Federer Semifinal Favorite at Masters Cup; Sticky Surface Claims Another Victim

Posted on November 19, 2005

Federer Leads Semifinal Saturday at Masters Cup

After a definitive first set loss, Argentine Masters Cup substitute Gaston Gaudio took advantage of some tight play from Fernando "Gonzo" Gonzalez to fight off three match points and advance into the semifinals Friday with a 1-6, 7-5, 7-5 win.

"I was thinking the same that everybody here (was thinking)," Gaudio told the media after the match. "That I was done (smiling). I don't know how I came back, but finally I did it...It was fun for the
crowd. Not fun for me, but...anyway, I'm so happy about it."

After blowing three set points in the second set, Gonzo also doubles faulted in the third serving at 5-5 to set up the victory for the Argentine.

"I think the biggest error wasn't the -- it wasn't an error, because I played a bad game when I served for the match," said Gonzelez, who danced around the term "choke" in his post-match conference. "I only put one first serve in, and then I lost that game. I mean, that was very important for me. And in the following game, I mean, I had three match points. But you never know when the other guy is serving. I mean, it's a little bit of bad luck and a little bit that I didn't play good in that game."

In the second singles match Friday, Nikolay Davydenko, already a semifinalist, defeated Mariano Puerta 6-3, 6-2.

In the Saturday semifinals Roger Federer continues his campaign for a third straight Masters Cup title against Gaudio, leading the Argentine 4-0 in career matches, and Argentine David Nalbandian faces Davydenko.

In the doubles semifinals Wayne Black/Kevin Ullyett face Leander Paes/Nenad Zimonjic, and in a rematch of the 2003 Masters Cup doubles final, the Bryan brothers face Frenchmen Michael Llodra/Fabrice Santoro.

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TENNIS-X NEWS, NOTES, QUOTES AND BARBS
The sticky Masters Cup surface took another victim Friday when Stephen Huss tweaked his knee and was forced to retire in the doubles -- gotta love that surface choice Masters Cup/ATP! Here was Andre Agassi on the Shanghai surface: "It's a difficult surface. I think, you know, it's always good to have a court that represents -- a tournament that represents an entire year of success. The top eight should have a court that allows that sort of a compromise between all of them: if you want to play up, you want to play back, you want to play high, you want to play fast. I mean, this is what the court should be, you know. It's definitely a court that's going to favor some players over another. It's difficult also to move on. Some of these indoor courts are, you know, but this one especially. The surface in Paris, in Bercy, is the same. The surface in Basel is the same. It's very difficult on the body because your feet stick, you know, when you move."...See if you can read this Google translation of an article on Daniel Koellerer, who fellow Challenger-level players are getting together to try and ban from the circuit for his on-court swearing and antics, without getting a headache: "The aggressive behavior of the Austrian Daniel Koellerer provoked a reaction without precedents of players who are disputing the funny South American of challengers in this end of season. In the Wednesday, started to circulate it one below-signed that it asks for to the ATP the expulsion of the athlete of the professional circuit. "It makes the game dirtiest of the history of the tennis", said the gaucho with German citizenship Tomas Behrend, number 80 of ranking. Browse-quality to the tenisbr@sil, the player explained that the initiative left of it, of the Hugo Armando and trainer Giovani Ballaizin during the Challenger of Guayaquil, Equator, last week. In the stage of Aracaju of the Petrobras Pantry, that still is in dispute, Koellerer attracted twisted against later that it was behaved in inelegant way with catching of ball in the departure against the Thiago native of S㯠Paulo the Alves, to who already had provoked in Bogota. "In the first game, it it imitated a right of the Thiago to ironizar it", counted Behrend, on the Columbian competition. In accordance with the gaucho, the below-signed one is gaining adhesion quickly. "In the first day they had been 40 signatures. About 90% of the ones that had taken knowledge of the idea they had signed. E Seting is making the same in Mexico ", explained. "Since that it entered in the circuit, it has one two years, the Koellerer comes making nonsenses. It is our sport that it is ruining ". The situation is so critical that in funny South American one of the adversaries it arrived to attack the Austrian."...Richard Krajicek weighing in on the Roger Federer vs. Pete Sampras conundrum: "Probably Federer is better than Sampras, but you can't really compare. Federer has an all-round game while Sampras was a big serve and volleyer and had a great second serve. Sampras was also the number one for a long time. Federer has to go some distance yet. But both are physically and mentally very strong." Krajicek also says the ATP and Slams are to blame for killing the serve-and-volley game: "The balls are slower and even the grass at Wimbledon is no longer fast. Coming in on slow synthetic surfaces makes no sense. Eventually the efforts to control the speed of the game has seen it all getting skewed against the volleyer. The sad bit is that the best of contests were always between players of contrasting styles."