Tennis

[TheNuclearOne]

Great tourney for upsets, more today.

[KristianJ]

Every time I've seen Boom Boom's puffy eyelids during Djokovic's games I've mistook him for someone else...

[Lagerlover]

KJ, you have nailed that.

[Ferrins]

Rupert might have to edit his poem about Roger after that double bounce last night against murray. He would of known he didn't get to that ball. Is it cheating? It's a grey area that develops after a few years of competitive tennis where it becomes a judgement call by the player. It should be open to a video decision IMO.

[Coldtopper]

Why?Cause he's blown up like a balloon?

Boris wouldn't fit into that cupboard anymore!

[matty]

Alcohol, drugs, both?

[goughy]

I know which I'd prefer to hear calling the footy, and it's not the guy from the second photo.

edit: if you hadn't said 'boom boom', I wouldn't have known who that was either!

[Ferrins]

About to watch the womens first semi live, should be interesting.

[oncewasagolfer]

Rupert might have to edit his poem about Roger after that double bounce last night against murray. He would of known he didn't get to that ball. Is it cheating? It's a grey area that develops after a few years of competitive tennis where it becomes a judgement call by the player. It should be open to a video decision IMO.

I needed a few more slow mo replays ffs.

[Steve57]

About to watch the womens first semi live, should be interesting.

Interesting start!
5 straight games to Li

[Coldtopper]

Every time I've seen Boom Boom's puffy eyelids during Djokovic's games I've mistook him for someone else...

Thats a great call!

[Ferrins]

Interesting start!
5 straight games to Li

Some quality shots by both players.

[Icestorm959]

Nadal tears Fed a new one.

Gotta be sad to be Fed, drawing Nadal has got to feel like a lost cause every time now.

[TheNuclearOne]

I said similar a year or two ago,

Nadal is the anti Federer, he's checked his place in history a bit imo. His game gives Fed so many problems.

Head to head

• All matches: Nadal, 23–10
• All finals: Nadal, 14–6

• Grand Slam matches: Nadal, 9–2
  • Australian Open: Nadal, 3–0
  • French Open: Nadal, 5–0
  • Wimbledon: Federer, 2–1
  • US Open: Have not met
• Grand Slam finals: Nadal, 6–2

Love Fedex but i could never consider him the greatest ever when he's been all but dominated by his closest rival, especially in grand slams and grand slam finals. You can take the 5 French Open wins off Nadal and he still matches or surpasses Fed in almost every GS category.

If Nadal can win Sunday and have a great run of health he could well overtake Federer historically. He'd then be just 3 Grand slams behind. A lot of things would have to fall into place for Fed to win another one where as Nadal would be overwhelming fave for this years French and could easily jag either of the other 2.

[goughy]

It is hard to completely compare the two in a head to head manner when Nadal is 5 years younger than Fed, and turned pro a few years later than Fed. I would hazzard a guess that Fed showed a dominance over Nadal earlier which has now switched over as he's gotten older. Nadal has also had a clear dominance on clay surfaces (where he's won well more than half his GS's, and seems to be such a specialists surface. Nadal also hasn't held the No.1 position (119wks)for even half the length of time Fed has (302), and less than a quarter as long a consecutive streak (56 compared to 237wks).
Nadal may get close or even beat Fed's records yet as he's young and plenty of tennis left in him, but he also has others knocking on his door already.
When I think of Nadal, especially in his early years, he reminded me of Kurten who made it to world No.1 yet only ever seemed to win on clay surfaces. Clearly Nadal has gotten better than that, but I remember it bugging me when that argentinian was No.1 yet could do nothing on anything but clay.

And hate or hate Hewitt, he's been our most successful tennis player on the modern singles era. Held No.1 longer than Edberg (one of my favs) or Connors and has a consecutive streak longer than Nadal. I used to think of him a bit like I did Chang - no great serve and didn't seem to have any special shots in his arsenal yet still beat people by dogged persistence. Some of our young players could learn a thing or two from him.

[TheNuclearOne]

I would hazzard a guess that Fed showed a dominance over Nadal earlier which has now switched over as he's gotten older.

Nadal actually won 6 or their first 7 encounters even if most were on clay.

Nadals game on other surfaces really came on. Thru 2008 - early 2009 Nadal beat him in 5 finals in a row including Wimbledon and the Australian when Federer was still very much on top of his game. Nadal had run him close at the big W the year before and you could see his continual improvement on faster surfaces.

Feds been somewhat lucky that Nadal has had a wretched run with injury for a long time now and also that others (with better head to head arsenals) have knocked him out a bit on hard courts after he came on hard. Fed was never going to jag that FO unless someone else put Nadal out which happened.

You just know you can take any version of Fed and put him against the best of Nadal and Nadal's going to rack up more wins comfortably. His game is a nightmare for Fed, and the bigger the event the worse it is. Over the course of 5 setters Fed can't hang with him. He puts more pressure on Feds backhand with his high kicking groundies than anyone in history.

[TheNuclearOne]

And hate or hate Hewitt, he's been our most successful tennis player on the modern singles era. Held No.1 longer than Edberg (one of my favs) or Connors and has a consecutive streak longer than Nadal. I used to think of him a bit like I did Chang - no great serve and didn't seem to have any special shots in his arsenal yet still beat people by dogged persistence. Some of our young players could learn a thing or two from him.

Huge respect for Hewitt's efforts, his heart, guts and determination is unsurpassed. Incredible competitor. At the time he came thru i saw him as a modern version of Borg/Wilander/Chang. He had all that consistency with a little bit more sting and aggression. The game eventually passed him by when it really ramped up power wise yet he's still hung pretty well, being reasonably competitive for a long time. He too, like Nadal has had a fair bit of injury drama.

[AndyP]

Feds been somewhat lucky that Nadal has had a wretched run with injury for a long time now...

For the most part, I don't agree with it being luck. Nadal's style of play is what causes these injuries. If he changes his style to remove the injury risk, he wouldn't be as good.

[goughy]

Fair enough on the early head to heads. I just made the assumption fed won more early on. Some people just have their bunny and Fed is Nadals. Obviously something in his style that just betters Fed. Still, while he's only a little behind in GS's (and wouldn't surprise me if he did surpass Fed, especially with the french up his sleeve) he's a long way behind in the No.1 stakes, and I don't know how close he will get.

[TheNuclearOne]

For the most part, I don't agree with it being luck. Nadal's style of play is what causes these injuries. If he changes his style to remove the injury risk, he wouldn't be as good.

Nadals style is gruelling for sure, but are you talking technical or strategical?

[TheNuclearOne]

Fair enough on the early head to heads. I just made the assumption fed won more early on. Some people just have their bunny and Fed is Nadals. Obviously something in his style that just betters Fed. Still, while he's only a little behind in GS's (and wouldn't surprise me if he did surpass Fed, especially with the french up his sleeve) he's a long way behind in the No.1 stakes, and I don't know how close he will get.

A fair part of Nadal's dominance is all that high ball to the backhand stuff. Of course he has other assets.

I agree Nadal has much to do to find that number 1. My bigger point however is that Federer is extremely hard to consider the best ever when Nadal, his closest rival, has the stats he has against him. No close rival bested Sampras. At a guess if we went back to the likes of Laver i'd be confident he wouldn't have a close rival with a similar dominance over him.

When Nadal ran Fed close in the 2007 Wimbledon (Federer owned this tourney) then rolled him the next year the alarm bells were ringing. Fed has not beat Nadal since then in a Grand Slam match.

[JADO75]

I think Fed's single handed backhand (which I love & wish more tennis players would use) works against him when it comes to Nadal. The two handed blokes seem to be able to shorten & stiffen up a bit to make lighter work of it, sure Fed can slice it back but its very defensive. I couldn't call Fed the best ever due to Rafa's dominance.

[TheNuclearOne]

I think Fed's single handed backhand (which I love & wish more tennis players would use) works against him when it comes to Nadal. The two handed blokes seem to be able to shorten & stiffen up a bit to make lighter work of it, sure Fed can slice it back but its very defensive. I couldn't call Fed the best ever due to Rafa's dominance.

Spot on all around! Fed has trouble coming over it enough leading to Nadal gaining dominance in a lot of rallies.

[goughy]

I just love single handed backhand. Two handed still looks wrong to me, especially on a bloke.

[goughy]

Is this the best winners speech ever?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-uV...e_gdata_player