Roland Garros 2014: MOTD Day 9 Mon 01/06/2014

truffin1 wrote:Edberg:

"The French Open isn't so much a priority for Roger, but if he remains fit and a little help with draw, his best tennis is coming and he can win Wimbledon and US Open"

I both think and hope so!

Verdasco doing a imitation of Tony Montana?!?
 


edit; if you dont know the guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IlMVZm1C0g

Order of play out for tomorrow:

truffin1 wrote:Edberg:

"The French Open isn't so much a priority for Roger, but if he remains fit and a little help with draw, his best tennis is coming and he can win Wimbledon and US Open"

yeah, that's what you expect a coach to say..

truffin1 wrote:Edberg:

"The French Open isn't so much a priority for Roger, but if he remains fit and a little help with draw, his best tennis is coming and he can win Wimbledon and US Open"

That's a statement. This is the result of having slugged it out versus nadal for years!!!! Real shame....but I understand....

wow, no love lost between these two. Verdy quite rude at times.
Curious how the handshake will be

gallery play wrote:wow, no love lost between these two. Verdy quite rude at times.
Curious how the handshake will be

Verdasco was pretty rude when playing in Nice final v Gasquet a couple of years ago, remember?

Here it is strange cause Murray gave that point which Garcia contested. But the tension if piling up for sure.

Tenez wrote:

gallery play wrote:wow, no love lost between these two. Verdy quite rude at times.
Curious how the handshake will be

Verdasco was pretty rude when playing in Nice final v Gasquet a couple of years ago, remember?

Here it is strange cause Murray gave that point which Garcia contested. But the tension if piling up for sure.

Don't remember that nice final. I suspect Verdy is only doing this for Nadal. He's not the guy who wants to fight back from 2 sets down. He's doing Nadal a favour by squeezing as much energy as he can out of Murray.

Murray is a fair player, i like him more and more.

Match beginning to look interesting.  Murray playing pretty lazy, Nole would have finished off this Verdasco long ago.

Verdasco is taking grunting to a throw-up level...

gallery play wrote:...Murray is a fair player, i like him more and more.

I still have a problem with his game and behaviour on court....but he has mellowed.

Murray moonballing at the right time....it clearly pissed Verdy off.

I guess Verdy did apologize there

Wow, the Scot threw his cap away to someone in the crowd!!!
He must be happy

I quite liked what I saw from Murray today. I have a bot more hope of him troubling Nadal now.

Tenez wrote:

gallery play wrote:...Murray is a fair player, i like him more and more.

I still have a problem with his game and behaviour on court....but he has mellowed.

Did  you notice he stopped smiling....must be a good sign!

Murray- Nole final, anyone?

noleisthebest wrote:Murray- Nole final, anyone?

Not going to happen.

It looks like we are going very much towards another Nadal/Djoko show down. I cannot see who is going to stop that.

However a couple of matches left shoudl be interesting:

Ferrer Nadal and Murray Nadal.

I don't think Djoko will have any problem with the players on his side the way he has been playing.

Tenez wrote:

noleisthebest wrote:Murray- Nole final, anyone?

Not going to happen.
It looks like we are going very much towards another Nadal/Djoko show down. I cannot see who is going to stop that.
However a couple of matches left shoudl be interesting:
Ferrer Nadal and Murray Nadal.
I don't think Djoko will have any problem with the players on his side the way he has been playing.

Yes those two matches offer promise. Ferrer should be fresh. Murray needs to get past Monfils which he should on sheer stubbornness. Amazing there are no hard hitters there, they are all on Nole's side. What a coincidence...

This RG has failed to produce any classics so far. Fed -Tursunov was good tennis at least.

The bottom draw was ok...the top one terrible....but both shoudl be ok from now.

The tournament feels B grade without Fed at least in the last 8, though....

I am getting used to it!

I'm refusing to!

gallery play wrote:

truffin1 wrote:Edberg:

"The French Open isn't so much a priority for Roger, but if he remains fit and a little help with draw, his best tennis is coming and he can win Wimbledon and US Open"

yeah, that's what you expect a coach to say..

not really- when have you ever heard anyone in the Federer camp, especially Fed say any tournament even a 250 level isn't a priority?    We know just from logic that they give more weight and intensity to the big ones, but Fed is always going on about how he treats them all the same- esp the Majors..    For a coach or someone in his camp to admit that he wasn't fully invested in a Major is pretty telling in terms of where he's at.. He know's he going to have to pick his battles at this point.

At least we will know that if he says it after a loss at Wimbledon...It was just an excuse!

truffin1 wrote:

gallery play wrote:

truffin1 wrote:Edberg:

"The French Open isn't so much a priority for Roger, but if he remains fit and a little help with draw, his best tennis is coming and he can win Wimbledon and US Open"

yeah, that's what you expect a coach to say..

not really- when have you ever heard anyone in the Federer camp, especially Fed say any tournament even a 250 level isn't a priority?    We know just from logic that they give more weight and intensity to the big ones, but Fed is always going on about how he treats them all the same- esp the Majors..    For a coach or someone in his camp to admit that he wasn't fully invested in a Major is pretty telling in terms of where he's at.. He know's he going to have to pick his battles at this point.

My eye was more on "he can win Wimbledon and US open". That's what any coach would say at this point, but i can hardly take it seriously

I think Fed was keen on RG, but the babies disrupted his preparation.
He may not have wanted to grind himself to dust, but I'm sure he saw himself at least in the SF, where he should've been based on everything he's shown this year. He would've even fancied his chances for the final.
I hope he gets enough matches on grass before Wimbledon, he needs them badly.
Good job there is an extra week  this year!

It seems like Fed doesn't use much drugs and products to recover from matches (legal or not doesn't matter here). I think he suffers a lot the following days and simply will refuse long matches on slow courts.

I think you are right, good on him!

Just for clarification: edberg said the quote in an interview after the 3rd round- so before the guilbus match- He also said in same interview he thought that fed would get past guilbus because "beating roger in a best of 5 match is still a huge task". So saying fed didn't view the French as a priority wasn't a loss excuse- in my view.. Just a glimpse into the inner thoughts of the camp.

truffin1 wrote:Just for clarification: edberg said the quote in an interview after the 3rd round- so before the guilbus match

Good to know that.  That is very important.  Saying it after the match is easy but if he said it before the match, I believe it much more - and it adds hope to my theory that he was just not trying all that hard.  This performance was far below what he showed this year he is still capable of.

noleisthebest wrote:Amazing there are no hard hitters there, they are all on Nole's side.

But I do not think they would be the biggest threats to Rafa anyway.  If I try to rank the remaining six players in order of how likely I think each of them would be to defeat Rafa if they met here (from most likely to least likely), I guess I see something like this:

1. Andy
2. Gulbis
3. Ferrer
4. Raonic
5. Monfils
6. Berdych

...it looks even clearer from their H2H vs Rafa.  The three guys on Rafa's side are combined 13-45 vs him (Andy 5-14, Ferrer 6-21, Monfils 2-10).  The three guys on Nole's side are a far worse 3-30 vs Rafa (Gulbis 0-7, Raonic 0-5, Berdych 3-18).  I think Rafa is stuck with the more difficult opponents.

Finally, the three guys on Nole's side are not exactly grinders - even if Nole has a tough match against one of them, it will not necessarily be a draining match.

All in all, I would say from now on, Nole's draw looks better than Rafa's (though not by a huge margin better).

From now on I agree it is probably a bit tougher for Rafa than Nole. But that was certainly not the case before. And fed's loss makes a bit of a difference. Nadal had absolute clowns to play against and arrives in the tough stages very fresh!

plus the H2H v Rao and Gulbis are not that relevant. They have gone up the ranking and in consistency quite a bit since they played nadal.

I'd still love to know how each would've fared if they swapped draws.

noleisthebest wrote:Did  you notice he stopped smiling....must be a good sign!

I watched the last few games of every set yesterday evening in "match of the day" and funnily enough they commented on his smiling, how he seems relaxed nowadays on court, not angry on himself so much anymore.

Match against Verdasco should have been a good work-out and preparation for a likely Murray-Nadal match - they're both lefties with dominant FHs after all.

Tenez wrote:It seems like Fed doesn't use much drugs and products to recover from matches (legal or not doesn't matter here). I think he suffers a lot the following days and simply will refuse long matches on slow courts.

It certainly seems so or if he does use whatever products they are not very helpful. Should look for a better doctor. I can only laugh when people talk about age concerning Fed and conveniently forget about guys like Ferrer who is the same age (!). And unlike Fed Ferrer is able to grind it out all day.

Fifth set record just became even worse, will be ranked just behind A. Agassi now.  Power of both guys went down yesterday after the first two sets, judging from the speed of serve. No data about the groundstrokes, but I suspect more of the same. Gulbis had more power from the beginning of course, with his average serve speed being close to Fed's top speed. 

Interesting comments from NITB yesterday about the enormous power you see nowadays from the big hitters, how even the guys who look to end the point rather quickly are extremely physical. I thought the same before when watching Wawrinka in Monte Carlo. Wawrinka is also of an exceptionally strong build, to not even mention guys like Berdych who thighs like tree stumps.

Autumnleaf wrote:

Tenez wrote:It seems like Fed doesn't use much drugs and products to recover from matches (legal or not doesn't matter here). I think he suffers a lot the following days and simply will refuse long matches on slow courts.

It certainly seems so or if he does use whatever products they are not very helpful. Should look for a better doctor. I can only laugh when people talk about age concerning Fed and conveniently forget about guys like Ferrer who is the same age (!). And unlike Fed Ferrer is able to grind it out all day.

Fifth set record just became even worse, will be ranked just behind A. Agassi now.  Power of both guys went down yesterday after the first two sets, judging from the speed of serve. No data about the groundstrokes, but I suspect more of the same. Gulbis had more power from the beginning of course, with his average serve speed being close to Fed's top speed. 

Interesting comments from NITB yesterday about the enormous power you see nowadays from the big hitters, how even the guys who look to end the point rather quickly are extremely physical. I thought the same before when watching Wawrinka in Monte Carlo. Wawrinka is also of an exceptionally strong build, to not even mention guys like Berdych who thighs like tree stumps.

I don't believe you can really judge anything by examples like that.  I worked with professional athletes for some 30 years-   there are so many factors that go into  "athletic" age-  just not number of years you've been alive.  Miles on the legs from however many more matches, physique, style, outside drags on your energy like sponsorship commitments, family-   just the mental toll from being at the top and all the pressure that creates.   Your always hunted, always looking over your shoulder, being pulled in a million directions by all your commitments.    After a match, Federer spends nearly 2-4 hours every single time doing pressers in 4 to 5 different languages, meeting with VIP's, signing for fans... That's a privilege and great- but also draining.   Someone like Ferrer plays, gets a massage and shower, 10 minutes in press and slips out the door to go to dinner.      I promise you- there is a huge difference mentally and physically to the body when you have all the extra stuff.   If anything- Federers longevity at the top in the midst of all the modern pressures being a Goat entails is even more impressive than his periods of dominance.

Now the clincher is the doctor part you mentioned.  Ferrer should be able to grind with all the help he's getting.  What did that player that recently got banned for doping say?... something like Ferrer chain smokes cigarettes until 5 minutes before the match, then goes out an lung busts the other player...........smh... not natural.

I would agree with AL here. Ferrer is a good example as in terms of having in the legs (and the same age) it's bizarre to see the difference in form between those 2. Fed probably played more matches but I am pretty sure Ferrer covered more miles in his career.

Fed seems like an amazing athlete and the only one to have beaten Nadal in 5 sets...on top of my head. But that is more an exceptional feat than anything else. His 5 sets record is very poor for a champion of this calibre. And it's not nerves as he has one of the best TB record. It's just that he has been suffering day before matches since 2008!!! He has lost quite a few TMS1000 final for that very reason and he even mentions in one of his interview back in 2008 (2009 at the latest) that he found teh TMS1000 more physically demanding than slams even because of no day in between.

It might be also that some recover less than others from a match...true but I know there are lots of legal products helping out there and maybe Fed does take them.....it just doesn't look like he does.

truffin1 wrote:Miles on the legs from however many more matches, physique, style, outside drags on your energy like sponsorship commitments, family-   just the mental toll from being at the top and all the pressure that creates.

You got me thinking of the "mileage" argument here and what it could possibly mean. It's clear that it's used to explain why some guys cope better with their "calendar age" than others. But how does "mileage" express itself? Can the effect be measured somehow or do you have to believe in it? I'm a bit confused about it.

Direct effects of "mileage" I could possibly see

1. physical deterioration from pushing the body over many years
- worn tendons/ joints etc., i.e. injuries are imho more likely to happen with higher mileage and more difficult to heal
Other than injury related, I don't see any physical problem that could possibly come from mileage? Have I overlooked something?

Sure, age related declining level of testosterone will lead to increased difficulty in building up/ keeping strength, especially after hitting 30. Recovery will be slower too. But from what I can see these effects are not "mileage" related, it's a factor for everyone. And you can slow them down with the help of modern science to the point that 40 year old athletes can compete nowadays with 25 year olds. My favourite example is of course Chris Horner, winning the Vuelta de Espagna last year at age 41 and Ole Einar Björndalen winning the Olympic Biathlon sprint gold medal in Sochi, aged 40.

2. mental deterioriation is hard to measure in any way, which is why it's hard to make informed comments on it, but I give it a go. I see as a possible effect of "mileage"
- primarily an unwillingness to push for more, loss of motivation and hunger
which could also be explained by a shifting of priorities, which is natural when getting older. These other factors you mentioned like all these commitments - I am sure they drain lots of energy, but how much they wear an athlete down depends probably more on how grounded a personality he is than on how many matches he has played. Tell me if I am wrong but isn't it possible that with age also comes experience to handle these kind of situations easier than say a younger player who might get carried away? Wouldn't an athlete get used to the pressure put on them?