China Open 500

[tossip]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

 

[herios]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

How come you are not bored by Serena's matches???
uzzled

 

[Front242]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

How come you are not bored by Serena's matches???
uzzled

'cos there's always that element of surprise that she'll lose to a total donkey.

 

[Kieran]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

Excellence is never boring... :nono

 

[Carol]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

It's not Joko's fault but how the whole Tour is running. What player is playing really well? Wawrinka? and he is not even one of the greatest at all. In the land of the blind, the person with one-eye is the king. I agree, it's getting boring :nono

 

[Riotbeard]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

Excellence is never boring... :nono

It's not Novak that's boring! It's the rest of the tour. Novak does his job, everybody else stinks right now outside of occasional brilliance by Stan or consistence but not enough in the big moments from Fed or Andy.

 

[nehmeth]

Until then, to the victor the spoils! Enjoy it while it lasts, they won't be around forever...

:nono They certainly won't be.


Hopefully Nole will remain viable more like Federer than Nadal (to this point).

 

[Kieran]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

Excellence is never boring... :nono

It's not Novak that's boring! It's the rest of the tour. Novak does his job, everybody else stinks right now outside of occasional brilliance by Stan or consistence but not enough in the big moments from Fed or Andy.

Exactly. People used to say Sampras was boring and talking to them was like this :deadhorse

 

[Kirijax]

Congrats to Novak. If I were a Nadal fan, I think I would be encouraged by how Rafa played this tournament. We have to remember this is his least favorite run of the season but he is going at it full blast and making the finals. There's no shame in losing to Djoko right now. Now that he has steppe out of THE FOG :snicker , it will be interesting to see how he goes the rest of the way.

Does anyone know what other tournaments he will be playing till the end of the season?

 

[Kieran]

^^ Shanghai, Basle, and the WhatTheFeck in London, far as I know...

 

[DarthFed]

A logical outcome. Nole was not going to be challenged in his best ever tournament where he has never been defeated.
He kept Rafa at bay, I hope they will meet again soon, to finally straighten that H2H.

Yeah, another few cheap wins against a Rafa looking for form after injury breaks would suit you well. I think Nole has about 7 wins this way, over the years. C'est la vie! I'd be looking for a more even match when Rafa gets better, if he ever does. At the moment it looks a long way off...

Roger has been "searching for form" following injuries and age for many years. I'm guessing you don't use that excuse for him

With Rafa it isn't about his stupid appendicitis from a year ago. The guy has always been about athleticism, spin and amazing focus. When one or more takes a hit what is he falling back on?

 

[herios]

^^ Shanghai, Basle, and the WhatTheFeck in London, far as I know...

Paris too. I love how you spell Basel

 

[herios]

Congrats to Novak. If I were a Nadal fan, I think I would be encouraged by how Rafa played this tournament. We have to remember this is his least favorite run of the season but he is going at it full blast and making the finals. There's no shame in losing to Djoko right now. Now that he has steppe out of THE FOG :snicker , it will be interesting to see how he goes the rest of the way.

Does anyone know what other tournaments he will be playing till the end of the season?

Beijing was going to be advantageous for Rafa because is a slow HC. Let's see if he can replicate finals runs on the faster courts which he will be playing next.

 

[Kieran]

^^ Shanghai, Basle, and the WhatTheFeck in London, far as I know...

Paris too. I love how you spell Basel

It's a proper spelling, but I thought you'd prefer how I spelt World Tour Finals...

 

[Fiero425]

Congrats to Novak. If I were a Nadal fan, I think I would be encouraged by how Rafa played this tournament. We have to remember this is his least favorite run of the season but he is going at it full blast and making the finals. There's no shame in losing to Djoko right now. Now that he has steppe out of THE FOG :snicker , it will be interesting to see how he goes the rest of the way.

Does anyone know what other tournaments he will be playing till the end of the season?

Finally; rational thought! How this match went shouldn't have surprised anyone! Everyone should know traditionally Nole plays this time of the year very well! Also history has shown this is the worst part of the season for Rafa; always has been even though he won it 10 years ago! By this time every season, Nadal is physically and mentally drained! Why people are whinging about this result and making excuses for him, I'm just non plus and embarrassed for them all! You all know this stuff already! His luck won't fair any better in Shanghai! There's a reason Nadal has only played a couple finals at the YEC! People forget back in '09, he lost all 3 of his RR matches! This is why Rafa normally packs it in after the USO! The only reason he's even trying is because of his ranking and a need for match-play!

 

[Kirijax]

In the world of blurred international lines, the Internet, autocheck and Twitter, there is no such thing as correct spelling anymore. Heck, Europeans have been spelling words the wrong way for centuries before we Americans got it right. :snicker If U no wut Im sayin, their is know sech kneed fer praper spellin!

 

[Kieran]

Here's a primer for the pedantic, befuddled or conflustered:

There are four different spellings in popular use - Basilea, Basel, Bâle and Basle - depending on the language and context they are all pronounced differently.

The city of Basle is situated in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, in the border triangle of Switzerland, Germany and France. The original Latin name was Basilea (or Basilia), which has been preserved in Italian and Romansh.

The German spelling is Basel, pronounced BAA-zuhl (-aa as in "father", -uh as "a" in "ago", stressed syllable in upper case).

I forgot about Paris - thanks!

 

[lacatch]

no longer watch Joko s matches...boring

It's not Joko's fault but how the whole Tour is running. What player is playing really well? Wawrinka? and he is not even one of the greatest at all. In the land of the blind, the person with one-eye is the king. I agree, it's getting boring :nono

I would hardly refer to Djokovic, given his superior level of play, as a king with one eye. This is not the first time in recent memory that one player dominates the tour because he's a cut above (Federer and Nadal anyone?). Boring tennis? Did you watch the US OPEN Final? I recently saw a 15 minute highlight reel to refresh my memory, and Roger was playing incredible tennis, and in my opinion would have won against ANY OTHER player on tour EXCEPT Novak. And Andy took Novak to 5 sets at the French, and then Novak was gassed against a superb Stan and lost the final as we know. Andy won the Montreal Masters and Roger in Cincinnati. So let's not confuse Nadal playing like crap (mostly) for the past one year+ with there being no competition on the men's tour, or saying that Novak is impressive because there's no competition (the old argument about Roger winning slams with no competition).

 

[Kieran]

^^ Why do you say Novak was gassed against Stan in Paris?

 

[Carol]

Congrats to Novak. If I were a Nadal fan, I think I would be encouraged by how Rafa played this tournament. We have to remember this is his least favorite run of the season but he is going at it full blast and making the finals. There's no shame in losing to Djoko right now. Now that he has steppe out of THE FOG :snicker , it will be interesting to see how he goes the rest of the way.

Does anyone know what other tournaments he will be playing till the end of the season?

Beijing was going to be advantageous for Rafa because is a slow HC. Let's see if he can replicate finals runs on the faster courts which he will be playing next.

Well, it seems that the slow HC fits well for Novak, isn't?

Anyway, I like how Rafa was moving playing the first set though his serve wasn't good and that's why he lost.
If he doesn't have any discomfort in his foot even that he has a tough draw in Shanghai I think he wiil
do better, he just needs to improve his serve :dodgy: