Gasquet Crumbles Giving Murray First Slam Quarterfinal Spot; Federer, Nadal Dominate

Not only that, but why the hell does NBC show a Serena Williams match that had been over for a few overs when there are live mens matches? Wtf is that bs?

I’m glad Murray won. I like both players but Gasquet is a little b*tch and I love Murray’s body language this year. I really hope he beats Nadal or atleast pushes him to the brink. He’s got the game to do it.

Schuettler and Clement… wtf?

Safin has a bad record against Lopez but he had a bad one against Wawrinka, too. I think it’s safe to say he’s on a pretty good roll and if he beats Lopez then he’s on a great roll. If he beats Federer in the semis then I think the whole world, not just the tennis world, but the world will be in shock and speechless after Safin pounds whoever he faces in the finals to win Wimbledon, of all touraments.

Federer vs Ancic? Once Federer gains even a slight lead it seems like he spreads his giant wings and just soars through his matches. I mean seriously, the debate about his vulnerability should be ended. He hasn’t dropped a set and faced a few set points, so the heart’s there. And he’s been broken… once? Cmon.

June 30th, 2008 at 7:46 pm

“I just wish there was a way to lose NBC or keep everything on one channel.”

I totally agree. I am on the west coast so the NBC coverage happened at the same time as part 2 of ESPN2.

So they blocked ESPN2!

Too bad I won’t see any of the more interesting matches now.

June 30th, 2008 at 8:54 pm

I mean seriously, the debate about his vulnerability should be ended. He hasn’t dropped a set and faced a few set points, so the heart’s there. And he’s been broken… once? Cmon.

the ‘debate’ was really just murmurings after the AO semi loss this year. it reached a crescendo via an opportunistic, #1 wanne-be who fanned that “V” flame to anyone who would listen pre-Wimbledon.

but let’s face the facts. we don’t even have to watch the final to start blogging back and forth. we already know what the media is going to report, assuming fed makes it to final.

if roger wins, they will all bow down as RF accomplishes what no one has ever done in tennis. if he loses, despite being in the semis of GS for 17th consecutive times etc etc ‘his career is over’, ‘the slump continues’ blah blah blah.

i’d love the media to actually find their own true voice and not be blind mice when it comes to finding stories. they remind me of the stock market and the phenomenon that ‘investor psychology’ plays in the ups and downs of stock prices. just riding someone else’s waves without holding ground or believing in their own thoughts/opinions.

June 30th, 2008 at 9:00 pm

sensationalsafin,

Not that it makes any difference as far as the point you make is concerned, but for the sake of accuracy I’ll correct you and say that Federer has been broken twice in this tournament. Well, it might be more accurate to say that he was broken once and dropped his serve once…

June 30th, 2008 at 9:29 pm

Very impressive Federer performance…. I still feel that if him and Nadal get to the final Nadal will beat him in 3 or 4 sets….

June 30th, 2008 at 10:28 pm

NBC did a fine job covering the William Sisters double’s match during the Safin-Warinka and Murray-Gasquet matches. I also enjoyed the re-runs of the sisters wins earlier in the day during the other live matches. I guess covering American’s ranks ahead of good tennis.

June 30th, 2008 at 10:36 pm

Aren’t mulligans kind of moot in the case of victory?

July 1st, 2008 at 12:20 am

The fight of some of these other guys is what is making this tournament so exciting, even if it does end up being the predictable final.

Mario fighting into the quarters, and Safin! Thanks Marat for knocking out Stan and getting to the Quarters; go at least one more now would you?

And Murray – no matter that Gasquet choked serving for it in the third, Murray never gave up. In Bollettieri’s words:

“You could see that in his pumped-up face the whole way through. He was within a couple of points of being sent on his way on his own British territory but you wanna know what I think he was thinking? “This is horseshit!

“I will not lose this match. This is mine. So screw you, non-believers, watch me pull this one from the fire.”

And that’s what he did. With intelligence. With physical superiority imposed more and more as the match wore on.”

Murray has looked good since his first match with Santoro; he needs a better second serve and needs to take care of his first serve because that’s what got him in the hole against Richard. But he believes he’s in with a shot against Rafa – I’d say it’s a slim one, but either way, this is a nice result for him and it’s great to see all these guys so fired up – and so hungry to win.

July 1st, 2008 at 12:47 am

Sorry, that’s why I had the question mark. But still. He’s lost his serve twice. Should he play Nadal in the final I doubt he’s going to lose serve more than he lost it last year. 3 or 4 sets Nadal? I just don’t see it. At the French, Federer stupidly tried to hit through Nadal, which is just impossible on clay and on that court. Here, Centre Court Wimbledon, it’ll work. Not only will that work, but Federer’s whole game is on another level on this surface and that’s a level Nadal can’t reach. I agree with what Dan Martin said. People keep saying Nadal should’ve won. I don’t even see the need to overanalyze it. If the score was 7-5, 8-6, 9-7, etc with Nadal holding match points and whatnot, then maybe he should’ve won. But 6-2? There was one article I read last year that said the match wasn’t epic because the fifth set was so routine Federer. Nadal shouldn’t have won. And he won’t win.

July 1st, 2008 at 1:58 am

sensationalsafin :

“Should he play Nadal in the final I doubt he’s going to lose serve more than he lost it last year. ”
How on earth do you figure that? If Nadal reaches the final this time, he would have done so being more dominant and having run through a harder draw. His game is vastly better on all fronts: serve, slice and net play and he won Queen’s(Something Youhzny talked about in his interview) so I honestly dont see how you think Nadal’s not going to do better this year. He might not of course, but it seems you are relaying a general hope than a real reason.

Regarding last year’s final BTW, Federer didnt start playing better in the final set, Rafa just wilted away. His movement was a notch lower and he was missing shots he shouldn’t have. This could easily have been an excuse by a fanboy (I am not one) but when does Nadal lose out mentally or physically to anyone in the fifth set?

I am not saying Rafa will win this time around (Heck, he hasn’t made the finals for one ), but if he does make the final, the portends are that he would actually do better than last year. Its hardly a given because Fed is after all the GOAT and he might raise his own game to beat what I believe is a much improved player on grass (than last year). I just dont see why the contrary is obvious to you, thats all.
You see, wishful thing is a wonderful thing, I’m sure, but this Is after all a discussion group.

July 1st, 2008 at 2:35 am

Ok that should be wishful “thinking” but more importantly, apologies for the last line. Its unwarranted and rude. Just my natural nastiness surfacing. So sorry again.

July 1st, 2008 at 2:43 am

sensationalsafin,

No need to apologize on my account. Man, if we are treated/subjected to another Federer v Nadal final, I really can’t call it either way. I give Federer the playing edge on grass, but I give Nadal the mental edge over Federer even though Federer’s got unreal and well-deserved confidence on grass. Actually, I give Federer the mental edge, too, up until he inevitably runs into frustrations with Nadal’s uncanny play. At that point, I still feel that the match would be on Federer’s racquet, but he sure does seem to hit mental blocks against Nadal. Regarding the French Open: Yeah… Personally I wasn’t bothered by the scoreline (bleak, though, it certainly was) so much as the fact that Federer did not play the same brand of tennis that he had in their prior two meetings on clay. I imagine, though, that if he should find himself facing Nadal on Sunday and feels rattled at some point, he won’t forget how to play on grass like he seemed to forget how to play on clay.

jane,

I’m with you on all counts regarding Murray.

July 1st, 2008 at 2:45 am

Kroll,

You are funny. But yeah, I agree as far as your reasoning for expecting Nadal to do better this year than last. And I agree that doesn’t mean he will. As much as I feel like Federer is psychologically vulnerable to Nadal – to mention the ways his technique is vulnerable to Nadal’s would be redundant at this point – I also feel like there’s a possibility that Federer will be fiery like never before since he feels he’s got something to prove to himself. I can just as easily imagine Federer routing Nadal as I can Nadal denying Federer a 6th straight Wimbledon.

July 1st, 2008 at 2:54 am

Murray has got a good chance of pulling off a win/upset against Nadal. He is now riding on his high of just having defeated Gasquet in 5 sets, and he did so coming from 2 sets down and feeding off the wimby home court advantage. Further, Murray defeated some quality players on his way to the QFs – Santoro, Malisse, Haas and Gasquet. He has lost three sets thus far and his first serve percentage is in the lower sixties. Additionally, he is averaging 12 aces per match, and has a much better defense than any of the players Nadal has faced, which is going to make it difficult for Nadal to win cheap points and/or obtain breaks as easily as he has been achieving them. I’d say all things considered, Murray is on a somewhat equal footing as Nadal and has a good chance of winning.

Nadal on the other hand is hungry for this Wimby title. His determination to win has grown to feverish proportions, and I’m sure that it’s been a burning desire at the back of his mind ever since his loss to Federer last year in the finals. Even though he’s not saying, it would be realistic to assume that he’d like to equal Borg’s FO/Wimby GS title combination. However, all of the foregoing is dependent upon his leg being 100 percent fit when he faces Murray. Only time will tell …

July 1st, 2008 at 3:52 am

Didn’t get to watch the Gasquet-Murray match because of the horrible coverage. Other blogs seem pretty consistent in their criticism of Murray trying to use the crowd against Gasquet. Was the crowd unfair towards Gasquet? Anybody know?

From what little I saw, the only thing Murray had going for him was footspeed. I think Gasquet was definitely the better player overall.

July 1st, 2008 at 5:02 am

Glenn,

I wouldn’t say the crowd was unfair to Gasquet. It was just extremely supportive of Murray. If there was anything negative about it, I must’ve missed it.

Also, I’d say that at least after the turning point of the match, Murray had a lot more going for him than just foot-speed. His serve improved and he constructed points quite well and at times exceptionally. Oh, and his attitude and show of heart far overshadowed his foot-speed, too.

July 1st, 2008 at 5:21 am

“Glenn Says:
Didn’t get to watch the Gasquet-Murray match because of the horrible coverage. Other blogs seem pretty consistent in their criticism of Murray trying to use the crowd against Gasquet. Was the crowd unfair towards Gasquet? Anybody know?…”

My answer: the crowd was unbelievably partisan.

Yesterday, I was up till morning two am, watching the match. And the way, Murray was provoking the partisan crowd seemed to me as a nuetral observer, highly unsportsman-like,to say the least,and calls for condemnation. The crowd behaviour was so atrocious that, in disgust, in middle of the match, I put the TV on mute and then watched the remaining match.

July 1st, 2008 at 9:40 am

Dan, Nadal has to win one of the Hard Court Slams before he can really be regarded as the dominant player in the world in my eyes. The tour is all about hard court events (i think its a 60/40 ratio Hard to Clay/Grass). Along these lines has the TMC ever been held on Clay?…it would seem like in the interest of fairness it should be every 3 years at least. Also interesting that there is no Grass court Masters Series event although I heard some rumours of Halle being converted to one.

July 1st, 2008 at 9:50 am

As far as uncouth crowds go the worst I have ever seen was at a US Open match where Marcos Baghdatis started cramping in the fifth set against an american player and was actually booed by the crowd as he fought through the pain…unbelievable.

July 1st, 2008 at 10:17 am

Dan,

Thanks for clarifying your point. I agree that playing the “coulda, shoulda, woulda” game is rather empty. But Von raises the one point in which Rafa’s chances last year may be a factor in terms of how he performs this year, and that is this – coming so close may’ve fueled his desire to win even further and increased his belief that he can do so. After all, he’s the only guy to ever get Fed to a 5th set at Wimbledon; he must’ve been inspired.

July 1st, 2008 at 11:39 am

I’d say that overall the French Open crowd are much ruder.

The Wimbledon crowd are generally polite, but they were whipped into a frenzy of support for Murray, after he came back yesterday. Generally they were just very enthusiastic for Murray, although at one point I think there was applause for a Gasquet double fault. This happens often at many tournaments.

Gasquet was the better player for the first 2 and 3/4 sets but he couldn’t close it out; Murray broke back, held and played some amazing shots from there on out. But he also served exceptional well from that point on.

It was a great match all-in-all, but the mentally stronger player won. As Ra mentioned – Murray put his heart into and stayed extremely fired up until the last point, and that made the difference in the end.

July 1st, 2008 at 11:47 am

Agree with you there Jane. Partisan crowds when home players are concerned are ubiquitous. The Murray-Gasquet crowd while not pleasant was hardly the worst ever. I remember Masters events where crowds are worse (the Madrid Masters for example).
But RG probably takes the cake since they dont need French players to turn on someone. The Graf-Hingis match in which they made it absolute hell for Hingis was insane. I mean Hingis was being a brat yes but that was going way overboard, considering she was just a kid playing a famous champion. The Serena-Justine match is another obvious example. Its a strange mob mentality at RG thats hard to pin down on some factor.

July 1st, 2008 at 12:09 pm

I agree that Nadal should have a lot of belief and hunger due to the past two years and especially last year’s showing. I also think Federer could be inspired a la Connors after one-sided losses to Borg in the 1976 and 1978 Wimbledon finals. Connors avenged those losses with 2 U.S. Open final victories including a 4 set victory over Borg on green clay. It is a complex thing. Safin, Murray, Ancic and others may yet say something about this rare triple happening (3 consecutive FO and Wimbledon title rounds decided by the same 2 guys).

July 1st, 2008 at 12:36 pm

Despite the great men’s matches that were going on, what did NBC choose to show? Serena over Mattek in straight sets, and then Nadal romping over Youzhny. And people wonder why tennis is losing popularity in the U.S…

July 1st, 2008 at 12:56 pm

Considering the many years that the British have witnessed a drought in both the men’s and women’s games, I’d say they should be excused for any display of partisan bias. It’s not every year they are treated to such big-heartedness or are able to become frenzied when one of their own is on the outskirts of a huge upset. Hence, We can place and/or categorize their frenzied behavior under the umbrella of “entitlement”.

Murray showed great heart and I’m sure if his display of big-heartedness was at a different GS, except the FO, he would have been able to spark frenzied crowd participation also. He was in the zone and deserved the encouragement he was given. His match with Gasquet was sort of a deja vu for Gasquet in his match v. Roddick at last year’s QFs wherein Roddick was up 2 sets and a break and let Gasquet back into the match.

I’m sure that Gasquet is not a newcomer to partisan loyalty. The French are known to turn on anyone, even their own, in a New York heartbeat, for any perceived gamesmanship or lack thereof. Let’s allow the British this one rare occasion to break out of thir genteel, well-harnessed emotions, throw caution to the wind and indulge in the urspation of the window of opportunity as was presented yesterday — to celebrate with wild abandon! It could very well be another 5 or more years for another of their own to be placed in the “a star is born” category.

Good job Muarray!

July 1st, 2008 at 12:59 pm

Von,

“His match with Gasquet was sort of a deja vu for Gasquet in his match v. Roddick at last year’s QFs wherein Roddick was up 2 sets and a break and let Gasquet back into the match.”

Exactly – I thought the same thing; it’s like Gasquet’s unraveling of Roddick had come back to haunt him or something.

I also thought of Roddick and Connors hyping up the crowds at the USO in days gone by – Connors on his final run there – to the semis, I think, and Roddick back in his visor wearing days, making some audacious shots, and gesturing to the crowd, maybe against Hewitt?

Anyhow, yes, big heart deserves big win yesterday! Are we hoping for a Safin vs. Murray final? Restore some unpredictability to the year? ;-)

July 1st, 2008 at 1:56 pm

jane:

Roddick was criticized considerably for gesturing towards the crowd on quite a few occasions in the past. I feel if it’s done tastefully, in a savoir-faire sort of way, crowd participation can be a huge boon for both players. They thrive from the electricity and/or excitement and the excitement can be dual-purposed, propelling both to new heights. I just wonder though, how much energy Murray has left after exerting so much in that match v. Gasquet. While, on one hand it was upflifting, on the other, it could be equally draining. Shakespeare’s words ring true here: “Can one desire too much of a good thing”? We’ll see tomorrow, won’t we?

I don’t know how many of you find today to be so very boring – devoid/bereft, lacking, whatever word you want to use, of activity, except for the women’s QFs and doubles, but no action whatsoever in the men’s singles. I don’t remember it ever being this boring in the middle of a GS, but this year Wimby went so true to schedule that they’re now fully caught up — there’s a kind of hush all over the world!

July 1st, 2008 at 2:14 pm

jane:

Footnote:

“Are we hoping for a Safin vs. Murray final? Restore some unpredictability to the year?”

I’m all for it. Anything that throws the pundits into chaoas and brings joy to a player whose alleged time has come and supposedly gone. Variety IS the spice of life. However, “To be, or not to be: that is the question”. :)

July 1st, 2008 at 2:19 pm

How about Zheng Jie? Although I can’t see her taking out Serena unless Serena has some kind of meltdown, that girl sure has done a wonderful job of tearing through seeds. Her ranking will undoubtedly be hugely rewarded on Monday. I’ve definitely felt like the top ranked women aren’t the strongest I’ve seen, but the weakest showing in the open era? Wow.

July 1st, 2008 at 3:06 pm

Roddick’s biggest transgressions are his outbursts which are directed squarely at the umpire. Take the example of his raging tirade during the Kohlschreiber match at AO 08. For 5 minutes he directed verbal abuse over some trivial issue. He was later shown to be totally wrong.

July 1st, 2008 at 3:35 pm

Gotta love ESPN in espanol, 8+ hours of uninterrupted live coverage of ALL major tennis tournaments.

I mean I’m not just talking about wimbledon, but these guys cover ALL masters series + some davis cup matches, I freaking LOVE IT!!

July 1st, 2008 at 4:22 pm

Borg defeated Connors in Wimbledon’77 in five sets and Wimbledon’78 in straight sets.

Connors defeated Borg in USOPEN’76 (on clay) in four sets and USOPEN’78 (hard) in straight sets.

July 1st, 2008 at 5:35 pm

For goodness sake I wish people would stop characterizing the British as “genteel”. Get hold of some British newspapers and see how the UK is sliding inexorably into “yob culture”. Look at the vitriolic displays of nastiness from posters on the sports forums of the BBC website. Ask continental Europeans what they think of British football fans.
Having been born here and lived here all my long life, I wish the country WAS a bit more flamin’ genteel!

July 2nd, 2008 at 12:46 pm

Colin:

“I wish the country WAS a bit more flamin’ genteel!”

I apologize for still referring to the British as “genteel”. I grew up in your country but left when I was 19 years old and am now considered an “American”. You can say I’m still stuck in the old days and ways of pomp and circumstance coupled with their ‘genteel’ behavior. I still think of the UK as my mother country with fond memories of a more gentler way of life. So sorry to hear about them sliding into the “yob culture.” Times change and people also along with the times. Keep the faith. :)

July 2nd, 2008 at 1:14 pm

i was sitting on the murray mound on monday! andy was whipping up the crowd at every opportunity but he was doing the same even when he was behind. in the first two and 3/4 sets, gasquet was playing sublime tennis and the crowd didn’t respond much although andy was trying hard to give them something to shout about.

richard should have known what could happen if he gave andy a sniff. when he came to serve for the match, he lost focus and his double fault on that break point was very disappointing.

July 2nd, 2008 at 1:36 pm

Stupid Murray gets rocked by Nadal. Damnit!

Woooooooooooooh!!! Safin is the man! If he beats Federer, he’s gonna crush Nadal in the final. If Federer wins, well, hard final to call. I mean, it’s grass, it’s Wimbledon. Federer’s gotta win.

July 2nd, 2008 at 7:26 pm