*Official* Tennis Thread

[Jono]

Fed stop going toe-to-toe with Gulbis, he's a better shot-maker than you atm.

I can feel an upset here if he keeps to this game plan.


Can ya feel it? Can ya feel it? Can ya feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeel it?

 

[Jono]

GULBIS UP A BREAK!






OH MY Lord!

 

[Jono]

3-5 in the third!

Fed serving to stay in.

 

[Jono]

CHOOOOOOOOOOOOOKE!

Had him dead on that match point did Gulbis!

That will haunt him forever if he loses.

 

[vcs]

Federer can't grind out a win in these best of 3 matches to save his life these days.

Ah well, there goes my pipe-dream of him defending his clay titles. Nadal to get back to No. 1 after the French.

 

[Jono]

FED SAVES SIX MATCH POINTS

I KNOW IM TALKING TO MYSELF HERE BUT WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW!


































Wow

 

[Jono]

Federer gifts the break back! And Gulbis will again serve for the match.


I am going to blow up in excitement.

 

[Jono]

HE'S DONE IT!

You are mentally mush Federer. Get the **** off Nadal's clay.

 

[vcs]

Heh. Gloat away all you like, but you're talking some rubbish in this thread. It's not that Federer doesn't care about these events, or that he lost his mental edge, he's simply not as good as he used to be. Don't let the fact that he still wins Slams fool you. He can't string three backhands together in a row, he can't bring the serve when it really matters.

It happens, he's nearly 29 and players at that age are no longer in their prime. It'll happen to Nadal and the rest, probably earlier than that as well.

 

[vcs]

Oh, and short memories. Remember Nadal struggling to win a set in the WTF and getting tonked by all and sundry on his worst surface, indoor HCs at the end of last season? This is Federer's worst surface as well. Still, I expect him to put up a better performance than this and be better prepared by the time RG comes around. He's playing Estoril, which he desperately needs at this stage.

 

[Jono]

Woah man, I was just mucking around. I had money on Fed and I wanted him to win.

Clearly i don't think Federer is 'mentally mush' considering he's the greatest sportsman I've ever seen.

For the record though, Nadal was clearly injured at the end of last season. It doesn't take a genius to realise that.

 

[vcs]

Woah man, I was just mucking around. I had money on Fed and I wanted him to win.

For the record though, Nadal was clearly injured at the end of last season. It doesn't take a genius to realise that.

Sure.

No, he wasn't injured when he came back after the USO (where he had an abdominal strain). Indoor surfaces don't take spin and it doesn't suit his style, that's all. He's never done well on them.

 

[Jono]

If you actually think Nadal was fully fit at the ATP World Tour finals in London you are absolutely kidding yourself.

And he made the Beijing finals and Paris semis by the way, so he hardly lost in the first/second round like Roger did at the indoor tournament.

 

[Jono]

By the way, good to have someone else to chat about tennis in this thread

 

[vcs]

...
Clearly i don't think Federer is 'mentally mush' considering he's the greatest sportsman I've ever seen.
...

Fair enough. I just find it weird when people expect him to still produce God-like consistency at this stage of his career and judge him by how he does in MS tournaments (I don't like it either but Sampras was even worse at a similar stage). It's like saying Sachin's nothing special because he was owned by the likes of Shaun Udal and Paul Harris.

 

[Jono]

But who in this thread is saying Federer is crap?

I was having fun and posting nonsense watching an absolutely crazy match. Get used to it I do it a lot in this thread at un-Godly hours (here in Australia) when I'm up watching tennis whilst everyone else is sensibly asleep.


But you have to hand it to me for picking Gulbis to win when he was only up a break in the 2nd

 

[vcs]

Yeah, same here. Clay season is usually a crap time for me to chat about tennis though.

Nadal was OK physically at the WTF, IMO. He double-bagelled Berdych one week later on clay in the Davis Cup final where he was a man transformed. Surfaces make a big difference at this level.

 

[vcs]

Watching the lovely Ivanovic is a decent consolation for sitting through Federer's crap performance.

Though she sucks as well these days, tennis-wise.

 

[Jono]

Nadal was OK physically at the WTF, IMO. He double-bagelled Berdych one week later on clay in the Davis Cup final where he was a man transformed. Surfaces make a big difference at this level.

Actually that's a fair comment. I still don't think Nadal was completely right, but I personally believe he wasn't confident in his body. It was shown that he was hitting his forehand at 8km/h slower at the end of 2009 compared to when he was at the start of 2009 and also start of 2010.

That being said, I do take your point regarding the Davis Cup.




Anyway this was my multi that Fed cost me:

Berdych + Almagro + Ferrer + Federer + Djokovic + Nadal

Only Fed lost and Ferrer and Nadal was yet to play.


I did feel dirty wanting Federer to win whilst watching though, because I felt so sad for Gulbis when he wasted those 6 match points. I was sure he'd be on suicide watch if he lost.

 

[Jono]

Watching the lovely Ivanovic is a decent consolation for sitting through Federer's crap performance.

Though she sucks as well these days, tennis-wise.

Haha now there's someone that cost me a lot of money until I finally realised she was crap for good.