Well, that was a bit of an anti-climax in the end - have to give credit to Djokovic for reducing the errors and just being very consistent, Murray seemed to tire a bit in the third set after missing a few good chances/half-chances to break in the second.
Shoot, just got spoiled by the internet(not you guys, don’t worry). Good for, to avoid spoilers, the winner. He deserved it.
It just aired on replay on EPSN2, but I won’t name the winner just yet.
This is the first time in 20 years that the Australian Open men’s and women’s singles champions both successfully defended their titles. Courier and Seles were the champs in 1992 and 1993. Djokovic is stepping into rarefied air now: he is the first man in the Open era to win this tournament three years in a row. He now has six major titles (four of them in Australia). Same as Boris Becker, among others. Players with seven including McEnroe and Newcombe, and the guys with eight include Agassi and Connors and Lendl. I got a weird sense that some commentators still wanted Andy Murray to prove something this tournament, but I think he did that. I don’t think there’s going to be much drama in the rankings for now: Djokovic is firmly in first with Federer in second, Murray in third, Ferrer in fourth, and Nadal in fifth (his lowest ranking since May 2005). There’s some daylight between all of them and it might take Nadal a while to get back into the top four since I presume he has a lot of points to defend when they start playing on clay again. He’s supposed to make his comeback next week.
That was quite a performance… Murray never broke Djokovic’s serve, and Djokovic was only broken one time in the entire tournament. While the first set seemed pretty even, and the second also went to tie-breaker, Murray could not hold serve in the 2nd set tie-breaker or the 3rd/4th set… hard to tell how much playing Federer took out of him, but Djokovic was a rock.
Nadal’s comeback officially begins in about an hour. He’ll be playing doubles with Juan Monaco against Cermak and Dlouhy, the #2 seeds in the tournament. Tomorrow he’ll play his first singles match.
Nadal/Monaco won the first set, and in an extra gift to Nadal, his opponent for tomorrow (Federico Delbonis of Argentina) had to win a third-set tiebreak to get out of the first round.
Nadal won the singles event in Brazil, and Serena is back at #1 on the WTA. This is her sixth time at the top ranking, and her first in almost two and a half years. She is also the oldest-ever player to be ranked #1 on the WTA Tour.
Federer and Djokovic and Murray have all spoken up in favor of stricter drug testing recently because (thanks to the dysfunctional state of the tour) what they have right now isn’t sufficient. This is something that needs to happen for the health of the sport.
Tennis is going with the biological passport as requested by top players.
Also, Roger and Rafa play tonight at 10 PM. Indian Wells.
Re Indian Wells 2013:
Woot on Del Potro making it to another final. Sorry that Djokovic wore him out so that he faded at the end. I do wish he’d manscape, though. He’s one hairy guy.
Woot on Rafa for winning another tournament. Liked his outfit quite a bit. Twice when he was sitting on the bench between games he started digging at his crotch. Someone should introduce him to some powder or something.
Too bad Rog wasn’t completely healthy for his Rafa match up. What a lackluster game that was. I started feeling sorry for Roger. Incredible.
The Wozniacki/Kerber match was like watching paint dry. I sooo wanted Serena Williams to show up and smash the ball down one of their throats. “Ladies, THAT’s how you end a point!”
After the majors, my bucket list includes attending Indian Wells, Miami and Monte Carlo.
PS - I hope this ends the rumors about Rafa doping.
Serena beats Sharapova in the final in Miami. Sharapova was playing well and lead by a set and a break, and then Serena turned on the jets and won 10 games in a row to win the championship.
Nadal won 8 straight Monte Carlo clay championships.
Ha, if you can believe it, Nadal is seeded 5th in the French Open. They should have bumped him up a bit, I think.
Wow, didn’t just beat him…thumped him! could that be Nadal biggest ever clay defeat?
I’m not sure how this works- if all major tournament organizers can just seed however they want or if they have to follow the rankings unless they say otherwise. Wimbledon is the only tournament that makes up its own seedings (because unfortunately there just aren’t that many grass events). Here’s where this gets weird: you could get Djokovic and Federer and Nadal all on one side of the draw this year. (Or Murray-Federer-Nadal.) So you could have two of those guys meet each other in the quarterfinals and then play the third in the semifinals- and get the highest remaining seed in the final.
It’s not the worst, but it’s been years. And it depends on how you count it.
I meant to say something about this earlier, but if anyone has Tennis Channel, you should check out their Decade’s Best series. The channel is 10 years old and they’re airing their choices for the 10 best matches over that time, one match every Wednesday night. I missed the first two entries but I’ve seen the last three and they’ve been excellent: #8 was Agassi-Blake from the 2005 U.S. Open (Agassi lost the first two sets and won the match in a fifth-set tiebreak - I forgot how great that match was), #7 was Soderling over Nadal at the French Open in 2009, and #6 was Serena coming back to beat Sharapova in the 2005 Australian Open semifinals, 8-6 in the third. #5 airs Wednesday night. They’ve already revealed their choice but I can’t remember it right now.
#1 match of all time will be Nadal-Federer’s classic Wimbledon final, the last one without a roof.
Definitely. It’d be nice if they show that one in its entirety- unfortunately the matches are edited down to fit into a two-hour timeslot.
I still think the #1 match was Borg v McEnroe’s 1980 Wimbledon 5-setter. I was a young lass then (14) and was riveted to my t.v. set.
But the Nadal v Federer was definitely a classic.
I’m imagining Isner-Mahut fitted into those constraints. Perhaps if they sped up the film…
I was hoping to see Federer-Sampras until I realized that was in 2001. This is just the best 10 matches since 2003.
…and played Yakety Sax, which would make it appointment TV.