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Safin Rides Slow Mower to Upset Djokovic at Wimbledon
From the Open Era through Bjorn Borg and Pete Sampras and most of the 1990s, a grass court was a short-shorn lawn where the ball skidded and players who could get the net, and even volley semi-well (see: Borg), were rewarded. The critics then complained that grasscourt tennis with its short points was nothing more than a serving contest.
ADHEREL
That’s when the All England Club began experimenting with denser turf and heavier balls to slow play until…today, when Spanish claycourters win grasscourt titles from behind the baseline, and the lawns resemble claycourts with a few blades sprinkled on top. But not everyone is complaining.
At Wimbledon yesterday, down and formerly-out former No. 1 Marat Safin walloped world No. 3 Novak Djokovic 6-4, 7-6(3), 6-2on the modern-day grasscourts, where the balls didn’t skid but bounced up nice and high in his strike zone.
“Thanks for the people to make the courts slower,” Safin said. “I played well because I think the courts, they has been getting slower and slower throughout the years. So it’s not like they used to be like eight years ago. It was really fast, and now you can play from the baseline and nobody even getting close to the net. I just had to do what I had to do: Serve well and try to stay with him. And also he didn’t impress me with his game today. I could read his serve. I could return. I could stay with him from the baseline.”
Djokovic was coming off a runner-up effort at Queen’s, while Safin has never felt comfortable on grass, posting an 11-8 record since debuting at the All England Club in 1998, and belly-aching about the surface ever since.
“The strawberries are too expensive,” said Safin, reiterating some of his complaints over the years. “It’s true. They don’t have enough for dessert. It’s true. Only the coach is allowed to come in the locker room is also true. Because some physios, they cannot come inside the locker room.”
For the 21-year-old Djokovic, who has been commenting on world No. 1 Roger Federer’s vulnerability, it was a bitter blow.
“I was serving a lot of double faults, which is unusual,” Djokovic said. “I was just not finding my momentum. It was certainly a very bad day for me. I didn’t do anything that I was supposed to. He was very solid in all segments. I had opportunities, but I just made some unforced errors, which were really uncharacteristic, without any sense. Safin still has his ups and downs, and is known for his mental instability in some ways, but he’s still a great player. He wants to step it up again. (Today) he was mentally there.”
Djokovic added that idol-worship may have played a part.
“When I was a junior, I looked at him as one of the greatest players, one of the idols,” Djokovic said. “I admired the way he plays. I used to practice with him because we had then, and we still have, the same manager. I have a lot of respect for him. Maybe that played a role today in the match.”
Federer faced a tough test on Wednesday against fast-court specialist Robin Soderling, but tamed the Swede in straight sets, further silencing his critics.
Other Top 10 winners Wednesday were (5) David Ferrer (d. Igor Andreev in four), and (10) Marcos Baghdatis (d. Thomas Johansson).
Other seeded upset victims were (15) Fernando Gonzalez, losing in four to Italian Simone Bolelli, and (21) Juan Carlos Ferrero, retiring in the third with injury against Mischa Zverev.
Matches of note Thursday at the All England Club are Xavier “X-Man” Malisse vs. (12) Andy Murray, (6) Andy Roddick vs. Serb Janko Tipsarevic, “The Importance of Being” Ernests Gulbis vs. (2) Rafael Nadal, big-serving Brit Chris Eaton vs. (25) Dmitry Tursunov, (8) Richard “Baby Fed” Gasquet vs. Sebastien Grosjean in an all-French, Rainer Schuettler vs. (9) James Blake, (23) Tommy Robredo vs. Tommy Haas in an all-Tommy, Croat riser Marin Cilic vs. (24) Jarkko Nieminen, (19) Nicolas Almagro vs. Guillermo “G-Lo” Garcia-Lopez in an all-Spanish, and (14) Paul-Henri Mathieu vs. Jeremy “Cheesy” Chardy in an all-French.
Ivanovic Wins Marathon to Survive Wimbledon Scare
An erratic world No. 1 Ana Ivanovic survived an almost 3-1/2 hour tussle with Frenchwoman Nathalie Dechy on Wednesday at Wimbledon, defeating the veteran 6-7(2), 7-6(3), 10-8 on her fourth match point.
“It was an amazing match,” Ivanovic said. “In the second set I saved some match points and from that point on I just thought ‘It’s my second chance.'”
The Serb will next face China’s Zheng Jie, who knocked out Britain’s Elena Baltacha in straight sets.
Two seeds were not so lucky on Day 3 of The Championships, with Anabel Medina Garrigues outlasting (20) Francesca Schiavone 9-7 in the third, and Barbora Zahlavova Strycova defeating (28) Alona Bondarenko, who retired in the second set with injury.
Other Top 10-seeded winners were (4) Svetlana Kuznetsova (d. Kateryna Bondarenko), (6) Serena Williams (d. Urszula Radwanska), and (8) Anna Chakvetadze (d. Edina Gallovits).
Seeds strugling into the third round were (18) Nicole Vaidisova (d. Samantha Stosur after getting bageled in the second set), and (29) Amelie Mauresmo (d. Virginia Ruano Pascual after dropping the first set).
Highlights Thursday at Wimbledon are (7) Venus Williams vs. Brit Anne Keothavong, an all-Russian in Alla Kudryavtseva vs. (3) Maria Sharapova, and Gisela Dulko vs. (25) Lindsay Davenport.
TENNIS-X NEWS, NOTES, QUOTES AND BARBS
Novak Djokovic suffered his earliest exit at Wimbledon ever, and his earliest exit at any Slam since 2006 Australian Open…
Marat Safin hasn’t won a title since the 2005 Australian Open…
Roger Federer dropped his serve for the first time Wednesday after 74 straight holds on grass…
Rafa Nadal has won 18 straight matches and 28 of his last 29…
Dmitry Tursunov’s Thursday opponent, Brit Chris Eaton, is ranked 661…
Both Bondarenko sisters were sent home Wednesday…
Thanks to Juan Carlos Ferrero’s bad leg, the men’s Wimbledon tournament needs just three more retirements (11) to set a Grand Slam record for pull outs…
Novak Djokovic turned out to be the vulnerable one at Wimbledon, not Roger Federer…
In Novak Djokovic’s last five Slam losses the Serb’s won one set…
Serbs Djokovic and Bozoljac have combined to hit 34 doubles faults this tournament…
Ana Ivanovic saved two match points against Nathalie Dechy who extended her further than she’s ever gone in a final set (10-8)…
David Ferrer has won seven straight grass matches. Go freakin’ figure…
Eight of 10 sets played between Simone Bolelli and Fernando Gonzalez have gone to a tiebreak. That’s weird…
Andy Roddick’s 140mph serve is tied with Robin Soderling for the fastest of the tournament…
Fernando Verdasco has broken a tournament-high 16 times…
The 16-year-old Pavlyuchenkova is in her first Grand Slam third round…
Weather: Continued dry spell, with mild temperatures…
From Oliver Holt writing for The Mirror on the fat British women players: “Some people saw Naomi Cavaday’s performance against Venus Williams yesterday as a valiant effort against overwhelming odds. I didn’t. All I saw was a missed opportunity for a talented player who needs to get into shape. Pointing out that players like Cavaday and compatriot Melanie South are carrying more weight than most other players in the woman’s draw is not being sexist. It’s just another example of British tennis players lacking the commitment and the conviction to achieve their potential. I’m not criticising her appearance, just her ability to win tennis matches. If Cavaday was in proper shape, she might have pulled off the shock of the decade in wo men’s tennis. But she isn’t, so she didn’t.”…
The Independent on Roger Federer’s Wimbledon sweater: “This, it almost goes without saying, is a prime example of how not to wear knitwear,” Susannah Frankel wrote. “Federer resembled nothing more than an ageing Harry Potter, although one suspects that this was not the effect he was aiming for.”…
How uptight are the Brits? BBC commentator John McEnroe threw everyone into a frenzy by saying “bastard” on air: “It was an off-the-cuff comment during a light-hearted exchange,” said a BBC spokesman, following on-air apologies…
SI.com’s Jon Wertheim on those writing Roger Federer’s Wimbledon eulogy too soon: “I was part of an IHT forum (shameless plug) last week and we all pretty much agreed that Federer is the champ until he’s beaten. From where I sit, it’s other players, former players (What’s up, Bjorn Borg?), hysterical fans, [ESPN’s] Chris Fowler…those are the folks squirting the embalming fluid on The Fed.”…
The ATP and ITF websites came under attack according to The Register: “Two high-profile tennis websites are among scores of victims of a new wave of SQL injection attacks. The website of game regulators ITF and ATP, the professional players tour, were hit by automated attacks in the run-up to this week’s Wimbledon championship. The ITF (International Tennis Foundation) website has since been cleaned up but the ATP website remains dirty, according to Fraser Howard, a security researcher at Sophos who’s tracking the attacks. Howard explained that hackers used search engines and automated tools to hunt for vulnerable sites. The timing of the infection of the tennis websites is therefore just a coincidence.”…
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