2014 Roland Garros SF: Nadal vs Murray

[Murat Baslamisli]

Well then...pretty positive from Rafa , no?

Rafa's groundies were good, serve, acceptable. He HAS played himself into form once again it seems like, like many times he has done in slams before.

 

[Iona16]

Awful. Just awful from Andy. Rafa just way too good though. Hope he wins on Sunday.

Off to sulk now.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Nice try with the French.

 

[Denis]

1h and 40 minutes with all those ticks. What a blowout!

It's just an embarrassment really. Unless we're going to give Muzza a pass because he's coming back from injury. But this...

Not good at all. At least Murray won't say he threw the towell. I hope.

Anyways, he's more interested in Wimbledon in the first place I guess. But even there I would give Nadal the edge normally.

 

[Denis]

Nice try with the French.

Rafa tried to speak French? I know Djokovic imitates Nadal, didn't know Nadal has decided to imitate Djokovic.

 

[TennisFanatic7]

Rubbish from Murray, let's be honest. Brutal from Rafa, to be fair to him.

I criticised Ferrer's attitude against Nadal "I pretty much gave up when I lost the second set", so I have to be fair and do the same to my guy today. Andy's heart was never in this, and that's not an excuse for him losing, because he almost certainly would have been defeated in straight sets anyway, but I think there was a very big subconscious element of "at least I reached the semi-finals" going on with him. Free points, grass coming up, etc. etc. all reasons why Murray may have been 10% less hungry to make a fight of this one at least. Regardless of a bad match up, surface disadvantage yada yada, it's not good enough for a member of the top 4 to go down 3, 2 and 1 to one of his peers on any surface.

I still think Novak will win on Sunday.

 

[Moxie]

Yes, good job with the French, Rafa. I hope it was only fatigue today for Andy. But Rafa was good, and I'm not going with the negative stuff. His game is better and confidence will be high, which is key, especially against Novak.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Andy's best point of the match was the first point of the match. Downhill from there...

 

[tented]

Nice try with the French.

Rafa tried to speak French? I know Djokovic imitates Nadal, didn't know Nadal has decided to imitate Djokovic.

He has spoken French here before. Let's not exaggerate.

 

[herios]

I did not see the match, but I guess Muzza was spent. He was going to lose anyway. Just would have been good for Novak if he was keeping Rafa more on court today.

 

[Garro]

Um, Rafa didn't even face a break point lol. I think that's almost unheard of for Rafa, at least when facing another top player. Even at Roland Garros 2008 and 2010 Rafa did not have a match without facing break point. A truly pitiful performance from Murray today

 

[Front242]

Well that was some blowout. Commiserations to Murray fans but Nadal was just far too good today. Murray's first serve % was pretty atrocious today and 1 winner to 10 UFEs in set 2. Not sure what it was in set 3 but that won't get the job done. One major observation here was that Murray's shots 90% of the match were just way too pedestrian. On average Nadal's shots were hit much harder than Murray's and Murray has enough upper body strength to hit them much harder than he did. The few times he put a bit more power behind his shots he hit some winners but most of the time he was pushing the ball way too softly.

On to the preparation for grass which is more important for him with a Wimbledon title defense. Not such a foregone conclusion that Djokovic wins the final now as Nadal was sublime today. Also, the weather really has such a huge impact on Nadal's topspin and today the conditions were a dream for his game. Remember the close Rome match was a damp night match and hence why Murray's shots were penetrating the court much better and Nadal's shots that match lacked the spin and pop they had today. A bit more cloud, less heat and humidity would've helped Murray today but either way it would've only got him a more respectable straight sets loss.

Also Murray did nothing at all today in his return games. For one of the best returners on tour he just pushed the ball back in play today and never really threatened Nadal one bit on serve. Disappointing for him and his fans and also a poor match to view unless you view it from a Nadal fan perspective and take major positives at him saving his best for last as I knew he would in this tournament.

Perfectly symmetrical scoreline too with the winner playing like a demon possessed and hence winning his sets :devil 6 6 6 :devil and the loser symmetrically losing his 3 2 1.

 

[JesuslookslikeBorg]

Congrats, Rafa ... blah, blah, blah.

Iona -- I'm sorry about today, but please give us a Murray update. I hope he's OK.

nothing wrong with him..he was just sh!te.

 

[Fiero425]

I did not see the match, but I guess Muzza was spent. He was going to lose anyway. Just would have been good for Novak if he was keeping Rafa more on court today.

Well that's about as disgusting as Federer beating Nole in the semi's so he could gift another title to Rafa in '11! "Thanks Andy for the workout; NOT!" Another gutless performance! Why bother?

 

[DarthFed]

Not sure why people expected anything different. Murray has done well in JUST getting to 2 SF's at RG (which isn't impressive in the least). He just isn't good on clay, doesn't even move that well on the surface. I do think he will be plenty good on grass, possibly the favorite even.

 

[Kirijax]

Wow. What a pathetic performance by Murray. Just awful. Sure hope he finds that special coach to help him upstairs because he sure isn't going to do it with the staff he has now. No expectations for him now. Maybe he'll make the semis at Wimby. Nothing more. Not after what we saw today. Just a disgusting show today.

 

[DarthFed]

^ Basing how he will do on grass after watching him on clay is illogical. Murray didn't even play RG last year.

 

[brokenshoelace]

Well then...pretty positive from Rafa , no?

Rafa's groundies were good, serve, acceptable. He HAS played himself into form once again it seems like, like many times he has done in slams before.

Yeah I figured he'll improve in the second week. Still don't think he's playing well enough to beat Novak. However, I always maintain that Djokovic needs to play very clean to beat Nadal on clay. So if Novak isn't on top of his game this is far from straightforward. He IS playing Nadal after all.

 

[Fiero425]

Not sure why people expected anything different. Murray has done well in JUST getting to 2 SF's at RG (which isn't impressive in the least). He just isn't good on clay, doesn't even move that well on the surface. I do think he will be plenty good on grass, possibly the favorite even.

If you listen to commentators, you'd think he was so great on the surface! He's been close to winning in 1 or 2 of the clay semi's played, but no cigar! He definitely had no chance after wearing himself out in back to back 5 setters against "also-rans!" He should think of skipping the FO like I suggested for Roger! They are wasting their time idiots!

 

[brokenshoelace]

To be honest I was hoping Murray would play better to see how would Nadal react, because for example, while Rafa's forehand was great throughout, he really didn't need to do much with the backhand. The way he hit it today, he gets clobbered against Novak.