A Writerly Serve & Volley
There are a couple of major story-lines as we reflect on Madrid, and order another beverage on our stop-over in Rome, en route to Paris with the anticipation and excitement for the potential drama of the 2019 French Open. Maybe this little hint at "a couple of major story-lines" is for the readership, for the …
Continue reading The Madrid Tea Leaves and Rome . . . and Roland Garros
Friday 3:00am PST Djokovic v Cilic Haven't really seen the Djoker play, but his draw has been weak. He missed-out on a Cecchinato or Schwartzman, even a Dimitrov though the later is pretty much on career laxatives. Still, Djoker got Fritz and Chardy, the equivalent of some Ritz Crackers and a bad French chardonnay. Cilic …
Obviously some interesting tennis today. Credit, of course, to Nadal for insisting that a tour wake the hell up and play some legitimate Masters 1000 tennis. The Shapovalov v Edmund that followed the Nadal v Thiem QF was quite entertaining. Following the Thiem upset of Rafa, even the casual observer sees that what we have …
I was 3/8 on today's R16. The silver lining? I picked Zverev and Nadal (ha ha), who should face-off in the final on Sunday. I suppose that's what's so disappointing about Del Potro losing (and even Djokovic to a lesser extent since he's been struggling): despite my irrefutable claim that the clay evens the playing …
The disaster is not my picks although I've missed everyone! Does this mean Nadal is in trouble? Lol. Clay is social justice tennis. Other than the insane inequality of Nadal, everyone else, no matter his or her ranking, serve, FH, etc., is on equal footing. This is the everyman surface, a sort of blue-collar version …
R16 play kicks-off in a few hours and Nadal has Schwartzman (the poor man's Rafa I suppose), who had one-of-the-best or the best ROS on tour last year, and figures to be as good a R16 match-up for Nadal as any (seriously, who would be the best match-up with Nadal on this surface at this …
Boy, you can't sell short that old clay. As the rain has begun to fall in Madrid, some names have fallen, interrupting match-ups Mcshow had on the cue like the rain has interrupted today's play. The irony of course is that venue's state-of-the-art court construction complete with retractable roofs. Chung out to Haase 2 and …
Stefanos v Sascha tomorrow could be quite an occasion, seemingly cousins though I am still a bit smitten with the 19 year-old's ability to come to net. That bottom bracket seems loaded (for tourney runners-up), but clay generally has that evened-playing-field feel. Fognini, Ramos-Vinolas and anyone else, practically, who gets the good wind (even Isner …
Madrid 2017 The SF and F matches went pretty much according to form. Though Cuevas played well, knocking-off Zverev in the QF (playing well of late, generally), we figured the future of clay would advance. Though a lot of people are critical of Thiem's scheduling, he's been learning how to win for a few years …
Above was literally the title a few days ago where I just wanted to comment on those two matches and a few other things, but never quite got there: but that's where I was going - to analyze some of this dirty tennis happening in Spain. Madrid. I had this video all lined-up, thought it …
