Indian Wells Tournament Wrap
Sunday saw the conclusion of the combined ATP, WTA tour events held in Indian Wells, California and the two tournaments could not have been more different. The usual suspects progressed through the men’s draw and deep into the second week, while on the women’s side it was a tournament of upsets as little known youngsters took down their more established rivals, announcing to the tennis world that it may not be too long before they themselves are part of the game’s elite.
Nadal Nabs Another Title
In a bit of an anti-climax Rafael Nadal destroyed Andy Murray in the final 6-1, 6-2 in blustery conditions to claim his second title here after his victory in 2007. The toughest opponent for Nadal on the day was the wind – and even that he handled with his usual gritty determination.
With a sandstorm brewing outside the stadium and gusts of up to 45mph measured, Nadal put in place a game plan that reigned in the aggressive shots targeted at the sidelines, and forced his opponent into making the mistakes.
“My strategy was to move all the time.” Nadal said “When there is a lot of wind, the important thing is you don’t have to find the shots close to the line. Put balls in play”
He executed to perfection and Murray was left to ponder the possibility that the Spaniard’s game is still improving.
“He moves around so well and he has improved his game by using more slice, coming to the net better, and his backhand is better. He’s doing everything better.”
A scary pro more »
Written by:They’ve done it again…..
I hate to harp on about it, but once again I’m here to give an update on the progress of the Great Britain team. After some puzzling, I managed to narrow down my impression of their performance to a single verb: struggling. The GB team limped its way through the play-off against Ukraine in the fashion of a group of people who do not quite know what’s going on. Not only did they lose, they lost with very little style. Where this source of confusion comes from is unknown.
Is it the coach? Does he in fact know what to do with a Davis Cup team to push them on? It appeared that John Lloyd knew exactly what he wanted at the very beginning, but with an X-Factor style selection process for Andy Murray and Ross Hutchins’ team mates, it seems a little unsure. There’s no doubt he’s a great tennis player and he is capable of making this team work on some level. But personally I can’t help wishing we could dispense with the nationality issue and just get John McEnroe instead…
Is it Andy Murray? Murray is the most experienced and talented of the players on the GB team. Is he really encouraging his less ex more »
Written by:Early Upsets At Indian Wells
The men’s and women’s events have both kicked off at Indian Wells in California, and while in the early rounds the men have performed as their rankings would suggest they should, two big name losses on the women’s side, combined with the absence of both Williams sisters have left this tournament wide open for the taking.
The Women
Coming into the tournament both Serena and Venus Williams had continued their boycott of the event, leaving a fairly even field with four women in particular rated as having the greatest chance. Two of those women – Elena Dementieva and Jelena Jankovic have been bundled out in the first round, leaving Dinara Safina as a slight favourite ahead of Vera Zvonareva.
While Jankovic has struggled to find form early in the year, the loss of Dementieva was much more surprising, having been one of the form players at some of the big events played earlier in the year. Her form has dipped slightly in the past month and she fought hard for the first two sets here but ran out of steam and lost the third 6-1 against Petra Cetkovska from the Czech Republic.
The Russian has had a very busy start to the year with back to back wins in the Southern Hemisphere followed by a narrow semi-final defeat at the Australian Open.
“I think I should not have come here” she said “because I did not have enough time to recover after playing so many matches at the beginning of the year. I needed a much longer break to get ready to play at my more »
Written by:Indian Wells Masters Gets Underway
The Indian Wells Masters is underway in sunny California, and it’s a tournament like this that just shows how times have changed. For starters, when this tournament took place last year Roger Federer was at the top of his game. Now he’s lost his No. 1 spot and has been out for a number of weeks with a back injury. He’s certainly impressive by anyone’s standards, but questions have been asked. You may have heard of a one ‘Rafael Nadal’ over this past year too; he has risen to take the World Number One spot from his sporting rival Federer in spectacular fashion, as well as winning a Grand Slam on a surface he has always found particularly tricky two months ago. And Andy Murray has shot to prominence as the new British Wonder, despite having a recent rocky patch with his health.
On the girls side, it puts a smile to fan’s faces to see Maria Sharapova back. She has been out for a significant amount of time with a shoulder injury, missing the first Grand slam of the year (the Australian Open).
But disappointingly, not much has changed from one Indian Wells tournament to the next for Ve more »
Written by:Davis Cup Upsets & Cleansweeps
The Davis Cup for 2009 is underway and has seen some great tennis action from all parts of the globe. The theme of the weekend seemed to be a mixture of destructive tennis and surprising upsets.
The Upsets
Czech Republic defeated France 3-2
French men’s tennis is currently bursting with talent – just getting on the team is an achievement at the moment. Along with Spain they have more players in the world’s top 25 than any other nation and were rated as one of the favourites to win the title this year
But over the weekend their top ranked player, Gilles Simon went 0-2 in his singles matches which left his team mates too much work to do. “You should never forget a weekend like the one I just had,” said Simon, struggling unsuccessfully to hold back tears after the loss. “You need to ask yourself the right questions, in order to be ready when facing a similar situation in the future.”
France will now be forced to re-qualify for the world group for the first time in almost a decade.
Israel defeated Sweden 3-2
In one of the least atmospheric Davis Cup ties imaginable, Sweden went down to massive underdogs Israel in front of just 300 invited guests, with anti-Israel more »
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