2017 Australian Open Final: FEDAL XXXV

[Frode789]

Another thing that blew my mind was that Federer actually WON most of the long rallies in this match (who would have thought that??). Rallies of nine shots or more (and there were plenty of those) Federer won 18 to Nadal’s 16. Previously that statistic was always massively in favor of Nadal.

 

[Front242]

^ Another milestone stat so for today

 

[Front242]

Another nice stat. Roger's 100th Australian Open match today and he won the title. How cool is that. :clap

 

[Front242]

Made it harder for both Nadal and Djokovic to catch his slam count now with today's win.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

I am not much into coincidences but Sampras also being the 17th seed when he won his last slam, this being 2017...

 

[crystalfire]

woke up checked the score..thought i was dreaming, refreshed still the same went back to sleep woke up its a good day to be a fed fan :,)

 

[Front242]

Someone posted the shot clock times over on tennis.com. Here we go. These are from the last 2 sets. Not one time violation given. Probably a good thing 'cos often Nadal gets so angry he starts to play better.

Fed (in seconds)

15s, 18s, 14s, 17s, 20s 14, 11s, 12s, 12, 15s, 22s (applause), 21s (break point against him), 11s, 19s (Advantage Fed), 8s 11s, 14s, 16s, 10s, 21s 11s, 16, 22,s, 20s 22s (15:40 break point!), 23s (break point), 17s, 22s, 17s, 15s, 16s, 17s, 13s, 17 s, 24s, 15, 17s, 18s, 20s, 20s 23, 16s


Nadal:

24s, 26s, 17s, 18s, 34s, 24s, 25s, 26s, 23s, 25s, 31s (40:40), 27s, 28s (Advantage Nadal), 27s, 15s, 18s (30:00), 15s (40:0), 18s, 19s (40:0), 20s, 20s, 24s, 19s, 26s, 25s, 34s (Break point Fed), 26s, 27s, 13s, 17s, 23s, 56s (30:30..critical stage), 28s, 33s (break point Fed), 27s, 29s, 35s (0:15), 30s, 29s, 30s (30:30), 50s (Fed break point), 30s, 20s, 25s, 35s (Fed break point), 27s 34s, 39s (Fed break), 22s,23s, 31s, 43s (Fed Break point), 21s (Fed break point), 30s.

Edited to fix typos.

 

[crystalfire]

just saw the highlights but man this was some of the best ive seen from feds backhand. he was crushing it.

 

[Front242]

just saw the highlights but man this was some of the best ive seen from feds backhand. he was crushing it.

Yeah, it's clear he's been working really hard on improving his backhand. It's better than his forehand these days. Less errors and he takes massive cracks at it when he senses the opportunity to go for a winner. His backhand was clearly what won him the match.

 

[Front242]

One of Roger's post match comments: "We're going to party like rock stars tonight." 85" tvs being f****d out the window from the 52nd floor and all the coke you can snort. Probably leave Mirka at home and go grab some skanky hoes too :laydownlaughing:snicker Good man, Rodge. You deserve it.

 

[Kieran]

You were gone way too long my friend. Don't ever take a 2 week vacation like that on us again :devil

Amazed that Roger pulled that out in the 5th. We'd seen that movie many times before and he finally flipped it with brilliant play the last 5 games.

I can't stand Rafa but I think he has an excellent chance to claim his 10th RG this year. Roger has a great chance at winning his 8th Wimby too but if he never wins another match this was one hell of a signature win.

I'm kinda cautiously optimistic about Rafa, but he's shown this tourney that he's still not wobble-proof. 2nd set against Milos, 2nd set against Grigor, and during patches of the match today, he was very ordinary. The fifth set today he just ran out of everything, but he fought well. A promising aspect is that generally in the clutch he was immense, after he wobbled. The points he played at 3-4, 15-40 against grigor spring to mind. He didn't reach such levels of aggression or intensity today, but that's understandable.

But there's no guarantee that playing great in one event means necessarily that he's cured of his woes and he's back. I'd have to see this a lot more often before I'll think he's going to be as great as he was...

Look, Rafa is a confidence player. He needs lots of match wins to get his confidence after coming back from injury. So, I don't see why he cannot get his confidence back in time for RG.

It's not simply a question of confidence: he'll come away from here feeling confident because he won tight matches, and he played generally a whole lot better than he has in the last 2 years. It's a question of age, and recovery from hard matches, in order to win slams. He's at the age when players are in terminal decline. He may get a great run in Paris (or anywhere, really), but that's not the same thing as being back near his best.

I have to admit that I'm coming away from this event more optimistic than I probably sound. Rafa did a whole lot better than I expected him to do, and had he lost against Zverev (who's leapt to the front of the queue of youngsters, for me), I wouldn't have been surprised, or disappointed. I thought Rafa handled Raonic as if it was 2013 again, and he fought like a demon to achieve a great victory - against a great performance by Grigor - in the semi.

He had little enough left in the final, but he showed that his warrior status is intact, and he wasn't far off from winning it. I'm happy with all of that, and I know it's greedy to expect too much more at his age, but we live in hope...

 

[Front242]

Raonic was injured and it affected his serve and movement (adductor like the Fedster) and had a virus/fever.... other than that I agree. He played fantastic against Dimitrov. Great match.

 

[rafanoy1992]

I think Kieran hit right in the point about Nadal. It's not that we are disappointed about level of play but can he do it in a 2 week span for a slam.

You Federer fans should know it too. The only difference is that Federer already has GS titles crown so even if he didn't win another one he was set to be number 1 in Slams count.

Nadal is in a different position because he is tied with someone who is retired already. So, the pressure of surpassing the retired player will only increase as more slams come by...

 

[Front242]

Full match in hd for anyone who missed it. Commentary is in Russian though. Still, it's the full match and not highlights.

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6fB2PYzMF8[/video]

 

[kskate2]

Russian! Are you going to translate for the forum? :snicker

 

[crystalfire]

Full match in hd for anyone who missed it. Commentary is in Russian though. Still, it's the full match and not highlights.

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6fB2PYzMF8[/video]

lol you can just go to watch espn and catch the free replay there online

 

[atttomole]

I wish I could get the full match in HD covered by ESPN.

 

[the AntiPusher]

When you are betting on a horse race you have 3 options to place a bet.
1. Win
2. Place
3. Show

It was evident Roger chose option #1. I think Rafa wanted to win but when 75% of the balls he chose to put in play were to show, his odds of regaining that title were not that great.

I posted a few years ago about having the mindset of striking every ball with a purpose which was Roger's strategy last night. It was the right play. He won. Nuff said.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Roger really improved his awful 5th set record this tournament too. Another plus. Many pluses from this event. Off the top of my head: 18th slam, now has 5+ at 3 of the slams (AO, Wimbledon, USO), beat 4 top 10 players on route to the title (after knee surgery a year ago and 6+ months off!), notched up another 3 x 5 set victories to improve that record as mentioned, oldest player to win a slam in donkey's years, lowest seeded champion I'd imagine for quite a few years, got the h2h with Nadal to 23-12. As I said earlier and a few years before, I always maintained that as these 2 aged, Roger would get that h2h looking less ugly and I stand by it. Especially in best of 3 I expect him to win a few more. When all's said and done, it won't look half as ugly.

Did you notice that in the trophy awarding ceremony speech, Roger requested that Rafa not retire and play for several more years. At that time, I was thinking exactly the same thing.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Becker said at the end of last year that Novak lost motivation at the end of last year as neither Roger nor Rafa was around. I don't know whether he meant it or just saying something. If it is, really true, we now have a memo to Novak from Fedal: "Novak, wake up we are back".