Thursday, January 29, 2009

Autralian Open Quarter-finals

Fernando Verdasco, has upset another top-seeded player. Jo Wilfried Tsonga, the #5 seed and the runner up at last years Australian Open became Verdasco's, latest victim, falling in an intense four set match.

Verdasco's, performance at the Open, has been nothing shy of incredible. Although he's probably tired from the grueling match with Murray, Verdasco, does stand a good chance of making the finals, despite having an 0-6 head to head vs Nadal. I think it's going to take everything Rafa's, got to put an end to Verdaso's amazing run.

Roger Federer, more than made up for his sub-par fourth round match by demolishing Del-Potro in... get this 6-3, 6-0, 6-0. I'm not surprised that Federer beat Del Potro but a double bagel?! It really doesn't say much for the sixth best player in the world. Still, I'm glad that Federer is taking the Open seriously. With a blow-out like this I would have to favor Federer to make the finals.

Andy Roddick, has made it to another major semi-final, his opponent, Novak Djokovic, apparently knew that Roddick wanted to make the semi-finals and was willing to retire from the match in the fourth set, so that Roddick could move on to face Federer in a match that he will most likely lose. Seriously, why does Djokovic retire from so many of his matches? Is it because he doesn't want to lose and feels that he's getting out of it this way? I don't know but I don't buy all of his injuries.

Maybe it's just me but I thought there were some especially good matches at the Australian Open this year.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Australian Open week 1






It looks like Nadal is bringing his A-game to the Australian Open. I wasn't quite sure how the time off after Paris last year would effect him. Nadal, seems to be incredibly focused at the Australian Open and he's adjusted well to the change in the court's surface. He's kept his points shorter and has actually been coming to net more often than usual. Nadal has also changed his look for the Australian Open. Instead of the sleeveless look with the long shorts, he's changed to a crew shirt with shorts that are maybe a little shorter.:/

Like Nadal, Gilles Simon also came to play at the Open. Simon, has had strong performances in most of his matches, taking down opponents like Guccione, Ancic, and Monfils. Simon, has really become a different player since his breakthrough during the summer hard court season last year, he's now a serious force to be reckoned with. I don't like has chances against Nadal in the quarters but a quarter-final finish is still enough to keep him in the top 10.

Roger Federer, seems to be continuing his 2008 performance, he looked shaky against Berdych and was lucky that Berdych self-destructed halfway through their five set match. I'm not sure how Federer is going to do from this point forward but he's got some tough opponents still left in the tournament. Can he make it past Del Potro, Roddick or Novak and Nadal to win his 14th grand slam title? I don't know but if Roger does win he will equal Pete Sampras's record of 14 grand slams won during his career. I would like to see this happen because it could be many years before a player like Roger comes around again.

Another player I'd like to talk about is Verdasco. I was surprised to see him defeat Andy Murray. I saw the last two sets of their match, Murray looked burned out and unhappy. Verdasco was by far the fresher of the two, despite being down two sets to one. Verdasco, got an early break in the fourth set which helped level the match out. The fifth set was very close, there was one game where Verdasco was trying his best to hold serve but every time he got the advantage Murray would come up with a great shot and force the game back to deuce. It was a very intense, exciting match.

Bernard Tomic, made his grand slam debut and managed to make the second round before losing to Gilles Muller. At 16, Tomic is in the same position that Donald Young was a couple of years ago. The new guy on the tour and a player with tremendous potential. I'm hoping that Tomic will have an easier time making the adjustment to the pros than Young had.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Demoing racquets

Hey Everyone,

Hope you had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Over the Christmas holiday I demoed some racquets, I'm about a 4.5 (I say about because it's hard to practice in the snow);) and I was looking for a racquet that would help take my game to the next level. I decided to demo the Head Microgel Radical Pro, the Babolat AeroPro Drive Cortex, and the Wilson K-Factor KSix-One Tour 90.












If you are a Federer fan, you might recognize his racquet in the ones that I demoed. As a Federer fan myself, I was very curious to see what the racquet was like so I decided to demo it, merely out of curiosity and I'm very pleased that I did. Fed's racquet was unbelievable at the net, it was very light weight and when I swung it, it felt more like a wand than a racquet. I was able to get a nice pop on the ball and it really enhanced my slice. It was also a great racquet for flat hitting. All in all, it's a great racquet, although it's not for everyone. The Wilson K-Factor KSix-One Tour 90 is best suited for advanced players who really know what they're doing. I also wouldn't recommend it if your playing style is topspin oriented (like mine is.) This racquet requires practice and flat strokes, preferably some net skills as well.

After playing with the Wilson I decided to try out the Babolat. The first thing that I noticed about the Babolat AeroPro was how light it felt. The head size was fairly large for a mid plus and it had a more flexible feel than the Wilson. The Babolat racquet was more like what I'm used to and that's probably why I enjoyed it so much. It's probably the best racquet that I've ever hit with for generating topspin. It was nice at the net although not exceptional. The power level was good and I didn't have any trouble with short returns. This is a good racquet and is worth a try, although like the Wilson, your ability to use the racquet will depend on your game.

The third and final racquet was the Head Microgel Pro. Since I started tennis, I have played with Head almost exclusively but this racquet was nothing like the other head racquets that I own. In fact the Babolat AeroPro felt more familiar than this one did. Unlike the other two racquets the Microgel felt heavy and the round frame took some time to adjust to. However, this was by far the best of the racquets from the baseline. I was able to hit deep penetrating flat shots as well as awesome topspin returns. The racquet blended the control and power perfectly together and added a nice bite to my slice. It's going to take some work but I decided that this is the racquet for me. In my opinion it was the most versatile of the three racquets, it was good from all over the court and wasn't limited to topspin or flat shots (which is perfect for me because I have a flat backhand and a topspin forehand.) This was by far the racquet that I enjoyed the most.