Was an exhibition in Abu Dhabi against Novak Djokovic that lasted 44 minutes and ended up with the scoreline 2-6 1-6 in the Serbs favor. It was Federer‘s first match since he won the ATP World Tour Championships and he mishit quite a few balls badly, likely due to a rusty racquet. Talking about his racquet, he was playing with the new paint job (as seen in the picture). The model called Wilson Pro Staff Six.One 90 BLX will soon be available for order at all major tennis retailers and I’m seriously considering ordering one through TennisExpress as soon as …
federer
Been too busy to blog, but still some activity on Twitter! (Check it out and follow). To summarize my thoughts of the day so far: Have a hard time seeing Murray go very far in Cincinnati. He looks a bit uninterested. Maybe 2012 will be the year he gets it all together. Most improved player in 2011? @mardyfish – no question about it. Taking your physique and your game seriously is key. A true role model! Tough loss for Dimitrov against Ferrer, playing well, but forehand is lacking a bit of Federeresque zip. Major talent tho! Hard to see anyone …
It’s hard to believe. Federer lost a 2-0 set lead to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 6-3 7-6 4-6 4-6 4-6 and the last three sets he wasn’t even close of breaking the Frenchman. It was a magical effort by Tsonga, but a sad situation for us Fed fans who had looked forward to a 7th Wimbledon title. Now Federer hasn’t won a slam in six tries and it’s becoming apparent that he might “only” have one (if that) more title in him. He’s still a contender for every slam, but never again the favorite. Tennisnerd mourns.
Here are the amazing matches to look forward to today: Murray vs Gasquet – I think Murray is too good and Gasquet will surely get a flashback from being 2-0 sets up and serving for the match a few years ago. Gasquet has improved, but Murray looks determined to go far this Wimbledon. Nadal vs Del Potro – Match-up of the day. Can Del Potro’s ball-busting strokes knock Nadal off balance or his the defending champion too strong? If this was hard court I would place a bet on Delpo, but considering his Bambi-like movement on grass, I don’t see …
Here’s my list of tennis booksyou have to read. I love reading about tennis, but a lot of the writing is dry and uninteresting. Since I’ve read a lot of the stuff on the tennis book market, I hope I can give you some valuable recommendations on tennis books you might’ve missed out on. Just click on the link to get to Amazon where you can buy the book, read excerpts (for some) or read some more reviews. The Inner Game Of Tennis is about becoming a better playing by focus on your mental skills and technique. Timothy Gallwey talks …
We are usually quite obsessed with working on our weaknesses. We want to improve shots we don’t feel very confident in, we want to hit that backhand technically correct, we want the volley to feel confident, we would like to add those extra miles per hour on the serve. This is all good. But sometimes we forget that when match play comes around we need to focus on our strengths. If you have played tennis for many years and feel really uncomfortable hitting for example a drive backhand despite hours of coaching, then try to avoid hitting so many drive …
Today is the first official day of the 2011 grass court season and it’s not a bad one. The two main warm up events for Wimbledon are as usual Queens and Halle. The big question is of course which stars will come to play after a long and testing French Open, Federer (Halle), Nadal (Queens) especially. But even if they don’t participate we should be in for quite a treat. The first day action offers: Nieminen vs Lu – Â Lu had an amazing Wimbledon last year, but we haven’t seen much good from either player of late. I would say …
It was excruciating at times for Federer fans such as myself, but in the end you just had to give it to Nadal who was too good on the most important points and at times played his very best clay court tennis in his 7-5 7-6 5-7 6-1 victory. But it was Federer who took the lead early, first at 3-0, then with set points at 5-2, serving for the set at 5-3, before Nadal won seven straight games to lead 7-5 2-0. Nadal was tentative in the beginning and made a few rare unforced errors while on the other …
And so here it is, the match we’ve been waiting for, another grand slam final between Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. In some way this final feels different then the previous ones, especially since they played their last GS final against each other in the 2009 Australian Open 2,5 years ago. A lot has happened since then. Djokovic has showed he’s probably the best player in the world right now. Federer has won the French Open and reached 16 Grand Slam titles. Nadal has proven that he wants to be in the GOAT discussion by making a career slam and winning 9 …