Nadal is playing good tennis, but he’s beatable at Wimbledon. We’re not certain about the condition of his injured foot, though he showed no signs of trouble on Wednesday. But you just have to figure that, eventually, one of these Brits (Tim Henman, and now Murray) will break through and win the tournament, and if Murray plays well, he could beat Nadal on grass. Working to Murray’s advantage is that he did just face a excellent lefty serve against Lopez in the quarters, and while Lopez and countryman Nadal are totally different players, conquering the opponent’s serve is a big step toward winning a match on grass.
The big news of the day is Roger Federer’s loss to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, which is surprising, though not the most stunning event ever to happen on a tennis court. He hasn’t won any of the last six majors, and three times during that span, he’s been ousted in the quarters. I thought either he or Djokovic would win the tournament, but Tsonga is a talented guy whose game is suited to grass. What makes Thursday’s result most surprising is that Tsonga overcame a two-sets-to-love-down deficit against one of the greatest closers in tennis history. And no one who watched the fifth set could have any doubt that Tsonga was playing better tennis than Federer. It was no fluke.
I’d love to see a Nadal-Murray final, but since that’s not possible, the best-case scenario for me is Tsonga-Murray. It would be great to have some new blood contesting a major championship. For so many years it’s been Nadal and Federer, with Djokovic occasionally getting into the conversation. A change would be nice.
On the women’s side, I see Azarenka and Lisicki coming through in Thursday’s semis, though I admit the Lisicki pick involves some wishful thinking.
No comments:
Post a Comment