Federer Edges Tipsarevic in a Thriller

Wow… what a match that was!! I am really loving this year’s open. Two epic matches (Roddick-Kohlschreiber  yesterday, Safin-Bhagdatis the day before) in two days and one more today.

The Melbourne rain which so disrupted play at the Australian Open could not dampen an extraordinary five-set game that saw, Roger Federer, chasing his fourth title and thirteenth Grand Slam crown, narrowly defeat 23-year-old Serbian Janko Tipsarevic.The game was decided by a brilliant final set which saw Tipsarevic, tiring visibly and beginning to grunt like Maria Sharapova, hit a succession of big serves to stay in contention. Both players displayed brilliance and tenacity, defying fatigue for sixteen nerve-shredding games until Federer finally edged in front.

Unheralded 49th seed Tipsarevic put on an incredible display. The first two sets were decided by tie-break, Tipsaravic won the first, inflicting Federer’s first opening set loss since 2006, but Federer took the second tie break with some ease.

Still Federer, who has been suffering with gastric illness, was unable to find his rhythm and made a series of unforced errors to allow the intense Dostoevsky-reading Tipsarevic to pull away, and eventually win, the third set 5-7. The sensational loss prompted Federer to call for his trainer as the game moved beyond three hours.

The strain initially told most on Tipsarevic who, still feeling the effects of a marathon first round game against Joseph Sirianni, suddenly looked leg weary. Federer took the fourth set 6-1 with commanding ease to set up a thrilling finale.

Roddick falls to Kohlschreiber in a Marathon Match

Great match and great quality of tennis. Kohlschreiber defeated Roddick in five sets,  6-4 3-6 7-6 (10- 6-7 (3-7) 8-6. Yesterday night’s match between Safin and Bhadatis was epic for the drama. And, tonight’s match is an epic for the quality of tennis. Both the players were solid on the serve (total 74 aces; 42 for Roddick and 32 for the German). And, only 2 breaks for the entire 5 sets. The other stats are also mind-boggling.  79 winners from Roddick and 104 winners from Kohlschreiber (WTF??).

In the next round, Kohlschreiber  will face Jarkko Nieminen. With this kind of form, Kohlschreiber should have an easy march to the quarterfinals.

Kuerten to Retire after 2008

From ESPN:

Gustavo Kuerten will play his farewell season in 2008.

The 31-year-old Brazilian plans to play only in a few tournaments before retiring, but said he wants Roland Garros to be among them. “I want to play in tournaments that are special for me,” Kuerten said in Friday editions of the Estado de S. Paulo newspaper. “I’ve been practicing and there are only a few details to finalize my schedule.” He also was expected to play in the Brasil Open and the Master Series in Miami. Last year, Kuerten said for the first time that he may retire from tennis if he fails to stay competitive in 2008. The 680th-ranked Kuerten had a 2-7 singles record last season, his first regular play on tour since hip surgery in September 2004. The Brazilian, ranked No. 1 in 2000, won the last of his 20 titles in February 2004. He won the French Open in 1997, 2000 and 2001.

Federer withdraws from Kooyong Classic

From Herald-Sun:

ROGER Federer’s Australian Open campaign has been disrupted after he was forced to pull out of the Kooyong Classic because of a virus.

Federer is battling a stomach virus and doctors have advised him to rest for a couple of days.

While the Swiss world No. 1 is not immediately in doubt for the Open, starting on Monday, he reluctantly pulled out of the eight-man AAMI Classic, which starts tomorrow.

Federer has not been able to shrug off the virus since arriving in Melbourne at the weekend.

He’s awaiting the results of medical tests conducted yesterday.

Federer’s no-risk policy left promoter Colin Stubs desperately searching for another replacement last night after earlier losing German Tommy Haas to precautions with shoulder soreness.

“He has been advised not to play until he finds out the results of the tests. To lose a bloke like Federer is always tough, but I’ve just looked at the field and we’ve still got five of the top 10,” Stubs said.

Federer, chasing a fourth Australian Open title, has always used the guaranteed three matches at Kooyong to complete preparations for Melbourne Park.

Murray, Youzny, Llorda win titles in the opening week

Andy Murray claimed the first title of the season with a battling 6-4 4-6 6-2 win over Stan-the-Man Wawrinka in the Qatar Open final. Murray is in sublime form. He played solid tennis throughout the week. I am pretty confident that this year Murray will join Nadal and Djokivic at the top to challenge Federer. He will be one of the main guys to watch out for at the Australian Open.

In Chennai final, Youzny hammered Nadal with a 6-0, 6-1 win. Although the Youzny’s win is not surprising, the scoreline is shocking. Youzny played beautiful tennis making only 4 unforced errors in the entire match. On the other hand, Nadal made several errors on the forehand side. In second set Nadal called for trainer to look at his right hip. Hope he’ll be 100% for the Australian Open.

In Adelaide, Michael Llorda took the title with a 6-3, 6-4 victory over third-seeded Jakko Nemenin.

Tough draw for Hewitt (Adelaide International)

Hewitt has been handed a tough draw for the season opener. The number-1 seed will play Dudi Sela in the first round. He might face Jose Acasuso in the next match. Hewitt lost to Acasuso in their previous encounter.

Full draw at ATP site.

However, the draw shouldn’t be a problem for Hewitt. He seems to be working very hard for the next season. With Tony Roche in his team, he might come up with added weapons to his game.

Chennai Open Draw

The Chennai Open (one of the three tournaments in the first week of 2008 season) draw was released few hours ago. Top four seded players for this tournament: 1. Nadal   2. Bhagdatis,   3. Moya,    4. Youzny

Full draw at ATP site.

The draw is evenly distributed. The seeded players do not have any significant challenges in the early rounds. Nadal will play the first round match against Frenchman Mathieu Montcourt. Good news for Nadal is that Malisse (who beat Nadal last year in this tournament) is not in his quarter.

Melbourne slicker than Wimbledon

From The-Age:

NOT ONLY are the new blue Australian Open courts faster than the contentious surface they replaced, they have been measured as even quicker than Wimbledon’s grass.

That is the claim of the Australian Open’s tournament director, Craig Tiley, who consulted widely with top players — keeping Australian Lleyton Hewitt “in the loop” — before selecting Plexicushion, a surface he says is quicker than Wimbledon and slightly slower than the US Open’s hardcourts — the slickest of the grand slam events.

The International Tennis Federation has devised a pace-rating scale for the various courts on the tour.

On the scale, a rating below 30 is “slow”, 30-34 medium, 34-38 was designed medium-fast, while anything above 38 was considered “fast”.

Tiley said the new Plexicushion had a speed rating of “34 to 38″, which defined it as medium-fast.

Surprisingly, this was quicker than Wimbledon — historically, the tournament that had always favoured serve-and-volley tennis, in which rallies were relatively short.

“Wimbledon is actually slower,” Tiley said. “Because Wimbledon is medium … the grass is new grass, a new kind of grass. The French is obviously very slow. So we’re faster than Wimbledon, faster than the French, and a little bit below the US Open — not much though … US Open is 38, 39, they’re faster.”

Tiley said Wimbledon’s grass had been changed five years ago.

While the notion that the Australian Open’s courts — in the past derided by the Hewitt camp for resembling “green clay” — might be quicker than the game’s grass slam seems astounding, this does not necessarily make the tournament a serve and volleyer’s nirvana.

As Tiley acknowledged, on grass “the ball keeps low” which tends to give the impression of greater pace. A low bounce and skidding ball makes it harder, for instance, to retrieve a volley.

Tiley said Hewitt, the major critic of Rebound Ace, had indicated that he liked Plexicushion, even though he had not been on Melbourne Park yet.

“Lleyton, I’ve kept him the loop the whole time. I’ve shown him colours, when we were in colour choices, I kept him in the loop on that and the type of choice we were making, … I don’t make any apologies for consulting our top players.

“He’s happy for us to be rid of the lot, what we had out here last time, and he’s played on this (Plexicushion) before and he likes it … he hasn’t said to me directly ‘I love it’ but he hasn’t hit on Melbourne Park yet, so he needs to hit on it, which he will do before the Open.

“But everyone else has liked it, you know — across the board, every single player has said they really love it.”

Tiley said world No. 1 Roger Federer also had been informed about the new surface. Federer is another obvious beneficiary of a quicker surface.

Tiley and Tennis Australia are touting the new courts as quicker, more reliable and consistent than Rebound Ace, which was said to have variations in pace and bounce.

“They like the colour because they can actually see the ball,” Tiley said.

“The most important thing is we can actually replicate this across Australia, so it takes care of all the environmental sustainability issues that we have,” he added.

Sampras: Federer is the most dominant sportsman in the history of mankind

Federer seems to have a special quality that makes people sing about his greatness. Last year, Nadal was all praises for Roger after their Seoul exhibition. Now, it’s Sampras.

In a recent interview, Pete said some nice and insightful words about Roger and also about who the greatest player is. After the exhibition matches in November, I think Pete and Roger became really good friends.

Some excerpts from the interview:

On the greatest player debate…

“It’s difficult to say who is the greatest tennis player in history. The people who are usually mentioned are Roger, myself and Rod Laver, and I think it’s probably one of us three.”

“Roger’s critics say that he can’t be the greatest of all time unless he wins the French Open, but I don’t think that’s true.

“It’s difficult to compare generations, as things have changed so much since Laver’s day. Rod was my hero, and I have such great respect for what he did, but I remember him telling me once that he only had to start playing from the fourth round onwards. There’s no way that’s the case now, as you really have to turn it on from the first round onwards.

“I think there’s a chance that people will look back on Roger as the greatest of all time.”

“But I don’t think that Roger is at all comfortable with how great he is. Roger and I were talking about this a few weeks ago, the debate about who is the greatest tennis player in history, and he found the whole conversation really uncomfortable.

On Roger’s performance in the past few years…

“What Roger has been doing the last three years or so has been nothing short of phenomenal - I think he has been the most dominant individual sportsman in the history of mankind. I can’t think of anyone in an individual sport who has even got close to what Roger has done the last few years,”

On Roger’s love for tennis…

“Roger isn’t playing tennis for the limelight, for the pat on the back and for the medal at the end of the race. He plays tennis because he loves tennis, and he is competitive when he gets out there on the court, but I don’t think he’s doing it for the praise and to be called the greatest. All he wants to do is get out there and play tennis, and that’s what I love about Roger, that you can see he loves the game.”

On their friendship…

“When Roger came to my house, it was great. We had a hit for a few hours, played a few points, did some drills, and spoke about tennis, about the different generations. But it was probably only in Asia that I got to know him that well. We hung out a ton there, and there was a connection between us.”

“Roger is such a great guy, and we had a lot of laughs over dinners. He is a funny guy, he likes his jokes, and is a bit of a prankster.

“I think that’s a side of him which he likes to keep private. All those things that people do say about Roger, they are all true - he is a humble guy, he’s down to earth. I love the way he handles himself. Tennis couldn’t have a better ambassador.”

On their respective play levels…

“Roger has got no holes in his game, he’s got the whole package, and he rarely has an off-day, and even then he usually finds a way to win.”

“Our games are different as I used to take more risks, so I probably had more off-days. There are a few players who have gone toe-to-toe with him, such as [Rafael] Nadal and [Novak] Djokovic, but Roger always seems to have something extra when it really matters, especially at the grand slams. He’s got another gear.”

On Roger’s 2008 season and possibility of breaking his record…

“Roger’s the favourite for the Australian Open, so that’s 13, and he has a good chance of winning the French Open, even though he’s never done that before, and so he could equal my record in Paris. And he could break it on Centre Court at Wimbledon, which would be something.”

“If he doesn’t win the French Open, then he will probably break it at the US Open.

“I don’t think it’s a shoo-in, and there is a lot more work for him to do, but I think he has a great chance of doing it in 2008. The story for the last few years has been Roger breaking all the records - during 2007, he beat the Jimmy Connors record for most consecutive weeks at No 1, and soon the grand slam record is going to be his as well. Soon all the records are going to be his, and I’m pleased for him. He is dominating the sport more than I ever did, more than anyone ever has.”

Full interview at Telegraph.

Stepanek, Vaidisova to Marry

From Tennis-X:

Hold onto your hats. Just when you though things in tennis couldn’t get any weirder, the Bradenton (Fla.) Herald is reporting that 29-year-old ATP tennis pro Radek Stepanek and 18-year-old Nicole Vaidisova, both of Czech origin, have filed papers in Bradenton to tie the knot.

Stepanek was engaged to Swiss Martina Hingis until the two broke it off last August. A couple months later, Hingis announced she had drug-tested positive for cocaine and was subsequently retiring from tennis.

The two applied for a marriage licence on Dec. 10 according to Manatee County Clerk of Circuit Court papers. Vaidisova’s agent at IMG Academies, Olivier Van Lindonk, could not be reached for comment by the newspaper.

Stepanek is known for his signature move “The Worm,” where he writhes around on court after big wins. Vaidisova is known as a young talent who struggles to control her temper, and finished 2007 just outside the Top 10 on the WTA Tour Rankings.