Tennisers of the World, Unite! The topspin blog

A reader writes:

"Subject: Zvonoreva

most of me hopes she keeps it together

signed
Edible in Etobicoke"

Zvonoreva, you may recall, is the chick who went ballistic in the semis at the USO last year, smashing her own injured legs, and shrieking while tearing off her bandages as she threw the match away. But she's more than just nuts:
http://m.tennis.com/19301/show/72642b9d6f58436897485bb50e29b719&t=3167d1b495ee276098c2e5ba1bc3cf4e

For one, I hope she does NOT keep it together. I hope she keeps it real.

If you can't be arsed with the first week of a major, this is for you. Cause Week Two is here and its time to get a little Wimblenutty. What makes a tournament great: at least three serious contenders. A massive breakthrough or two. Something special, somewhere, some way. And of course, some great tennis.

The men's side has it all. Right now, Rafa, Roger, Murray and Soderling, you could pick any of these pretty legitimately, and you've got strong dark horses in Tsonga, Djoker, and Berdych. Then there's Lu! Lu who? Exactly. Lu, #82 or so in the world,, first ever Taiwanese anywhere near this far in a Slam, and beater of Andy Roddick. Lu. Who knew?

I said in the early rounds, that if Roger and Rafa progressed, plus one other contender, we'd have some real tension growing. And just about all the potential candidates are doing their jobs. I had mentioned Hewitt and Querrey as possible dark horses too, but they were knocked out by Djokovic and Murray respectively. In other words, this is as good as it could get. Well, Roddick could have been here, but then where would Lu be? So seven of the final eight are stars I picked before the tournament. That makes for a great final week!

Then there was the 11 hour Isner-Mahur match, with a fifth set longer than the previous longest match ever. What was it, 70-68 in the fifth? Best line on Letterman's Top Ten as read by sudden celeb John Isner: “We’ve been playing so long, I’ve forgotten — am I Isner or Mahut?”

All through it, we've had some brilliant tennis from Soderling perhaps overall, but Murra, Rafa and Roger at times too.

On the women's side, upsets have been the order of the week. Venus, OUT, Clisters, OUT. Only Serena and that crazy chick remain among the big names. Serena looks awesome, and she gets some total no name in the semis.

Today:
Fed v Berdych: Berdy was one of those picked as the "next Fed" a few years back. Huge talent, huge big hitting game. Never lived up to his potential, lots of mental breakdowns. Until this year. He beat Fed in a thriller a couple months ago, and made the semis of the French. So this should be a great match.

Djokovic vs Lu: Well, who knows?

Murray vs Tsonga: the defensive master against an all out offense machine. If Tsonga has his best day, he wins. If he is less than perfect, he loses.

Nadal vs Soderling: A similar dynamic to Murray/Tsonga. If Soderling makes his serves and hits his lines he has the power to blow Nadal off the court, and the height to be untroubled by Nadal's high bounces. Look for Nadal to be more aggressive than usual, going for winners, to counter Sod's power. They also have a great history: in '07 they fought a brilliant 5 setter here that included a Sod mimmicking of Nadal's ass picking and time wasting. It was not well received. Then last year, The Sod knocked Rafa out of the French, for Rafa's first ever loss there. This year, Rafa demolished Soda Pop in the French Finals.
This is your match of the day!

Great tournament, this Wimbledon. Great tennis-ball game.

Some quick notes:
Things are looking exciting. The secondary characters- the Roddicks, Murrays, Soderlings are looking good (actually, there's only one of each of them). I'm hoping that Berdych, Hewitt and Djoker can also step their games up,perhaps Tsonga or Querry too. Actually, even one of them would make this more interesting, but as it is, we have got one legit threat on Fed's path in Roddick, and two in Nadal's way in Murray and Soderling. I like this mix of characters, lots of different styles, nationalities, personalities. Great tennis jambalaya.

First round casualties: Stan Wawrinka, Francesca Shciavone (French Open women's cinderella).
Major scares: Fed, Djokovic, Davydenko
Beat Downs: Nadal, Murray, Soderling, Roddick

Did you catch Fed's escape act today?

Fed barely escaped scalping in the first round against Alejandro Falla. Falla played the match of his life, Fed looked completely out of sorts, and only a few choked shanks from Falla kept him from exiting on Wimbledon Day One. Yet luck and a 6-0 fifth set were with Federer, who admitted afterwards that Falla probably deserved the win (and did anyone else notice the back pats Fed kept giving Falla on their way off court? Cute.)

But here we are, Fed is through and Roddick as well, so I'll get back to my thoughts on this tournament.

There are only two serious favourites. Roger (six time champ) and Rafa (2008 champ, missed 2009 with injury).

The next tier of contenders is a good step below: the two Andys. Andy Roddick, who lost a heartbreaker final to Fed last year, and a couple finals blowouts to the same man years earlier, and Andy Murray, who Roddick bested in a brilliant semis last year.

Those two have great grass games and always seem close in the Slams the last few years. I said before the draw that the fairest would be for each Andy to go on a different side. So it is: Roger gets Roddick, and Rafa gets Murray. Personally, I think Roddick is the more dangerous- he beat Rafa just before the clay season and Murray has been mostly absent since his own Demolition By Fed at Oz. Still, Murray can play here, he is the homecrowd favourite, and he played some of the best tennis of his life in beating Nadal in the Oz semis.

Looking further, I think the next tier of contenders has no genuine shot at the finals, but could knock out one of those top four. I count Hewitt, a former champ here who just beat Fed on grass last week, and who fought Roddick extremely tough last year. Look for him to possibly upset Djoker in the quarters. There's French Open upset specialist Soderling, whose huge serve could be troubling on grass- he fought Nadal closely here a couple years ago and is playing much better tennis now. Fittingly, he gets Nadal in the quarters. I would also count Berdych, whose game has really jumped to a new level in '10, Djokovic IF he gets his serve in a groove (big if)... and that's about it.

I've pretty much given up on Tsonga or Monfils making the jump to the next level.

So, while Fed has not had a good year since Oz, and Nadal lost early in his grass warm-up event, I just don't see anyone else showing the game to challenge. Nevertheless, look what Falla did to Fed this morning. Anything can happen. Nevertheless on that Nevertheless, remember back to Oz: Fed was outplayed and nearly upended early by Korolev, then went on to run the table and win the tourney.

Over the last three years, if you picked a Fedal final at each Slam, you'd have been right more often than wrong. So I'll keep doing it. But keep an eye on Hewitt, Roddick, Murray and Soderling. I'm also very interested in how de Bakker progresses. I see that another great junior (and major dickwad) Bernard Tomic was already knocked out today.

On the women's side, I think Serena will take it in a walk. But I'll have my eye on Melanie Oudin. Just in case.

And so we move from red to green, clay to grass, Paris to London.

Historically, the transition is a tough one for players. The best grass players, like Sampras, MacEnroe, Becker, have never conquered clay. The best clay players, Lendl, Muster, Guga, have sucked on the grass. But thirty years ago, one man, one super-duper man, conquered both, year after year. When Nadal did the Double in 2008, he was repeating a feat that had not been done since Bjorn Borg. That Federer dittoed the Double last year perhaps made the accomplishment seem somewhat less monumental.

The fact is, Wimbledon made a concerted effort to slow their courts down from the 90's, when big servers ruled. Now, even at Wimbledon serve and volleying is a secondary tactic. Wimbledon slowed things down because of the boredom of an extreme fast court. Wimbledon had become a serving contest. So Wimbledon was slowed and the serve and volley became a bit of a relic. At the same time, Roland Garros has, to a lesser extent, sped up their courts. So the difference between the two venues has shrunk. The US OPen is now regarded as the fastest surface, and many claim this to be the reason Nadal has yet to get past the semis there.

Where am I going with this?

Nowhere. Just talking.