posted Nov 14, 2007

TennisMasta, I think if two players are equal then the player who beat the other player in the RR stages goes through... I can't get my head round this .

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posted Nov 14, 2007

"I do find it amusing that the vultures are circling on the downfall of him already"

yes, indeed! All Fed has to do is loose one match. These vultures are rejoicing in the "doom" of Fed.

If he looses twice, the end of Fed is near for these Fed hating vultures...

One wonders who these vultures are. Here are some possibilities:

Roger is not American. The US media and fans simply cannot enjoy a foreigner dominating the sport. Roger is getting exactly the opposite coverage that Pete got in the US. He is much maligned as the guy who will "take away" Pete's 14 GS record. So it seems everyone is rallying to wish the worst for Fed. The fans and media here would be ok if an American beats Pete's record. It just cannot be a foreigner.

Then there is a smaller legion of boisterous folks who love the personality of Djokovic than that of the mild mannered Fed.

There is another group that want close matches. They'd rather watch a long match between two lesser guys than Fed everybody. They simply cannot appreciate tennis played at its best.

Then there is clearly jealosy. Even legends are not bereft of it. Pete started it by saying that the competition is lesser today. I suppose if someone is as talented and as professional as Fed even greats like Pete feel mediocre about their abilities.

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posted Nov 14, 2007

i am finding it hard to believe that americans would not admire and applaud federer. is not true of my american friends. they love their sports and sure they would support home grown talent, but they would applaud other talent too, from other countries.

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posted Nov 14, 2007

TennisMasta, sorry, this nationality argument is just outlandish! the americans like winners, and that is why becker, graf, noah etc. were very popular there. yes, people like to see closer matches, like the legendary 5setter wimbledon final 80 btw. Borg and Mac (18-16 in 4th set tie-break), would you not? on the contray, Fed has in his 12GS wins only played one 5setter (wimbledon 07) which was the only good final as far as the level is concerned. most of the others were picnic-like 3setters against unworthy opponents like Bagdatis, gonzales, philipousis, djoko,etc... tennis played at its best can only occur when there are worthy opponents to play against, and pete is right, apart from rafa on clay, who is the worthy challenger to fed today? surely not Djoko and Davy!

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posted Nov 14, 2007

Who said they don't admire Federer in US? Me and most of my friends just enjoy watching him. We have some disagreements with Sampras fans, that's all fun. I don't know of any Fed haters here where I live.

I hope Fed gets to semis on Friday. If Gonzo match is first (which I think it will be), Fed will know the result before he takes court.

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posted Nov 14, 2007

once again, there's a match between Fed & A-rod. Against the big servers, Roddick,Isner, Karlovic,Lopez, Lubicic, Fed seem to struggle in the first set, after which he reads their serves perfectly well and goes on to win(usually breaking them with his brilliant passing shots).
Now go to atptennis.com and compare Fed's H2H with these players, its amazing to say the least.
Come friday, he will beat A-rod again. No doubt. The players that beat fed recently dont have big serves(Nalbandian, Canas, Nadal), they are technically(and mentally sound).
A-rod is not technically sound; he just serves and "bullies" the ball back at his opponents; unfortunately for him, that doesnt work against Federer.

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posted Nov 15, 2007

to bingting

if Fed was less talented than he is, then there would be competition from Roddick and the others.
It might be the fact that this IS a weak era, but I think it's a case of Federer's ability that he faces not much competition.

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posted Nov 15, 2007

Steffi Graf lost only one or two matches in her dominant days -- even if she played terribly, she still won by a huge margin. Then Seles came along and took three out of Four majors away from her and beat her on regular basis, until that terrible attack by a Graf-fan. The point is: it is not always how well you play to win you matches, but how poor your opponents play. I consider Henin a better player than Graf who possessed only a weak slice-backhand, but before Seles came along, Graf didnīt have opponents of the caliber of Venus, Serena, Sharapova, Davonport, etc. for many years.That is why Graf won more than 20Major, and Henin only seven.

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posted Nov 16, 2007

"if Fed was less talented than he is, then there would be competition from Roddick and the others."

Well said, Im_Mortal_1.

This is a classic glass half-full or half-empty argument.

If Federer did not have the all round game and all court game, then the regular greats like Roddick, Safin, Moya, Hewitt, Agassi would have been able to compete with him. So you can call that the greatness of Federer if you are not biased or you can call it that there is no competition to Federer (sounds bad, but is true: there is no competittion to Fed's genius).

It's like saying that all the MP3 players are bad instead of saying that IPOD is better than most.

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posted Nov 16, 2007

clever try comparing women's tennis with men's tennis... it's like appples and walnuts.

Still, no one (not one article I read) ever said that Graf won so many because her competitin was weak. Everyone raved about how great Graf was.

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