tented said:
Does this article make sense to anyone?
http://www.atpworldtour.com/News/Tennis/2013/05/21/Brain-Game-Rome-Federer-Nadal.aspx
The end of the second paragraph immediately caught my attention:
"... it was definitely a step in the right direction in trying to battle Nadal on clay on his terms."
The beginning of the third paragraph is also perplexing.
I don't really agree. We've seen Federer being too aggressive in recent years against the top players and its caused some really lopsided scores. (See RG 2008 vs Nadal, RG 2012 vs Novak and Olympics vs Murray). Its really easy to simply UE yourself right out of a match, by going for broke. Yes every once and awhile it creates an upset, but I don't feel like Rafa and Roger's level is that far apart that he has to redline his game so early in a match.
In some sense you give the match away before you even get a chance to fight for it.
It's worth comparing this to his early years in 03-04. People will say oh he was so aggressive back then, look at the pace of his groundstrokes on the tape, look how much more he S/Ved. But note, while it looks like he's being very aggressive in those matches, you'll note just how few errors he'd make per match. This was because he was playing within himself.
But more crucially, the thing that was really making it 'appear' like it was so aggressive, wasn't so much that he was going for huge 100mph shots willy nilly, but rather b/c his movement was helping shorten points.
Instead of taking huge Safin like cuts at the ball, Federer could achieve the same result by taking strong motions into the court (typically off the fh side) and cutting the ball off really early in its trajectory. B/c of the great athleticism, he was able to get there before almost anyone else. This is the source of his success. Plenty of guys on tour hit the ball flatter, harder or with more spin. But almost no one hits the ball that early, while still being able to hit relatively hard (90mph instead of 100 mph) and with that type of accuracy and consistency.
His problem with Nadal (which is mostly absent indoors) is that when he tries to do that, he can't quite control the balls bounce and what happens next (either from the fh or bh really). This really takes away his great advantage, and explains why he looks as ordinary as a David Ferrer at times.
Now, its worth noting that Dimitrov played Rafa really tough by hitting the ball well behind the baseline. Instead of trying to take it early, he would simply say, ok you have to beat me, I won't let you make me overhit or try to control something I cannot.
I like that approach. Not b/c I think that it will make things better, but rather it's more relaxed and less frantic. It also allows you to gradually make adjustements to perhaps move in a bit more. Increase the confidence slowly as you get used to the highly idiosyncratic pace and depth of Nadal's ground strokes. Instead of, oh lets just Kamikaze the net on clay against the game's greatest defender and passer...
A lot of times, it seems like Roger doesn't even make use of his great defense against Rafa. He simply gets too frantic and picks the wrong shot and errors himself off the court. He forgets that one of Rafa's weaknesses at times, is that he has difficulty finishing points as his spin allows fast players time to catch up to it. Novak for instance has won hundreds of points this way, and it visibly gets in Rafa's mind.
Yes Nadal is ultimately a better claycourter, and at some point you have to roll the dice with some chancey shots and some redlining. But you can do that at the tail end of sets, rather than simply giving the match away after game 1.
