the ceremony, after the photo shoot and on-court interviews, finally Li Na got her gear and waved to the remaining people in the stands, walking out the door from which she had entered three hours earlier.  Ball kids carried the all white huge bouquet of flowers that each of the players received before they came on court and all of the ball kids were lined up on both sides of the hallway and stairs, clapping, as the new champion smiled and descended a flight of stairs into the locker room.

One more match tomorrow and how bad can that be?  Federer vs. Nadal.  Have at it, boys.

And on a final note today.  What a bungled deal that whole thing was this week with Fabio Fognini, the Italian player who beat Albert Montanes in the round of sixteen.  He had leg cramps during play and in the middle of a game received treatment.  It was the chair umpire who went out of her chair and on to the court to say whatever she said and after that play stopped.  You are not supposed to receive treatment for leg cramps, in the middle of a game or on a changeover.  So I don’t know why the umpire did what she did.  And funnily enough, she was the one who officiated the final today.

Then, it turned out that more was wrong and the doctor for the tournament weighed in by saying Fognini probably shouldn’t play for a couple of weeks.  But before that, he withdrew from the tournament, his decision, rather than wait a day or so to see if it got better and then decide if he was well enough to play, and his camp apparently said he decided not to play because it was Djokovic he would face.  Maybe if it had been someone else he would have tried, but Djokovic?  He was saying why bother, I’m going to lose.  I had thought he felt bad to miss the opportunity but apparently not.  He’s no Francesca Schiavone.  That’s a little too lazy and spineless for my taste.

Enjoy the final match wherever you are.  More from Cupcakes and Tennis tomorrow and thanks for reading.

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forza!

Posted on June 2, 2011 | 2 Comments

I confess I have not been rising at 3 am all these mornings of tennis from Paris, that’s when the live tennis begins, 11 am in France.  But today, I woke up at 5 am, set to watch the women’s semifinals, and they didn’t even start until 6 am.

First up, Maria Sharapova and Li Na on a very windy but sunny afternoon.  With an exceedingly high ball toss, Maria had her hands full.  Full of difficulty.  Where earlier in the tournament, and in Rome, where she won the title, her serve was working well, today the windy conditions played havoc with it.  And it made the critical difference. Her first serve percentage was only 45% and that just never gets the job done in this kind of match.

Li Na was in command, with just a few patchy spots where she sprayed her forehand, and she’s a better mover than Maria.  Over and over she exposed the limitations of Maria’s footwork.  Breaks of serve were exchanged.  Li went out in front to begin, then Sharapova broke back to get things back on serve.  In the final game of the first set, Maria serving, Li took a 40 – 0 lead, thanks to double faults from her opponent and on the final point, Maria went in for a forehand kill shot, but the ball clipped the tape and bounced out.  A pretty unpleasant way to lose the first set, if you were Maria.

The second set was closer but in the end, at 5-5, Li came out to win a love service game.  In the final game, Sharapova threw in her ninth double fault of the match, Li generated two match points for herself.  Maria gifted her the match by serving one more double fault, losing the second set 7-5.  Yet another ignominious end to a set, and in this case, the whole shebang.

Maria will not complete her career Grand Slam, as she had hoped.  Li Na will play in the finals on Saturday, her second Grand Slam final, having made it to the Australian Open final earlier this year.

So the second set of semifinalists, Marion Bartoli of France and Francesca Schiavone of Italy, took the court a short while later knowing one of them would play the Chinese woman in the final.  But which one would it be?

To my mind, the outcome of this match was easier to read early on, though you still never know.  The truth is that Francesca is the better player.  Actually the truth is that Francesca is a clay court player and none of the other three semifinalists were or are, including Bartoli who should know how to slide but doesn’t.  In addition, Francesca has tremendous variety in her game, off both wings she can and does slice the ball and hit it with topspin.  You don’t know which is coming when and you have to be ready for both.  Will it jump up high and you’ll hit it back with all your strength from shoulder height?  Or will it sidespin low on the court, requiring you to bend your knees to get down to it?

Francesca has a fine, powerful serve, surprising since she is so small herself, and even in the windy conditions, it worked reliably.  Bartoli’s game is flat and hard hitting and though Francesca had to run and work hard, you could still see that it was the Italian who was calling the shots and the French woman who was reacting.

The stadium was packed and though the French have taken a long time to warm to Marion, they were fully behind her.  Last year, everyone was cheering for Francesca in the final against Sam Stosur, and in earlier matches.  But she wasn’t playing a French woman then.    Still, nothing deterred Francesca today.  (Although there was something that went on with the umpire early in the match and I don’t know if she was noting how long Bartoli was taking between points.  Marion did get a warning for time violation once, but the fact is she averaged 35 seconds between points to Francesca’s 26.)   She played her game, defended her title and earned herself another chance on Saturday to take home the title for a second year in a row.

I like Li Na, she has a great fun personality, always laughing and joking, but I’ll be on Francesca’s side for this one.  It’s such a wonderful story.  She’s thirty years old, a veteran, she’s been knocking on the door for a long time.  She’s incredibly ripped, works hard.  Anyone who has worked long and hard towards a goal can appreciate that when the reward comes, it comes because of all the work.  It’s not a fluke, it’s all there in the final moment, every practice session, every match, every everything.  So for all spirited men and women who work hard and have a dream, Francesca is an inspiration.

Go win the final, Francesca, hoist the trophy and take home a big fat paycheck.  She did that last year and has joked that all her friends expect her to pick up the dinner checks.  I’m sure this bighearted girl does it with pleasure.  Her Italian friends, many of whom drove from Italy last year at the last minute, are all here this  year, seated in a pack with flags and hats and who knows what all.

Two heart grabbing women will take the court on Saturday for the final of the French Open.  One will win.  Don’t miss it, get up early, tune in to NBC.

And come back to Cupcakes and Tennis, the tennis blog with a sweet spot, right through the final days.  I’m all in, can’t wait for the exciting men’s semis tomorrow and then both finals on Saturday and Sunday.  Still hard to predict, but I’ll call Schiavone now for the women’s side.

Thanks for reading, see you tomorrow.

PS – I watched French Open Tonight last night on Tennis Channel and there was Bill Macatee interviewing none other than Guga Kuerten, the Brazilian player I wrote about in a blog post earlier this week.  Guga was probably the most loved player of any generation and it’s not hard to see why.  You just like him.  He’s a little like Francesca that way.  You just like her.  Guga is a former number one player and he won the French Open three times between 1997 and 2001.  He retired from the tour in 2008, never fully recovering from hip surgery.  These days he’s busy with his foundation in Brazil that helps poor kids, which he was himself, and he says it’s more meaningful to him than all his success and titles in tennis.

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nowhere to hide

Posted on June 1, 2011 | 1 Comment

If you watched Maria Sharapova play tennis anytime since recovering from the shoulder surgery she had a couple years ago, you would have thought her glory days were over.  The serve, which had always been a real strength, a weapon,  and the key to her game, was a mess.  The toss was off, she was attempting to learn a whole new motion, good luck with that.  She double faulted over and over and over, no exaggeration.  It was painful to watch.

Not painful to watch these days.  You no longer wonder and worry what will happen when she goes to the line to serve.  You have confidence, as does she, that she will toss it straight up, in the right place, and connect with it for a ball that nearly everyone will find difficult to return.  After that, she will hammer you with furious ground shots from the forehand and backhand wing and if your name is Andrea Petkovic and you find yourself on Suzanne Lenglen on June 1, 2011, your tournament will be over.

And not just over.  But over with a beatdown.  Maria recovered from her encounter with Caroline Garcia in the nick of time by reeling off eleven games in a row, thank you very much.  Today it was the reverse.  She reeled off seven in a row, 6-0 for a bagel first set, and then one more before Andrea got on the board.  Good golly Miss Molly.  You think Maria wants this title?

It will complete her career Grand Slam, an achievement for the exalted few.  Roger completed his in Paris, Andre did the same in the City of Light and it’s a pretty good bet Maria will do it on Saturday.  She dispensed with Petkovic, who had beaten her earlier this year at the Australian Open but whom she got the better of in Miami, 6-0, 6-3.

Her next opponent will be Li Na, the Chinese player making history for her own country by advancing to the semifinals in Paris.  Li Na won her quaterfinal match on Chatrier against Victoria Azarenka and most, including me, would have picked Vika to win that one.  Pretty convincing, playing some of the best tennis of her life, she won in straights, 7-5, 6-2.

Of the four women’s semifinalists, the only one I picked correctly was Francesca Schiavone.  She’ll take on Bartoli tomorrow.  I’ll predict the final between Schiavone and Sharapova and Maria the winner on Saturday.  But even now with only four women remaining, it could turn out differently.  Li Na could upset Maria.  Marion could upset Francesca.  And that’s what makes this women’s competition interesting to the last.

On the men’s side, I am pleased to report that the top four players in the world will compete for the two final spots.  And I had all four of them in my racquet bracket.  So, as I’ve said before and you all know, on the men’s side, these were the guys you expected to be right where they are.  Friday we’ll see two thrilling matches, or so we hope.  Djokovic vs. Federer, Nadal vs. Murray.

Anything can happen there.  But Rafa finally played a match he has to feel good about today against Robin Soderling, a victory in straights, but for the first time these two weeks, he looked like he had it going.  Hitting the ball cleanly, placing it impossibly, making the wow shots.  Robin fought back in the third set and took it to a tiebreak after looking flat footed for the first two sets, but Rafa won the tiebreak convincingly and that was that. 6-4, 6-1, 7-6.

The crowd, packed to the gills, really got into the exciting third set, after being quiet for the first two sets.  They didn’t come to see a lopsided match, just to see Rafa spank Soderling.  What they really wanted was a five set edge of your seat thriller.  Most are probably on Rafa’s side, but plenty were cheering for Soderling.

And, of course, the particular match-up of Rafa and Robin Soderling carries a weight at the French Open no other does.  Two years ago the two took the court, Chatrier, for a round of sixteen match.  I was in the stands, had a very nice seat low down on the umpire side, where I could see all the action from the door where the players come on and off the court.  I had watched Soderling in the previous round on the Bull Ring and he beat David Ferrer that day, not a happy camper, because at that point who thought Soderling would get past him?

In May 2009, Soderling was 25 in the world, he’d been on the tour for eight years, was twenty five years old.  No one payed that much attention to him.  I watched him play that day (and although he wasn’t a well known player, he was one I liked and wanted to see play) and I can’t tell you how fast and hard  he was hitting the ball, and finding the lines and the corners for winners.  Ferrer was thoroughly frustrated and ten feet from where I was sitting would pass by his chair on the changeovers, his towel in his teeth like a dog, muttering angrily.  I remember thinking if Soderling played like that against Nadal, he would beat him.

And he did.  And that’s when Soderling got famous and it’s also when he did a bunch of things to take himself and his game more seriously.  He still didn’t quite have the belief on court today, but this is a guy who isn’t the most popular in the locker room, but who has gotten the respect of his fellow players.  Robin Soderling is the only player who has beaten Rafael Nadal at the French Open. The only player.  So when these two come on court that’s what everyone knows and remembers and that’s what everyone wants to see again.  So far he hasn’t beaten him again, not in last year’s final and not today.  But there’s always next year and until someone else beats Rafa on Chatrier, Robeeeen’s the Man!

Much has been said about the fact that Rafa plays slowly and often eats up the clock and then some between points.  He gets called on this occasionally but not nearly as much as it happens.  Today even Soderling was getting annoyed and calling out to the umpire to do something about it.  Rafa even slowed things down on Soderling’s serve and you’re always supposed to play at the speed of the server.  Whatever speed you prefer, the rule at a Grand Slam is you’ve got twenty seconds from the time the umpire announces the score to the time your ball should be up in the air.  Rafa averaged 27 seconds for the match.  Does it matter?  Not  here and there, but when it’s like that for a whole important match, yes, you bet it counts.  What if Rafa had to get ready every single time in no more than twenty seconds, would he be as prepared each time or would it throw him off?  I think if he had to be rigorous about the time, he’d make the adjustment eventually but to begin with I think it would be difficult; he would feel rushed and he would flub some shots.  And at this level in these matches, it’s always the slimmest of margins that determines the winner.

Murray started slowly on Lenglen against number 35 in the world, Juan Ignacio Chela.  Chela went up 5-2 in the first set, had numerous set points, chances to win it, didn’t do it.  The second set looked like it was going to be easy for Andy but Chela fought back to make him work harder for it.  Finally, Chela, the skinny thirty two year old, lost his legs and went away quietly.  7-6, 7-5, 6-2.

Murray has shown a lot of fight.  He’s got a bum ankle, try playing on that, and popped who knows how many pills just to get through the matches he’s had to play.  You better believe he’ll come out to play against Rafa, and congrats to Andy on reaching his first semifinal at Roland Garros.

Wind was a factor on court again today.  Let’s pray to the weather gods for perfect sunshine and calm for the last four days.

Thanks for reading Cupcakes and Tennis, the tennis blog with a sweet spot.  See you tomorrow.

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the heart of the matter

Posted on May 31, 2011 | 2 Comments

Maybe it’s because so much tennis is being played, maybe it’s because the stakes aren’t yet that high, but in the beginning of a major tournament the focus of attention isn’t always on the role that heart plays.  But if you want to see heart on the court, heart that makes the difference, that is the critical component,  stick around for the quarterfinals, the gateway to what matters most to players, a Grand Slam title.

It was well on display today on both Chatrier and Suzanne Lenglen.  Francesca Schiavone, the defending champion, found herself in a deep hole the same size as the one Maria Sharapova was in a few days ago in her match against newcomer Caroline Garcia.  Nineteen year old Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the last teenager in the draw, was having her way with the nearly thirty one year old veteran.  The score?  6-1, 4-1.  In the words of the late Yogi Berra, it’s getting late early.

How was Schiavone going to get herself out of this one?  Well, Maria did it with steely determination, unwaivering self-belief and that worked for her, it usually does.  Francesca is Italian, though.  She’s all heart.

She came back to win the second set 7-5.  The third set was a topsy turvy affair.  Francesca took the lead 5-1 and served for it at 5-2, but couldn’t convert.  She served for it again at 5-4, and couldn’t convert.  Yikes.  The wind was swirling, the temperatures were cool.  Conditions were difficult.

Finally she broke her opponent to go up 6-5 and then she served for the match for the third time.  She had two match points that went begging.  Finally, Francesca created a third match point for herself with a drop shot executed from the baseline, to perfection.  Gutsy.  You could see her look up at her box, on their feet, and say “Forza!”

And so, finally again, on that match point, a microcosm of the whole match, Anastasia made a volley reply and Schiavone drove it past her for a winner down the line, taking the deciding set 7-5 as well.

Walking off the court, Francesca scooped a handful of the red clay and smeared it on her face.

Who wants it more?  Who doesn’t get tight?  Who doesn’t choke?  Who has the most heart?

All of these questions were to be answered on Lenglen in the fifth set between Murray and Troicki, the resumption of their match from the day before that was suspended as darkness fell, two sets each.   Murray came from two sets down to take sets three and four, and when they took the court this afternoon for the deciding set, he was working from behind all the way again.

Troicki went out to a 5-2 lead.  He served for the match at 5-3 and was up 30-0, two points from the victory,  and then the wheels fell off.  He choked, he got tight, you could see it.  He kept looking around and up to his box with a self-defeating smile, shoulder shrugs that seemed to say it was out of his control, it was someone else’s fault.  That is not going to get it done.  That is the opposite of heart, of digging deep.

Nineteen minutes later Murray had charged back all the way and was at 6-5, serving for the match himself.  He went up 40-0, Troicki fought back and saved those three match points.  But it was too little too late.  Murray had a fourth match point on the Ad and as in the women’s match, he ended the last point, requiring some incredible gets from him that he made, with a glorious shot, in this case a backhand crosscourt passing shot for the winner.  This is the fifth time in his career that Murray has come back from two sets to love to win a five setter.

Murray is into the quarterfinals (the match against Troicki was still round of 16) and he’ll play Juan Ignacio Chela, a match he is much the favorite to win.

While Djokovic was having another day off, due to Fognini’s withdrawal, Roger Federer and Gael Monfils took the court for their quarterfinal match.  Roger won the first two sets and you had to wonder if it was already over or if Gael was going to put up more of a fight.  To his credit he played a very competitive third set, 6-6,  but Roger went out in front in the tiebreak and never looked back.

At 6-1 in the tiebreak, I found myself saying out loud “A handful of match points”, only to be echoed in exactly those words by Patrick McEnroe who was calling the match on ESPN.  Hey, Patrick, wanna spend more time at home with the wife and kids?  I’m available.

Federer has not dropped a set in the tournament.  And this is his 28th consecutive appearance in a Grand Slam quarterfinal or better.  Think about that.  Seven years, all four tournaments, round and round we go from Paris to London to New York to Melbourne and start all over again, not to mention all the other stops on the tour.  He has never retired from a match; he has been nearly totally injury free.  It makes a case for staying relaxed in your body.  He’s fluid, light on his feet.  Even Rafa Nadal has said that he would play like Federer if he could, that it takes much more effort for him to play his game.

Roger will play Novak in the semifinals on Friday.  It should be a fantastic, exciting match.

On both the men’s and women’s sides, history is being made in this year’s French.  Never before in the Open era have the top three women’s seeds been gone before the second week.  And never before have all five of the top men’s seeds advanced.

In a day of play that was marked by heart, the match between Svetlana Kuznetsova and Marion Bartoli on Lenglen was no exception.  Sveta won the French in 2009, I saw her win it against Dinara Safina (who?), someone you had to feel sorry for she went into such a meltdown.  Kuzy, as she is known, is the first to admit she often gets nervous at the end of big matches, but that day Safina’s nerves took up all the air and space.

Today, Marion Bartoli was on her game.  She’s such a quirky player, with the weird serve motion, and the constant jumping around and shadow cuts at the ball to get ready.  She’s a little chunky too.  But she hits the ball well off of both sides, two hands for forehand and backhand, and if you get it in her strike zone, she’s lethal.  Today she was relentless and Sveta played well, but not quite well enough.  Was it heart?  Lord knows Marion wanted it.  She’s French, the crowd was really behind her and she used it and worked it.

She served for it at 5-2 in the second, having won the first in a tiebreak.  Unable to close the door, she got another chance at 5-4 and she took it.

At this level of tennis, you can’t fade, you can’t blame, you can’t hold back.  Famously, Guga Kuerten, drew a heart on the clay on Chatrier, and then lay down inside it.  That says it all.

gustavo kuerten at roland garros, laying in the heart he drew in the clay

guga laying in the heart he drew

(Via Kamakshi Tandon)

One last comment on today’s action.  There was a unique moment in the Murray Troicki match early in their deciding set.  A ball kid thought the point was over when Troicki, up at the net, hit an overhead, but Murray got it back and Troicki angled another overhead for a winner.  But just as he was going for that shot, the ball kid was running out on the court at the net, just barely not colliding with him.  It was disruption of play, unintended, and the umpire ruled that the point be replayed.  Troicki was upset, understandably.  The kid felt terrible, a young boy, maybe ten or twelve. Being a ball kid in France is a huge honor, thousands of kids apply from all over the country for the coveted positions.  A point or two later when the same boy hesitated to retrieve the ball, Troicki messed with him in a way that was testy and unkind and to my mind, showed his true character, not a pretty picture.  I just hope the head of the ball kids wasn’t too hard on him.

That’s it for today.  This is really a fun, special French Open.  Stay tuned for the remaining matches, there are bound to be some great moments.

See you tomorrow at Cupcakes and Tennis, the tennis blog with a sweet spot.

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happy memorial day

Posted on May 30, 2011 | Leave a comment

Here it’s Memorial Day Monday, in Paris it’s Day 9 of the French Open.  If you were judging from the packed stands on Chatrier and Suzanne Lenglen this afternoon, though, you’d swear it was a holiday.

One of the most exciting matches of the tournament so far was the two parter between David Ferrer and Gael Monfils.  With Monfils up two sets to one and Ferrer  up 2-0 in the fourth set, play was suspended last night due to darkness.  The two opponents had to wait out a five setter between Chela and Falla, the former taking the victory, before they could get on court today to finish.  There was a great shot of them in the players’ lounge hanging around until they were called with Ferrer sitting up right next to a reclining, possibly sleeping, Monfils.

Finally on court, Ferrer continued to press in the set he already had a lead in and took it rather quickly 6-1.  But then Gael actually did wake up from his nap and the fifth set was completely riveting.  Gael broke early to take a 3-1 lead.  At 5-3 Monfils served for the match. The crowd was just wildly excited.   He had two match points and relatively easy shots for the win on both of them and he dinked them into the net.  Ferrer ended up breaking for 5-4.  That quieted the crowd down.

They go into fifth set no tiebreak battle.  In the next game, Monfils had another match point, his third, and couldn’t convert.  Ferrer got out of that game, 6-6.   At 7-6, Monfils in the lead, Ferrer quickly dug himself in a deep hole, 0-40,  and all of a sudden, Monfils is looking at three more match points.  After squandering three, who knew he would get all these chances again, and so soon?  He was not to be denied this time, winning the match on the fourth match point with a no guts no glory passing shot down the line, 8-6 in the fifth.  The French crowd, not a seat empty, were rewarded and could go have dinner.

In the 6-5 game, there were a couple of dicey line calls on Monfils’ serve.  On the first, Ferrer walked up to the line and immediately rubbed out the mark, indicating it had been good.  But shotspot showed it had been out.  It happened again, Monfils now with two serves instead of a second serve only, and the chair umpire came out to have a look and called it good, giving Monfils another first serve, but shotspot again showed it to be out.  Now the technology isn’t one hundred percent, but it’s pretty close.  At moments like these in matches, this kind of thing gone wrong can be terribly expensive, can cost someone the match.  Ferrer ended up winning that point, but still.

Monfils will face Federer in the quarterfinals and I imagine it will be a lot of fun to watch, but I don’t think Roger is going to walk off the loser.  I’m a big fan of Ferrer, but I doubt he would have given Roger trouble in the end.  Against both these players, Federer has been dominant.

What is great is to see Monfils doing more with his talent than he has previously.  His coach, Roger Rashid, has been with him for three years, a record in itself apparently as Monfils has gone through coaches like they were paper napkins.  Rashid coached Lleyton Hewitt, a player who is more like Ferrer, no work too hard or too much, fighter spirit, utterly maxing out on what they’ve got to work with on small frames.  For Roger Rashid to make an impact on Monfils has been exceedingly difficult it seems.  He’s tried hard to get Gael in better physical condition so he won’t suffer all the injuries he’s had, and you can actually see him shouting at Gael on court to play harder, want it more.  I’d bet there have been more than a few times that he thought of throwing in the towel, I don’t need this shit, and getting on a plane back to his family in Australia.

That’s the thing about coaching, it takes you on the road for weeks and weeks every year.  If you’re going to do it, you damn well better have a player who makes it worth your while.

Nadal won his match against 32 year old Ivan Ljubicic, in straights, but in his press conference afterwards, he spoke candidly about how he still isn’t feeling quite right out there.  Not as consistent, more nervous at times.  If Rafa thinks he’s a different Rafa, at least so far, on court at his beloved French, I guess we ought to believe him.

Meanwhile, fierce contender and Superman tennis player Novak Djokovic is into the semifinals.  He won’t be playing a quarterfinal match because Fabio Fognini had to withdraw with what indeed wasn’t just cramping yesterday.  He’s got a muscle tear and it won’t get better in time for him to play the match tomorrow.  You had to feel bad for the guy.  His best result in a major, about to have the opportunity to maybe be the one who breaks the Novak streak, or at least have the challenge of playing him on Chatrier, a huge pleasure and privilege, and he can’t do it.

Andy Murray and Victor Troicki played the last match of the day on Lenglen and they’ll have to finish it tomorrow.  At first it looked like Murray was having real difficulty moving, the result of a bad ankle tweak two days ago.  But he fought back and the players walked off at darkness with one deciding set yet to be played.  Don’t miss that tomorrow.

On the women’s side, Li Na defeated Petra Kvitova, both surprising and not.  Either one of them could have won that match, but Kvitova beat herself.

Maria Sharapova faced off against Agnes Radwanska and piled up huge numbers of winners and unforced errors in a game of total aggression on her part and steady play by her opponent.  But Maria is playing well and when you combine that with her dogged determination, she’s going to come out on top.  Aggie had five set points to win the second set and take it to a third and she couldn’t close the door.  Maria did it instead winning the match 7-6, 7-5.

And on Court One, Andrea Petkovic, the German player who has come into the spotlight this year, won her match in three tough sets against Maria Kirilenko.  Last year she lost on the same court to Kuznetsova, so it must have felt good to her to take the victory this year.

Finally, Azarenka dispensed with Makarova in two easy sets.

So it’s down to eight women and you still don’t know who’s going to win.  Sharapova, Li Na, Schiavone, Petkovic, Azarenka, Pavlyuchenkova, Kuznetsova and Bartoli.  Do you know?  I don’t.  The quarterfinal matches should all be interesting.

And it’s down to seven men.  Nadal, Soderling, Chela, Monfils, Federer, Djokovic and either Murray or Troicki.  Besides Novak, already there, who else will be in the semis?

Still some great tennis to come as we now head into the true business end of the tournament.  Thanks for reading Cupcakes and Tennis, the tennis blog with a sweet spot.

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down to the wire

Posted on March 31, 2011 | Leave a comment

Okay, let’s start right up front with the men’s semi-finals decided just moments ago by the outcome of the Nadal/Berdych match played in front of a totally packed house.  Nadal won in three sets.  The first he played like a maestro, and then he had to fight for the rest of the match.  It looked like maybe he had the same stiff neck after the first set that prevented Gilles Simon from playing his full match against Roger this afternoon (he retired at 3-0 in the first set to the great displeasure of the crowd; they booed as he left the court which I thought was bad form, the guy would not have left the court if he could have played).  Still, Rafa won, whatever the physical difficulty was, and tomorrow night I will be there along with thousands of others to watch Rafa and Roger play for the first time in North America since 2005.  This is real tennis excitement.

And I love that of the final four, you’ve got Rafa, Roger, Novak Djokovic, the top three players in the world and who else?  Number fourteen, Mardy Fish!  Go Fish.  Love Mardy.  I don’t think he’ll win against Novak, who is unbeaten this year.  That’s right. Twenty matches, twenty wins.  Or is it twenty one?  That kind of winning streak does not happen often.  John McEnroe had a 39 match winning streak, and someone else almost as many, not remembering right now.

I do have to say that Brad Gilbert is truly impressive when it comes to knowing tennis history.  Last night, when Cliijsters was down 1-5 in the second set against Azarenka, Mary Joe Fernandez was asking about other consecutive match dig outs (Kim had saved five match points the night before against Ivanovic.) and Gilbert came up with some pretty obtuse information and he was right.

Kim lost last night.  She seemed flat after her late match the previous day and only at the end when defeat seemed a short step away did she rally.  There comes a point in many matches when the loss is nearly inevitable and it’s always interesting to watch how the almost defeated player just loosens up and goes for his or her shots, what the hell, and often it can turn a match around.  One thing I think is clearer when you are watching tennis live is the mental game.  You can follow that thread more easily, you can see the players during the changeovers, you can see a lot of things you don’t/can’t see on television.  You can just read that story in a way you can’t otherwise and tennis is such a mental game, it’s a huge part of it to be able to know what’s going with the players internally.

Back to Mardy Fish for a moment.  I didn’t give him much of a chance against Del Potro and he pulled that out, so who knows?  Still, I love it that Mardy is in the semis.  If he wins tomorrow, he’ll be in the top ten, a major goal of his.  I don’t know what the weather conditions will be for their afternoon match.  Today it was just plain a bitch for Sharapova and Petkovic.  The wind was constant and strong, it was extremely hot and humid.  Petko played a great first set and then just went away.  So Maria is in the final, and will be in the top ten for the first time in over two years.

She’ll play either Azarenka or Zvonareva who are doing battle as we speak.  God help us if it’s Victoria because she shrieks as loud as Maria.  Vera is quiet.  Please win Vera, tonight and Saturday.

The stadium looks different on television than it does in person.  On tv, it looks huge and kind of stretched out.  Actually, it’s a good size but still feels intimate.  As I wrote earlier, I like it the best of the three large tennis stadiums in the U.S.

I’m going to check on Vera and Victoria, then catch some sleep.  Big tennis tomorrow.

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men from the boys

Posted on January 24, 2011 | Leave a comment

It’s Day 6 and starting to be that time, the men from the boys time.  The goal of every player in a Grand Slam is to get to the second week.  Lucie Safarova is about to take the court against Vera Zvonareva, the second seed.  Lucie is Thomas Berdych’s girlfriend.  This one will probably go to Vera, but you never know.

Sharapova got through against Julia Georges of Germany.  I have not missed Maria’s shrieking, don’t know about you.  And Venus indeed did suffer a miserable injury the other day on court and was only able to play into the second game of the match against Petkovic last night.  It was the first time in her long career Venus retired from a Grand Slam match; as I said, she does not bow out because she has a cough.  The crowd was disappointed and unfortunately took that to the next stage, hostility.  They booed Venus as she left the court.  Unfortunate.

There was a wonderful moment between Chris McKendry and Brad Gilbert talking at the ESPN desk after the match between Justine Henin and Svetlana Kuznetsova.  Sveta won the match in two tough sets.  Brad Gilbert was talking about how much more fit she has gotten herself and exclaimed “she’s a full dress size smaller!”   To which Chris McKendry, she of the lovely figure and face and some great looking clothes, spontaneously combusted into a wide, genuine smile directed right into the camera.  As if to say to all the women out there, yes, you heard it first here, BG declaring Kuzzy is a full dress size smaller.  It was a great difference of the sexes moment.

Gilbert is like that, of course.  He has this kind of very specific awareness of measurements whether it’s dress size, wind speed or on court temperature.  He’ll say things like “I’d say the wind is 14 mph and the temperature is 87 degrees.”  Fowler is always chortling about this exactitude, ready to make fun of the guy.  Brad can convert serve speed from kph to mph faster than Andy Roddick can get the ball from here to there.

As for the win over Justine Henin, good on Sveta.  She’s a strong strong player, thighs like a linebacker, and she’s lost more matches that she played well but choked at the end than anyone cares to remember.  So no surprise that she served for the match not once but twice last night and failed both times, sending the second set to a tiebreaker.  It was 6-4 in the tiebreak, Sveta had two more chances to close it and succeeded on the second of the two.  What a relief.  She has a 2-16 record against Justine and 0-5 in Grand Slams, well, no longer, now it’s 1-5.  As Justine’s ball flew barely long and Kuzzy got the win, she pounded her chest a couple of times.  Pam Shriver commented that she usually doesn’t like it when players do that, and neither do I.  Djokovic almost always does it and puffs up like he’s going to burst.  To me, if you’ve got heart, you don’t need to point to it and probably shouldn’t, wouldn’t.  But Pam and I both got onboard with Sveta doing it last night, after all the losses to Justine, after serving for the match twice.  You knew if she lost that second set, it was going to be Justine in the third, so it really was a now or never situation.   Props to Sveta.

The match between Mikhail Youzhny and Milos Raonic, the twenty year old qualifier from Canada via Serbia has just finished and Raonic won it in four sets.  Of all the up and coming players on the men’s side, this guy is being talked about as the top of the heap.   Probably he will meet David Ferrer in the round of 16 though the outcome of the Ferrer/Bernakis match is not yet determined.

Yesterday featured a history making match between Francesca Schiavone, the reigning French Open Champion, and Svetlana Kuznetsova.  They took Hisense Arena court at about four in the afternoon and left, exhausted a la Isner and Mahut, four hours and forty minutes later.  The lucky fans saw the longest women’s match ever played in the Open era.  It went 16-14 in the third set, a set that took three hours to play.  Schiavone saved six match points in the early goings of the set.  As things progressed both players brought out their best tennis.  When you get that tired, I think your body goes some other place, you’re hitting on instinct and guts and heart.  It’s just all out, and that brings out the best.  Which is a thrill to watch.  So, my earlier assertion that you could have left on after Day 1 and not seen anything better is probably erroneous.  This was a fantastic match.

Schiavone meets Caroline Wozniacki next and it’s unlikely she’ll have much left in the tank.  As at Wimbledon with Isner and Mahut, it’s a case of winning the battle but losing the war.  Wozniacki is playing well, has not been sorely tested, and has energy for goofing on the press that a cut on her leg she got because she fell trying to go from one treadmill to another was caused by a kangaroo!  Oh to be twenty and gorgeous and have the whole Yale football team in love with you; it gives you confidence in all sorts of situations.  This week, after hearing the press was tired of her boring answers, she came in and told them she was tired of their boring questions.   She was smiling and did this in the nicest of ways.

Back to the tennis.  Roger got past Tommy Robredo in four sets.  Rafa, Murray, Soderling and Djokovic are all advancing.   Jurgen Melzer defeated Marco Baghdatis, an upset, and Alexnadr Dolgopolov of the Ukraine, who looks a little like a girl with his ponytail, took out Tsonga.   Cilic and Isner had a five set battle that Cilic won 9-7.   Ferrer is through and will meet Raonic next, an interesting match up.

Nadal told the press yesterday that he has had a virus since the beginning of the year and there was much talk about whether making this statement was advisable with general agreement it was not.  Everybody has something, most just don’t say it.  It does set down a track you don’t want or really need to set down.  Why let your opponents think you’re weak?  Why have this being talked about?  But Rafa is a straightforward guy, not a politician.  He’ll win or he won’t and it will happen on the court, not off.  There’s something to be said for it.

As for Andy Roddick, the last American man standing until last night.  The talk all week has been about his game not being sufficiently offensive to really threaten the big boys these days and the show on court last night against Stan Wawrinka was all the proof you needed.  Andy had absolutely nothing for Stan and the result was a straight set win, 3,4 and 4.  Roddick was completely frustrated, Stan was completely comfortable, laying in aces and winners like there was no tomorrow.  Divorce, which is apparently what is happening in Stan’s personal life, does not seem to be affecting him on the court.  He won the tournament in Chennai and is into the quarters of a Grand Slam.  Next he plays Roger and he could give him some trouble, but ultimately the Swiss Number 1 will beat the Swiss Number 2.  But do have a look at Stan’s one-handed backhand, one of the best in the game.

Meanwhile, if Andy Roddick wants to have any chance at all to compete in the second week of a major, he will need to change his game, become more aggressive.  Andre Agassi had to reinvent himself in the latter stages of his career.  It’s doable.  But the way Andy plays now, he can’t beat Roger or Rafa, or Murray or Soderling, or Novak or a growing list of other tennis players.

Oh, it was painful to watch Sam Stosur get knocked out.  She didn’t choke, as I  feared.  She just got outplayed by Petra Kvitova who has a big game and was on fire.  And Sam had a double break lead in the first set tiebreak and lost it.  A straight set win for Kvitova who shifts now from dark horse selection in the draw to real contender.

Petkovic won in straight sets over Maria Sharapova, Na Li advanced over Azarenka.  The joke going around about all the women players with last names ending in “ova” is ova and ova again.  Not counting qualifiers in the draw, there were 22 players out of 128 total whose last name ends in “ova”.

The tournament kicked off a week ago, it’s Monday morning in Melbourne, play begins in an hour. No Aussies or Americans left in the draw.   And the Packers are beating the Bears.  I’m about to win a dinner off a Chicago friend.

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