ATP 250: Brisbane, Chennai, Doha

Tenez wrote:Federer playing today.....as well as ever! Rao is hammering the ball...but Fed's BHs are a dream today. Pace and consistency....exactly what he needed v Nadal a few years ago.

Raonic is fragile, no serve, even a doubt of someone potentially returning it - and he's undone.
His 1D game- hammering the ball only works with the serve.

If Fed breaks him again soon, all the wheels will fall off Raonic.

Fed's serve has been so underrated, always my favourite on tour, such placement and timing, you can't beat it.

Laver not missing an occasion to watch Federer.

Tenez wrote:I disagree with most of that Rao is a 1D boring player. He is playing very well and pretty complete! Great BHs, FHs, serve and quite fast on his feet nowadays.

What he has to offer would've maybe been enough in the 90s but not now. He is still too mechanical.

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:Federer playing today.....as well as ever! Rao is hammering the ball...but Fed's BHs are a dream today. Pace and consistency....exactly what he needed v Nadal a few years ago.

Raonic is fragile, no serve, even a doubt of someone potentially returning it - and he's undone.
His 1D game- hammering the ball only works with the serve.

If Fed breaks him again soon, all the wheels will fall off Raonic.

Fed's serve has been so underrated, always my favourite on tour, such placement and timing, you can't beat it.

Well not many will break him this year. he is really solid nowadays and I am pretty sure he will beat all top players this year.

noleisthebest wrote:

Tenez wrote:I disagree with most of that Rao is a 1D boring player. He is playing very well and pretty complete! Great BHs, FHs, serve and quite fast on his feet nowadays.

What he has to offer would've maybe been enough in the 90s but not now. He is still too mechanical.

Disagree. Last year yes.....but today he is showing that he keeps improving!

Yes, he has improved, looks a bit more natural and supple in the baseline, even his haircut is decent.
With this game he's guaranteed top 10 for as long as he wants it.

Anything more...possible but not easy.

Actually you are right about wheels coming off once he is challenged. But not many will challenge him this year. he started very strong and had he been in the lead he woudl be difficult to stop.

McEnroe would have dreamt to have such a good chip and charge as federer. McEnroe did it well too but with much slower balls.

I was just admiring those immaculate block BH returns, and FHsDTL...so smooth.

But Rao's wheels are back on again.

Tenez wrote:But Rao's wheels are back on again.

Yes, but thanks to Fed switching off for some reason.

great volley reflex from Rao in that last point of his serve.

I am sorry but I see a very complete player....certainly not a 1D player. He is as reliant of his serve as Djoko is of his mouvement. This applies to all players.

Tenez wrote:great volley reflex from Rao in that last point of his serve.

I am sorry but I see a very complete player....certainly not a 1D player. He is as reliant of his serve as Djoko is of his mouvement. This applies to all players.

I see a fragile player and fragile players are not complete.

Sorry, but no sorry from me.

2-0, 7-2  where did that come from!?!?

luvsports! wrote:2-0, 7-2  where did that come from!?!?

yes weird. The first point was excellent...then downhill from there.

Has Federer taken a break?

That's the problem with Fed nowadays....he only lasts a couple of sets max.

1000 beautiful wins baby!

I could not watch the last set....But I am seeing how Fed went down in that second set I doubt he can win anothere slam. He had the tennis to win the last USO and Wimby but failed because his fitness lets him down. I wish he was using those recovery substances like everybody else does.

The physical difference between him and Rao was so huge today.

Tenez wrote:I could not watch the last set....But I am seeing how Fed went down in that second set I doubt he can win anothere slam. He had the tennis to win the last USO and Wimby but failed because his fitness lets him down. I wish he was using those recovery substances like everybody else does.

The physical difference between him and Rao was so huge today.

Wasn't Fed's fault in the 2nd set TB. at 2-0 Raonic had his back against the wall, and he really started to chance on Fed's serve. It really Surprised Fed and caught him off guard and got 2 mini breaks for Raonic. It could have resulted in  poor TB for Raonic too, but to win he had to take some chances. It was good to see him not sinking his head in and instead going for a fight.

It was a close match. Fed was just a little better in the end, also serving first in the decider was crucial ( it almost always plays its part ).

The double fault on 30-30 proved costly for Raonic. This is where player who rely too much on their serve start to feel the pressure. Fed played the MP rather safely not going to the broke shots but let Raonic have if it wanted to. It was a chance which he that time could afford to take. It paid off.

Raonic has improvement some of his mouvement. He needs to stay clam and not panic. And stop those voodoo stuff he was doing during the breaks.

raiders_of_the_lost_ark wrote:

Tenez wrote:I could not watch the last set....But I am seeing how Fed went down in that second set I doubt he can win anothere slam. He had the tennis to win the last USO and Wimby but failed because his fitness lets him down. I wish he was using those recovery substances like everybody else does.

The physical difference between him and Rao was so huge today.

Wasn't Fed's fault in the 2nd set TB. at 2-0 Raonic had his back against the wall, and he really started to chance on Fed's serve. It really Surprised Fed and caught him off guard and got 2 mini breaks for Raonic. It could have resulted in  poor TB for Raonic too, but to win he had to take some chances. It was good to see him not sinking his head in and instead going for a fight.

I agree that Rao played like he had nothing to lose but I did not mean the TB....the way he surrendered his break of serve at the beginning of the 2nd set and the rest of the set. Very different level than in the first set.

raiders_of_the_lost_ark wrote:Raonic has improvement some of his mouvement. He needs to stay clam and not panic. And stop those voodoo stuff he was doing during the breaks.

What did he do?

Stan time..

Tenez wrote:

raiders_of_the_lost_ark wrote:Raonic has improvement some of his mouvement. He needs to stay clam and not panic. And stop those voodoo stuff he was doing during the breaks.

What did he do?

He had his eyes closed, chanting something, and hand crossed and doing something on both his knees. He was doing that at multiple sittings during breaks. ( Live streams was showing it, live channel take that time for advertising. )

Holy moly maybe he's a wizard.

Fed has now won as many titles in 2015 as he did in all of 2013.

Great to see Roger start the season with a title. The match was played too early for me to watch, so all I have is the result and the stats, but I like what I see.

Fed breaking Rao three times, winning higher percentage of his first serves than Rao, and even out-acing him. Very cool.

Stan also looking promising - good tennis week for Rotla and, well, most of us.

Stan also wins.  Good week of tennis overall - Fed wins in Brisbane, Stan in Chennai, and Nole/Rafa go out early in Doha.  Cannot really ask for more.

I am afraid that AO results will look very different though

Tenez wrote:I could not watch the last set....But I am seeing how Fed went down in that second set I doubt he can win anothere slam. He had the tennis to win the last USO and Wimby but failed because his fitness lets him down. I wish he was using those recovery substances like everybody else does.

The physical difference between him and Rao was so huge today.

I thought the exact same (and didn't see TB and 3rd set).

Somewhere in the mid 2nd set his arm got tired and I thought that's it, this is a new era that has passed him by with physicality, electric trains replacing steam ones.
Speed gained, but so much else lost.

I just hope it doesn't dishearten him as he still has good two years in him.

Of lovely, B road scenic route...that sometimes join up with motorways.

summerblues wrote:Stan also wins.  Good week of tennis overall - Fed wins in Brisbane, Stan in Chennai, and Nole/Rafa go out early in Doha.  Cannot really ask for more.

I am afraid that AO results will look very different though

First HM steals my cereal, now you; stop soon or I won't have any Cornflakes left.

But I do not think I am jinxing - I just do not want to extrapolate too far from this week.

I am not going around saying that Fed is washed up and has no chance at AO.  I am just saying that it is very unlikely that results at the AO will be as favorable (from my point of view) as what we got this week.  I do not think we will see Nole and Rafa lose in the early rounds and Stan and Fed playing in the final.

Well yes of course it's unlikely Nole will lose early in the AO and both Stan and Fed reach finals; but as a prep this is as good as it will get for Federer and Stan. You should appreciate that as a big positive.
I don't see stan going past the semis though, even though he won Chennai.

I watched some of the match now.  I am not a big fan of Rao's game but I think he played very well.  At the end of the second and early in the third he was really going for his shots - presumably figured he was not going to win playing more patiently - and many of those were going in.  Fed did well to hold him off then.

Fed looked very good from what I saw.

Of course, agree it is a big positive.  The year could not have started better, but AO will be much harder.

I do not see Nole going down easily - he will only lose to one of the top players or some out-of-this-world performance by someone else.

As rusty as Rafa may be, I would still be surprised if he went out early.  And the more rounds he gets through, the more likely he will have played himself into some form.

Agree with you I cannot see Stan repeating his last year's performances.

Fed has a chance, of course, but he has been finding it difficult to keep his form throughout a fortnight and even if he does advance far and gets to play Nole or Rafa, he will be the underdog in either of those matches.

Yes Rafa will be tough to beat again at the AO cause beating him over 5 sets on slow HC is a real challenge. Plus he is at his peak physically and reaching his peak technically.

Tenez wrote:Yes Rafa will be tough to beat again at the AO cause beating him over 5 sets on slow HC is a real challenge. Plus he is at his peak physically and reaching his peak technically.

lol

Rao hit an extremely high level on the 2nd and 3rd. The Australian comm on the U.S. coverage were saying that the tv screen wasn't doing justice to how hard he was hitting it and they said the pace Fed was absorbing and sending back. At times he was overpowering Fed, but also Fed might be the only player able to absorb that much power and come out ahead. I tend to agree- raonicin that form is exactly the type playee that can and had blown Nadal off the court, and he can give djokovic all type of trouble. No one is going to want him in their quarter.

It was a high level from both. The one comm said "I dont think might be under appreciating the quality of the tennis we are seeing from both players and the level of difficulty they are pulling off shot after shot"

A heck of a great quality victory for fed in a 250 tourney and he certainly showed the title and I think the 1000 win meant a lot to him. Rare to see such a happy reaction from him in a smaller tourney.

The dips in concentration are still there and the dips in energy - to be expected from a clean player, but I think Fed is a hot favorite to reach semis of ao. Then it depend who's there.

Congrats on this win though fed!!!

truffin1 wrote:Rao hit an extremely high level on the 2nd and 3rd.  The Australian comm on the U.S. coverage were saying that the tv screen wasn't doing justice to how hard he was hitting it and they said the pace Fed was absorbing and sending back.  At times he was overpowering Fed, but also Fed might be the only player able to absorb that much power and come out ahead.  I tend to agree-  raonicin that form is exactly the type playee that can and had blown Nadal off the court, and he can give djokovic all type of trouble.  No one is going to want him in their quarter.

It was a high level from both. The one comm said "I dont think might be under appreciating the quality of the tennis we are seeing from both players and the level of difficulty they are pulling off shot after shot"

A heck of a great quality victory for fed in a 250 tourney and he certainly showed the title and I think the 1000 win meant a lot to him. Rare to see such a happy reaction from him in a smaller tourney.

The dips in concentration are still there and the dips in energy - to be expected from a clean player, but I think Fed is a hot favorite to reach semis of ao.  Then it depend who's there.  

Congrats on this win though fed!!!

I think that was just typical commentators' over-hype.

Good movers with DBH will always contain Raonic: Murray, Nole, Ferrer, Nishi, Nadal...no problem. Of course it will look close.

It's a lot harder for a SBH player, though, as they only have one arm to rely on, DBH-ers get a huge respite there, hence their advantage to sustain power-hitting and keep rallying. But that's another story.
Today though, Fed again showed how easily he deals with big servers, and what a great server himself he is.

I don't know why he dropped that game in the second set after he was 2:0 up, it could've just been a little lapse, main thing he won in the end.
He actually looked almost sedated, def. a step too slow in that passage of play.

But again, I hope people can see how new generation, despite being less talented, is able to look dangerous just by the mere fact they grew up with new technology and learnt to hit the ball hard and safely, win matches with limited shot selection.

Today it was Raonic, in round one Millman...no difference really.

Picture paints a 1000 words, congratulations well done Rog!

Just saw this amazing stat:
out of 1000, Federer won 810 matches without having to play a deciding set!

truffin1 wrote:Raonic in that form is exactly the type playee that can and had blown Nadal off the court, and he can give djokovic all type of trouble.  No one is going to want him in their quarter.

I agree. This is where fed's strength shows most....against those tall hard hitters. Djoko just lost to karlo, lost v Isner in the past and had already trouble on clay v Rao. An improved rao woudl really hurt while v Fed he was often rushed, especially in that first set.

Rao's post match interview:

"It was a great tennis match. I stayed out there, competed, gave it my all," said Raonic. "I gave myself a chance after being down a set and a break. I think it just shows the development I've been able to make over the last little while. You put me in that same situation few months and weeks ago and I think I could be out of that stadium pretty quickly."

noleisthebest wrote:

truffin1 wrote:Rao hit an extremely high level on the 2nd and 3rd.  The Australian comm on the U.S. coverage were saying that the tv screen wasn't doing justice to how hard he was hitting it and they said the pace Fed was absorbing and sending back.  At times he was overpowering Fed, but also Fed might be the only player able to absorb that much power and come out ahead.  I tend to agree-  raonicin that form is exactly the type playee that can and had blown Nadal off the court, and he can give djokovic all type of trouble.  No one is going to want him in their quarter.

It was a high level from both. The one comm said "I dont think might be under appreciating the quality of the tennis we are seeing from both players and the level of difficulty they are pulling off shot after shot"

A heck of a great quality victory for fed in a 250 tourney and he certainly showed the title and I think the 1000 win meant a lot to him. Rare to see such a happy reaction from him in a smaller tourney.

The dips in concentration are still there and the dips in energy - to be expected from a clean player, but I think Fed is a hot favorite to reach semis of ao.  Then it depend who's there.  

Congrats on this win though fed!!!

I think that was just typical commentators' over-hype.

From what I saw I think the truth is somewhere in between.  On one hand, some of the stuff commentators were saying was clearly OTT (as expected - they are supposed to exaggerate).  But on the other hand, Rao was indeed playing as well as I have ever seen him play.  I think he may have been playing above himself at times, but for long stretches he was able to sustain it.