US open prediction game - day 11

Sorry it's late, needed a drink after court... 

Joker available!

Serena (5) vs Pliskova (50)
Wozniacki (33) vs Kerber (8)
Garcia/Mladenovic (1) vs Hingis/vandeweghe (6)
Herbert/Mahut (2) vs Murray/Soares (8)
MattekSands/Safarova (12) vs Makarova/Vesnina (5)
Lopez x 2 (8) vs Carreno Busta/Garcia Lopez (16)

Pliskova, Kerber, Garcia, Mahut, Mattek sands (joker), Lopez

Pliskova joker, kerber, garcia/Mlad, Herbert/Mahut, samds/safarova, lopez2

I just checked and men's semis are tomorrow.

Why did I think they were on super saturday and the final on Monday....

bulge: serena, Woz (joker), hingis, murray, makarova, lopez
Hugh Jass: serena, kerber (joker), hingis, herb, mattek, lopez

Wawrinka
Djok

Now time to check the results.

tough loss for serena as she loses the no1 ranking..
she definitely seems to be losing the grip of dominance she has on the game
players dont seem to fear her as much and shes getting really tight under pressure..i cant see that changing as many former pros say that as you age the more nervous you become in big moments 
the fact that shes struggling to break the grand slam record just proves how hard it is to break records i.e it could hypotjetically take another 4 grand slam finals just to win 1 more..

Couldn't happen to a more deserving person. She's awful. And she also blamed injury - like Nadal always does.  She was just about to beat Stefi's consecutive record for no.1 too.  Boo hoo for her.

Veejay wrote:tough loss for serena as she loses the no1 ranking..
she definitely seems to be losing the grip of dominance she has on the game
players dont seem to fear her as much and shes getting really tight under pressure..i cant see that changing as many former pros say that as you age the more nervous you become in big moments 
the fact that shes struggling to break the grand slam record just proves how hard it is to break records i.e it could hypotjetically take another 4 grand slam finals just to win 1 more..

I had never seen Pliskova play before but when I saw that lean tall player I knew the stocky one was going to be in trouble. Tall players can generate easy power and lean ones can move better.

My chosing Pliskova and putting joker on her was a piece of luck as I had never seen her play.

Oh god, nice to see Serena lose and Pliskova, while ugly as a barn door, still young and good to see her wining.

Good to see Kerber No1 on the Rankings now, 1000 points ahead of Serena.

Tenez wrote:

Veejay wrote:tough loss for serena as she loses the no1 ranking..
she definitely seems to be losing the grip of dominance she has on the game
players dont seem to fear her as much and shes getting really tight under pressure..i cant see that changing as many former pros say that as you age the more nervous you become in big moments 
the fact that shes struggling to break the grand slam record just proves how hard it is to break records i.e it could hypotjetically take another 4 grand slam finals just to win 1 more..

I had never seen Pliskova play before but when I saw that lean tall player I knew the stocky one was going to be in trouble. Tall players can generate easy power and lean ones can move better.

My chosing Pliskova and putting joker on her was a piece of luck as I had never seen her play.

shes a very good player,but i dont see her as the next big thing in tennis,she just got hot in this tournament 
i would be surprised if shes able to reproduce the level shes playing at,at the next AO
 i also think that the occasion of being in the final will get to her so i expect kerber to beat her

Jahu wrote:Oh god, nice to see Serena lose and Pliskova, while ugly as a barn door, still young and good to see her wining.

Good to see Kerber No1 on the Rankings now, 1000 points ahead of Serena.

That was totally uncalled for. 

Veejay wrote:tough loss for serena as she loses the no1 ranking..
she definitely seems to be losing the grip of dominance she has on the game
players dont seem to fear her as much and shes getting really tight under pressure..i cant see that changing as many former pros say that as you age the more nervous you become in big moments 
the fact that shes struggling to break the grand slam record just proves how hard it is to break records i.e it could hypotjetically take another 4 grand slam finals just to win 1 more..

This is always the case.. ...Fed earlier could only lose to Nadal in slams.. then came some more.. Djokovic.. then some more Tsonga, Berdych..Cilic, Raonic.. even someone like Seppi.. Stakh

Nadal these days can lose to lot of players... he is around but not a major slam contender.. just like Fed 

Djokovic is up there right now... but he too will have to face it..

raiders_of_the_lost_ark wrote:

Veejay wrote:tough loss for serena as she loses the no1 ranking..
she definitely seems to be losing the grip of dominance she has on the game
players dont seem to fear her as much and shes getting really tight under pressure..i cant see that changing as many former pros say that as you age the more nervous you become in big moments 
the fact that shes struggling to break the grand slam record just proves how hard it is to break records i.e it could hypotjetically take another 4 grand slam finals just to win 1 more..

This is always the case.. ...Fed earlier could only lose to Nadal in slams.. then came some more.. Djokovic.. then some more Tsonga, Berdych..Cilic, Raonic.. even someone like Seppi.. Stakh

Nadal these days can lose to lot of players... he is around but not a major slam contender.. just like Fed 

Djokovic is up there right now... but he too will have to face it..

true,time catches up with all of them
williams and federer had an air of invincibility i have never seen among pro tennis players before though...they both went through periods where they were pretty much the favourite every time they stepped on court
i have never seen players fear other players the way they feared them 
when was the last time serena wasnt the favourite for the title? 
that unfortunately for her looks like it wont be the case anymore,which could work out in her favour as she will be playing with much less pressure and expectation...but i guess only time will tell
i dont think that serena would have lost all these recent close matches if her slam count was around 15 majors,its the fact that shes chasing history combined with the widow of opportunity that adds immence pressure 
federer faced the same problems once his hit 12 majors,it started becoming a lot harder for him to win majors

One only has the air of invincibility when one is invincible.  Its as simple as that. Fed lost it cause Nadal got him and Nadal lost his cause Djoko got the better of him. 

Fed kept his air of invincibility long after Nadal had the better of him cause Nadal was only troubling him on clay. 

Then he had that bug in 2008 and that is when he started to lose to people he would not lose to. But thats roughly after 4 years of "invincibility ".