Tennis Roundup: The more things change…

April 30, 2008 by Jeremy Howard

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Last week in Monte Carlo, two things were proved to be fact -

Roger Federer, the greatest player of all time, is back in form;
Rafael Nadal is still far and away the most dominant clay court player in today’s game.

In my personal blog a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that I thought Nadal was due for a bit of a below par clay court season in 2008. He has just seemed a step slower this year (in his defence, he does put his body through the ringer year in-year out), and I thought that this would translate into less dominance on clay, and you know what, he may well indeed be a step slower.

Here’s what I failed to realise though - Nadal, even at step slower, is still better than anyone else in the world on clay. Nadal manhandled the two top Spanish players in the world (Ferrero and Ferrer), and demolished Davydenko - but his performance against the top-ranked Federer still proved to be his best.

Not only did he come back from a break down late in the first set to win it 7-5, he stormed back down 4-0 in the second set to take that 7-5 as well. Now, any tennis fan knows that Federer more or less needs a miracle to beat Nadal on clay, and if you watched that match live you know that Federer made FAR too many unforced errors, but you still need to credit Nadal for willing himself to victory.

With regards to Federer, even though he did not win, and he did not even have a legit win over Djokavic in the Semi Finals (although he had won the first set before Djokovic retired with a sore throat - which is an entirely different story in its own right), making the finals of a clay-court event proved to me, and the rest of the tennis world, that he is back near the top of his game. I think it is a bit too early to judge how he was able to regain his form, but for a player of his calibre, confidence is of the utmost importance. The fact is, after his shaky start to the season due to mono, his confidence faltered; now he seems to have regained that confidence. His new coach, clay court legend Jose Higueras, no doubt played a part. Whether or not this spike in confidence will lead Federer to any clay-court titles this season, and moreover a Roland Garros victory (the one slam that has eluded him), remains to be seen.

In other tennis news, the Fed Cup Final is set. After Russia and Spain dominated their opponents, USA and China respectively, the two will compete for the 2008 Championship September 13th and 14th, in a location yet to be determined in Spain. Even though China seemed to have a slightly stronger squad, Spain handed them a 4-1 defeat, in China no less. In Russia, the USA took a young starless squad to Moscow, home of the defending champions. While they competed hard, they lost the tie 3-2 - and it wasn’t really as close as the score sounds.

Share and Enjoy: