Wimbledon!!

No serious analysis from me as yet...

What about that fucken game between Isner and Mahut??

59-59 in the 5th set and we're on to day 3.

Say wha???



gc.

If you weren't watching this you'd seriously be tempted to call bullshit on this set... almost as if two guys of little note deciding amongst themselves they'd see how long they could wring it out just to get in the record books.

And Isner wins!

Jesus. Nadal made a dog's breakfast of his 2nd round match too. Being taken to five set by 56th ranked Robin Haase. Very unlike Nadal to get rattled especially so early in matches.

Also, the guy Isner plays next, Thiemo De Bakker, also had a five set match, winning 16-14 in the 5th...

Actually... Haase is ranked 151st, not 56th.

Last night Hewitt and Federer both won.

Hewitt just made 21st ranked Frenchman Gael Monfils look pretty average mentally. French guys just have such a hard time matching their talent with brains to match.

Federer played the very experienced Arnaud Clement and utterly smashed him, playing a lot more like we expect from him. Hit some fantastic volleys too - def coming into the net a bit more.

Tonight:
Nadal vs Philipp Petzschner - solid player ranked in the 30s..
Andy Murray vs Gilles Simon - solid Frenchman ranked 26th
Robin Soderling vs Thomaz Bellucci - a solid player who beat Austrian Martin Fisher in 4 sets last round.

Nadal struggled again in a 5-set match against a relative nobody, winning basically on being fitter mentally and physically.

Murry looked pretty good too against 26th seeded Giles Simon.. Still not sure he'll win Wimbledon... he just doesn't seem on top of grass court tennis. He'll have to have a blinder and his opponent an off day for him to ever take Wimbledon it out imo.

Rest day today but tomorrow:
- Federer takes on 16th seed Jurgen Melzer (another lefty - Fed is getting good practice against them this year! Has also been to the 3rd round here 3 times previously and was a semi-finalist at the French so isn't a bunny at all)

- Murry takes on 18th seed Sam Querrey

- Djokovic takes on Hewitt which could be an interesting one. The guns vs the brawn.

- Nadal has unseeded Paul-Henri Mathieu who's been playing pretty well this tournament so far.

Federer gone



I didn't see the match but from what I've seen of Monfils he needs to get a a lot fitter or change his game completely, he runs around like a mad man for 2 sets then tires before being exhausted in the 4th (if the game gets that far).

Yeah, I watched the Federer match and can't recall the last time I've seen him look/play so uninspired and lacking spark. It was quite sad, like he'd run out of mojo. He showed some moments of sheer brilliance but they were too few and far between.

Berdych showed his flaws also even though he won. I think in the last 2 sets he was up 40-0 on serve four times and ended up a break-point down... He will get nailed by guys like Nadal if he can't close out games better.

Lastly. I can't recall the last time I saw so many bad bounces - even off grass. There were about 5 per set, way too many to be acceptable... Players will be spitting tacks about that in the locker room I reckon.

Ah.. just watched the Federer post-match. He said he wasn't moving as well as he hoped because of a sore leg (which he's had strapped a few times in this and the previous tournament). As lame as it sounds you only have to watch matches from past years to see he wasn't moving as well.

In the entire match I don't think he hit a single classic Federer running forehand or backhand winner down the line - usually hallmarks of his game.

Also Berdych was hitting low balls consistently well for a big guy - really well. Should be a lesson for lazier tall guys like Soderling and Djokovic.

This is the telling chart...

In almost every area Federer was doing fine - he just failed in converting break points. Am surprised Berdych won so many of his 2nd serve points because Federer, while a master at getting serves back, didn't seem to be winning as big a percentage of those points as the stats show.


Hate seeing guys talk about injuries in post-match interviews as it feels a bit undignified but, since everyone else seems to get injury time-outs during matches (Nadal as a routine habit) and Federer has had one ever that I recall, I'll give him a free pass on this one ha ha.

One thing Berdych really should work on is his 2nd serve. The great servers in history haven't had the huge gap in pace between their 1st and 2nd serves (Sampras, Federer etc)... it's telling that a guy who can throw down so many huge serves a) had a slower second serve av speed than Feds, b) isn't winning the number of free points he should on his 1st serve, i.e. he's doing a Roddick and serving too many in obvious places.

Surprised Berdych has taken until this year to do anything of note in the slams...

Fed also showing a good sense of humour at the end of his post-match interview..

yeh that sarcasm from Rog was awesome

http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2010/07/everything_i_kn_4.html