The 2010 Australian Open (of tennis)

Hang on, why does the world #16 have to play qualies?

the stupid mess last year when she and Xavier Malisse was banned for a year for not reporting their whereabouts to the doping authorities even though neither had ever tested positive for any drug-taking, and at least in Wickmayer's case, had valid reasons for being unable to report on time.

the ban was lifted in December but she wasn't entered into the AO's main draw as a result.

Ah ok, thanks for info!

And Wickmayer still struggled in her opener - 7-5 in the third over Yurika Sema.

Screecher de Screamo lost 3 and 0 to Dzehalevich in the first round of qualies - whoa, the wheels have come off that one. Terrible results for half a year now. Maybe we won't have to endure the De Brato Era after all.

draws out!

men's http://www.australianopen.com/en_AU/scores/draws/ms/index.html
women's http://www.australianopen.com/en_AU/scores/draws/ws/index.html

Points of note:

- Fed's gotta be on point from the off. Andreev has sucked lately and is a limited player, but he took Fed to five sets at the 08 USO - can't remember when Fed got such a tough opener at a Slam
- Youzhny/Gasquet and Monaco/Gulbis are the best 1R matches, plus Blake/Clement for the memories and Cilic/Santoro for the farewell
- Such a strong, well-balanced men's draw. A golden age for the ATP.

- Sigh, WTA. Safina is a mess, Ivanovic is a mess, Zvonareva is injured, fan reports from Venus's exo matches this year have gone along the lines of "has she EVEN PRACTISED this winter?"
- Dementieva/Henin in round two, whoa. Henin's the popular pick due to Demented being who she is, but I think it's be much more Dementieva-like to win that one in an epic and fuck up in a later round

Anyway. Predictions...with the caveat that if Wickmayer ends up in some of those Q spots, she could well come through.

S.Williams d. Lisicki
Azarenka d. Dulko
Peer d. Hantuchova
A.Radwanska d. Safarova
Dementieva d. Pennetta
Clijsters d. Rezai
Jankovic d. Martinez Sanchez
Sharapova d. K.Bondarenko

S.Williams d. Azarenka
Peer d A.Radwanska
Clijsters d. Dementieva
Jankovic d. Sharapova

S.Williams d. Peer
Clijsters d. Jankovic

S.Williams d. Clijsters

Men's...

Federer d. Baghdatis
Davydenko d. Verdasco
Djokovic d. Gasquet
Tsonga d. Soderling
Roddick d. Berdych
Cilic d. Troicki
Murray d. Monfils
Nadal d. Benneteau

Davydenko d. Federer
Djokovic d. Tsonga
Cilic d. Roddick
Murray d. Nadal

Djokovic d. Davydenko
Murray d. Cilic

Djokovic d. Murray

Predictions: Nadal d. Murray. Murray makes disgruntled faces but can't find it in himself to throw his raquet. Murray hides his anger and pent up raquet throwing energy behind clenched face then fades away to the locker room

man when is gasquet gonna get a good draw?

am rooting like hell for murray

Lol is WozDEN really playing WozCAN in the first round?

Wickmayer and Malisse are both through to the main draw. :)

also Nole dude I know it's just an exo but how the fuck could you lose to Atomic Tomic 7-5 in the third?

I can't believe the winner of Vandeweghe vs. Zahlavova gets 100 points. WTA.

Wickmayer landed in the Henin/Dementieva section, naturally, with Pennetta in the second round. She could probably make the 4th round out of that.

Kulikova qualified; she's pretty good and could give hot mess Safina trouble in round two.

Thought this needed to be in here because it pretty much made my day which also just happened to be ma burfday :) - Nadal and Djokovic doing the Bryan bros chest bump:

http://d.yimg.com/a/p/ap/20100117/capt.mel13101170525.australian_open_tennis_mel131.jpg

from an impromptu charity exo organised by Federer for Haiti - they raised $200,000AUD literally in one day (the announcement was made the afternoon before) and it was easily one of the most fun charity exos I've witnessed in a while. There should be clips up on youtube.

They raised $200000 AND launched a thousand slash fiction pieces. Hey, it's all our birthdays :)

Checking in for 2010.

Can't see too much happening outside Laver and the Nonsensical Arena for the next few hours unless it fines up in a real hurry.

Excited! The rude health of the men's tour makes it that much more interesting (see also: Formula One 2010).

Got my popcorn and bottle of absinthe -- ready for Maria vs Maria and many late nights (and somehow early mornings) of tennis.

hmm my beloved streaming sites don't seem to have anything on offer and I'm not sure that staying up to watch Murray play "Kevin Anderson" on the BBC just for the sake of seeing something will be worthwhile. Boo.

Suspect that the links might only appear on some streaming sites once play is underway? I use channelsurfing, fromsport, atdhe...

Though my internet connection is being so flaky and I have so little desire to see Shriekapova/Kirilenko, and none of the other televised opening matches looks promising either...maybe Safina for the comedy but it'll just be painful after a while.

Kevin Anderson is a big-serving goon in the Karlovic/Isner mould btw. Avoid at all costs.

oh and happy bday for yesterday Roz!

Not that I have anything against her but, for the good of the game: Safina, PLEASE LOSE.

Shreik already has three break points on Kiritekanawalenko

best bit of that charity game woulda been roddick's "you're seriously going to foot-fault me in a charity game? can't you see serena's sitting over there???" at some poor line judge. hysterics ensued!

Three games in, and indeed everything is on break so far. </2009joke>

Not that I have anything against her but, for the good of the game: Safina, PLEASE LOSE.

seriously. Am casting my mind back to all the horrendous Slam performances she's gifted us with over the past 12 months. Against Cornet here last year. The Sweta collapse at RG. That awful awful awful Lisicki match at Wimbledon, followed by the humilation against Venus. The Rogowska match at the USO, which may well have been the actual worst match I've ever seen. Safina needs to go away immediately.

Shreik looks dreadful - seaweed on legs. And Dame Kiri hasd a break-back point.

Rybarikova: great serve, great volleys, horribly tentative groundstrokes.

Great point by Dame Kiri to hold off second break. She's playing some goodt shots but you already feel she's hanging on for dear life....

Kiri breaks back and still playing well, first set looks bound for a tiebreaker.

they're away on the outside courts - local neophyte Jason Kubler already a set down v Ljubicic. At this stage of his career, competing against seeded players in grand slams, Kubler khan't.

...but Kiri kan! She takes the tiebreaker after being a couple of mini-breaks down and has Shreik on deuce first up in set 2.

oh and happy bday for yesterday Roz!

cheers lex!

best bit of that charity game woulda been roddick's "you're seriously going to foot-fault me in a charity game? can't you see serena's sitting over there???" at some poor line judge. hysterics ensued!

My favourite was Fed's "Rafa, vamos a la playa?"

I'm watching the golden globes and not tennis but go MaKiri! Although naturally she's alr down a break in the second. :/

Dame Kiri has second break-back point as Shreik serves for set 2 - she's not going away....

set point Shreik

YAY! Shriek lost! Ugly match in the end but Safina through :(

Clijsters up two breaks after about four seconds. Wickmayer has really struggled but will serve for the match. Didn't notice Pennetta had drawn Chakvetadze - tricky draw, even given ChkChkChk's issues and general lack of consistency, but it's a set up but a break down to Flava. Kuznetsova is playing Rodionova and if she gives up more than five games she should just give up.

Kim wraps up a bagel. Martinez Sanchez looking like getting one of those too. Slamtracker has gone fruity so relying on TV, ugh, Dickhead up two sets. Wickmayer FAILE TO SERVE IT OUT! Women's tennis.

Todd Woodbridge and Tracy Austin discussing the new series of a reality program isn't quite the new nadir of television, but getting close.

Oh here's Jim Courier and John Alexander. That'll be that nadir, then. It's raining so sod all to pick from :( Murray bashing some big server it is.

is murray rocking a goatee???

A very faint one.

lol at attempts to build up to Peter Luczak playing Nadal. He'll get liquefied and rightly so!

Murray steamrolls while getting in 32% of his first serves. Not winning any slams if he keeps that up. Only caught the very last bit of Delpo's match - lost a set, 61 UFEs in total. :/ He's had wrist tendinitis for a while and pulled out of Kooyong last week, guess it's still bothering him. Karlovic defeats Steps in 5 sets - if i cared about either player, i guess i'd call this an upset.

On the WTA side, Makiri takes out Masha, MJMS dishes a double bagel, Wickmayer finally gets it done 10-8 in the third, Flavia Flavs also wins in three.

Henin already up a break, Nadal and Luczak on serve in the first.

Most of the other matches have been suspended due to rain.

hahahahahahaha Sharapova. Didn't see that one coming. She's improved at regular Tour events but it's shocking how she's flopped at the last three Slams.

I thought Dulgheru would get massacred and it hurts so much more that she managed to push Wickmayer to 10-8 in the third but still lost :(

The Wickmayer scoreline is such a delightful "women's tennis" scoreline. 1-6 7-5 10-8. Wtf.

Nadal just went down a break after an eternity. Really weird so far, he nearly broke Luczak, then had a slew of break points which he saved, the first of which was a well-played point by Luczak where he flubbed the put away, but he lost the game anyway despite momentum having been with him. But really, surely he can break a fly-by-nighter like Luczak at will. He won't be winning slams like this either if he doesn't (Luczak can run hot for about a set, but that's all, anyway).

The Murray match, I forgot to say, was mindlessly tedious.

Nadal broke back thank goodness

Also enjoying the Peng/Zheng scoreline: Zheng won 0-6 6-1 6-2.

And just to show that the men can do that too, Petzschner won the first two sets 6-0 6-2 AND THEN LOST FROM THERE, 4-6 2-6 2-6.

Diva conceded all of three games to the Douchebag. Nadal won easily. Dokic is on. Do I care? No.

Amazing

worthy of Nadal

has murray made a first serve in this breaker?

fortunate fed netter there, let's get this one

welp

11-11!

Murray no longer British. Just a Scot.

ehhhhhhhhhh

ach well

stamina questions are gonna come up with Murray again; he looked absolutely miserable physically at the end there.

Everything will be questioned again, its the British media after all

Arf I swear Sue Barker just called Henman 'Timmeh'

I just switched off in anger: he so should've won the 3rd, maybe that 1st set...

Everything will be questioned again, its the British media after all

― xyzzzz__, Sunday, January 31, 2010 11:26 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

yeah, but I was talking about questions from sane people too.

eagerly await federer quotes re: Britain not winning.

has anyone else noticed that tim henman looks really like daniel from ugly betty yet?

think the more pertinent question is about Murray's mentality - why does he underwhelms in these latter-stages Slam matches compared to his usual level, why was he so passive in some of those rallies, where did his passing shots go, why couldn't he serve out the third set (never mind the two rallies on SP that he flubbed the final shot - that netted FH and that volley)...federer is excellent, obviously, but I don't buy this "too good" stuff: Murray's beaten the dude six times, it's not as though it's a horrible match-up for him, and he's going to have to do it at a Slam if he wants to win one, just like Djokovic and Del Potro managed to do.

Delpo is a good comparison - going into the USO final he'd never beaten Federer but managed to raise his game when it mattered to do it for the first time. Murray, with a much stronger record against Roger, does the opposite.

As for fitness he looked more tired, but looking and feeling are different things. Really the main issue is that he didn't press his advantage at the vital moments in the 1st and 3rd sets.

One thing Fed hasn't done is four slams in a calendar year: always something to go for...xp

oh for fuck's sake two consecutive years of the loser crying. MAN UP, TENNIS PLAYERS.

well perhaps Murray's physical problems are a manifestation of choking, but clearly he was having physical problems. Grabbed his knee a zillion times.

Players often do that when they're losing - its not a physical problem. If Murray had played like we know he can, this could've been over in four.

Really all I need is for Rooney to make a mockery of Sol Campbell's return (why did the Gunners have to play united this afternoon ffs!) and my day will be complete.

In four for Murray, btw

lex otm. that was absolutely disappointing from murray and i refuse to believe it's a physical problem. He choked, he wasn't nearly as aggressive as he was vs Nadal or at the end of the match with Cilic. At the very least he should've served out the third set. I've watched him trouble Fed many, many times but Roger never looked quite as bothered here even when Murray had set points or break points.

keep waiting for Fed's decline to set in and it never does. -_-

I kind of disagree with the Djokovic and Delpo comparisons. Against Djoko, he was coming off mono, and against Delpo he served horribly.

The only guys who have beaten Fed at Slams while he's playing well (since his run of titles began) are Safin and Rafa. Everyone else has had to catch him on a bad day, in my opinion.

Meh Roddick came so very close against Fed on a good serving day. AND IT'S RODDICK.

Sure Roddick has a more reliable serve but there was no reason that Murray's superior defensive skills and variety on his shots couldn't have taken him as far. Roger's difficult even when he's on a bad day but he isn't unbeatable at his best either.

Players often do that when they're losing - its not a physical problem. If Murray had played like we know he can, this could've been over in four.

Could have, but probably not. Federer has played better than what we saw tonight too. Murray was just weak on the big points. He made lots of good inroads onto the Fed serve but could never close the deal.

agree w/Roz - also "x has a good/bad serving day" hardly ever exists in a vacuum - one of Murray's strengths should be to get under his opponent's skin to the extent that he makes them have a bad, or at least not-excellent, day. and it bears repeating, he's beaten Federer SIX times - is that just b/c Fed was havinga "bad serving day" every time? you could flip that and say that Fed only beats Murray when Murray is having a passive day.

anyway yeah, as Roz says Murray never even looked like bothering Fed - let's be real, what he was fighting for in that 3rd set was for a 4th set which would have gone 2-6 to Fed. And he couldn't even get that.

on a bummer note, Nadal is out of the top 3 for the first time since 2005. :/

I miss Rafa. Is he ever coming back? Properly, I mean - I thought we were in for a golden era before he got hurt

I should hope so. watching him since he came back, it seems like he doesn't trust himself right now - he knows he can't keep playing his natural defensive style because he doesn't want his knee problems recurring. I think he's trying to change how he plays but obvs it's a very slow process and you can only hope that the injuries won't keep coming back and force him into early retirement.

christ it's started already. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/tennis/australianopen/7118248/Australian-Open-2010-Will-Andy-Murray-ever-win-a-grand-slam.html

back the fuck off him, british media. no wonder the kid keeps choking.

ughhh i hate the british media.

The 22-year-old is ranked No 4 in the world but is the only member of the top five without a Grand Slam title to his name - coincidence, or a sign that he lacks the mental resolve when it really matters?

how about neither? somewhere in between? god i hate the binary vision, either someone's a CHAMPION or if not they're a BOTTLER, as if those are the only two options available. win a match and watch 5,000 pages get devoted to you. lose a match and it's all WILL NEVER WIN A SLAM. it's so mentally deficient.

i somehow managed to get through this entire slam without really noticing doubles or juniors, which is v unlike me. anyway, everything seems to be done and dusted so ROLL OF HONOUR!

Men's singles: Roger Federer
Women's singles: Serena Williams
Men's doubles: Bob Bryan & Mike Bryan
Women's doubles: Serena Williams & Venus Williams
Mixed doubles: Cara Black & Leander Paes
Boys' singles: Tiago Fernandes
Girls' singles: Karolina Pliskova
Boys' doubles: Justin Eleveld & Jannick Lupescu
Girls' doubles: Jana Cepelova & Chantal Skamlova

and a look to the future in this report on Russian junior Yulia Putintseva - http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/tennis/article7002707.ece

The diminutive but confrontational 15 year-old Russian has developed quite a reputation for herself in a short space of time and her penchant for intimidating umpires by persistent arguing and attempting to influence the calls of line judges have become notorious.

“She is a pit-bull, pure and simple,” said Peter McNamara, the former Australian doubles champion who now figures amongst the elite coaching team at the Mouratoglou Academy just outside Paris. “She will fight and scrap and do anything. The only person I’ve seen argue and try and intimidate umpires more consistently is John McEnroe."

i'm sure she'll provide us with a LOT of entertainment in the future!

Love that! Also, Karolina Pliskova is a badass with a thigh tattoo. Just thought I should mention that. She beat Laura Robson in the final, who was doing her own chokey-act for Britain - double-faulted both her minibreak away and on championship point in the second set TB.

I expect Murray to win a slam, ffs he's only 22, but to be honest, I wouldn't be that shocked if he didn't, either. But WAKE UP BRITISH MEDIA, he's got to two finals on his own merit without the, er, helpful seeding Henman always got at Wimbledon and not everyone wins their first, or even second, Slam final. That's just lazy, and acts as if the GRAET BRITISH PUBLIC have some right to have a champion, and anything else is failure.

I think he'll win more than one slam, just because he always seems so discontent to be at whatever level he's at (which is a good thing) - but it might need Federer to retire first. Other than when we had peak Nadal, I'm surprised Roger doesn't win them all.

b-but he's already proved he has the beating of Federer. He does seem to be showing signs of choking at the really big games, but, as has been noted, he is only 22.

oh man. Um. Please let Pliskova be awesome in the pros.

http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii314/DutchieSarah/Prague%20day%204/karoprague092.jpg

So that was AO2010.

Once again my computer chose semi-final night to cark it, but both finals were so gripping that it was unlikely I would have been able to turn away from the idiot box to this thread anyway. Besides, what with Foxtel this time unable to replay the finals a dozen times between now and next Friday (ref previous rants), it was either watch the game now or miss out.

On Murray: He was second best player on the court last night by a fair margin but his destiny is not cast in concrete (unlike the brains of some of his countrymen in the media) and the slams will come. He provided the most complete performance of the fortnight with his demolition of Cilic, and (British crayon-suckers please take note) he is not just the only top 5 without a major, he is also the youngest member thereof. And he's lagging a whole one maje each behind two-fifths of the aforementioned top 5.

The womens' final was the best since about 1975. (Admittedly the competition has not been all that hot.) Henin was great and in a way kept the heat off Clijsters and her overhyped, 'stalled' comeback. A few local girls did OK, Stose managed to win a couple of games she should, convincingly (not something she could always be relied on to do) and then ran into someone she couldn't beat in a million years. Casey Delinquent showed she had overcome her injuries and may return to the form of two years ago. Molik's comeback may still take off but sadly I wonder. Dokic? Who knows....

The Oz men still start and end with Hewitt and he's about ready to end. Luczak was OK for half of one match, Tomic (the FOAT)needs to grow up as a matter of urgency, and that's about it.

We welcomed a new cult hero in Nikolay Davydenko, the master of busted English, and maybe an even newer one in John 'King Kong' Isner, to fill most of the available room for CHs after the tennis world may be starting to tumble to Geal Monfils.

Overall, a fine fortnight of tennis. Just a shame the TV coverage of it was so unbelievably shithouse....

Lendl lost his first four Slam finals, Agassi his first three (they did have to undergo some kind of radical physical regime to become the players they were in the second half of their 20s though; not sure Murray could be any fitter), so no worries there.

My flippant point about Fed's serve accuracy was a bit simplistic but I do wonder how many matches RF has lost in the last 6-7 years when he's landed two-thirds of his first serves. Perhaps the 2008 Wimb final (checks stats... yes-ish, 65%; but Murray did beat him in Madrid in '08 when he hit 66% - same as yesterday - so, er, point withdrawn).

Terrific tie-break though, even if it was more about the errors.

Henin was great and in a way kept the heat off Clijsters and her overhyped, 'stalled' comeback.

this is a good point. other than Clijsters' USO run, where other than the victory over a taken-by-surprise, exploding Serena, the draw rather fell apart for her, she's lost to Safina, Jankovic, Schnyder and Petrova in her comeback. more bad tournaments than good, basically.

Pliskova looks AWESOME.

New rankings! (Henin will remain unranked until she plays a third tournament, but will debut at least inside the top 40.)

1. Serena Williams (1)
2. Dinara Safina (2)
3. Caroline Wozniacki (4)
4. Svetlana Kuznetsova (3)
5. Venus Williams (6)
6. Victoria Azarenka (7)
7. Elena Dementieva (5)
8. Jelena Jankovic (8)
9. Agnieszka Radwanska (10)
10. Na Li (17)
11. Samantha Stosur (13)
12. Flavia Pennetta (12)
13. Marion Bartoli (11)
14. Vera Zvonareva (9)
15. Yanina Wickmayer (16)
16. Maria Sharapova (14)
17. Kim Clijsters (15)
18. Francesca Schiavone (18)
19. Nadia Petrova (19)
20. Jie Zheng (35)
21. Aravane Rezai (23)
22. Shahar Peer (28)
23. Ana Ivanovic (21)
24. Virginie Razzano (20)
25. Sabine Lisicki (24)
26. Alona Bondarenko (30)
27. Daniela Hantuchova (25)
28. Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez (27)
29. Elena Vesnina (29)
30. Dominika Cibulkova (22)
...
37. Maria Kirilenko (58)
42. Carla Suarez Navarro (33)

1. Roger Federer (1)
2. Novak Djokovic (3)
3. Andy Murray (4)
4. Rafael Nadal (2)
5. Juan Martin Del Potro (5)
6. Nikolay Davydenko (6)
7. Andy Roddick (7)
8. Robin Soderling (8)
9. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (10)
10. Marin Cilic (14)
11. Fernando Gonzalez (11)
12. Fernando Verdasco (9)
13. Gael Monfils (12)
14. Radek Stepanek (13)
15. Tommy Robredo (16)
16. Gilles Simon (15)
17. Tommy Haas (17)
18. David Ferrer (18)
19. Lleyton Hewitt (22)
20. Mikhail Youzhny (20)
21. Stanislas Wawrinka (19)
22. Juan Carlos Ferrero (23)
23. Tomas Berdych (21)
24. Ivan Ljubicic (24)
25. John Isner (28)
26. Nicolas Almagro (25)
27. Philipp Kohlschreiber (26)
28. Albert Montanes (32)
29. Juan Monaco (33)
30. Sam Querrey (29)

Surprisingly little movement within the men's top 30, except for the big changes at the top. Unless whoever was #27 has plummeted 100 places or something. But this...

3. Caroline Wozniacki (4)

...means I really haven't been paying attention to the WTA tour. I had no idea.

Melzer went from 27 to 32.

Yeah, Wozniacki all the way up there is kinda embarrassing. She's gained a ton of points from mopping up premier tournaments with weak fields (Eastbourne, New Haven), plus of course the USO run when the draw collapsed. Plus immediately beneath her, Sweta and Venus have been total failures for 3/4 of the year.

yeah I was a bit stunned by Caro at number 3 too. Oh man. xp

Karolina Pliskova apparently has an identical twin sister, Kristyna, who Robson beat in the semis. No reports yet on whether they have matching tattoos.

Karolina's already ranked 220 in the seniors - Kristyna languishes at 471.

God, if Safina continues to collapse and Sweta and Vee don't get it together, we could well see Wozniacki sneak into No 2 before Clijsters/Henin/(Sharapova?) accumulate enough points to be ranked where they should be. Aagh.

Safina *will* collapse though - she has a ton of points i can't see her defending in the next few months. :(

If Stosur makes the top 10 the WTA should just fold in embarrassment.

it's going to get worse before it gets better - looking forward to proper rankings in 2011 (assuming Henin doesn't re-retire as soon as she wins Wimby, if she does win it this year... has she said anything about how long she'll remain on tour this time?).

we were only a couple of points away from that - thank Venus for collapsing against Li. it still might happen!

xp

fun fact: with cilic's ascension in the ranks, everyone in the atp top 24 is a current or former top tenner.