Internazionali BNL d'Italia Rome ATP Master

[Front242]

I hope Thiem upsets Kei. I like the progression I see from Thiem.

I hope Thiem wins as well. They both have very inconsistent serves though that make it hard for them to beat the top players unless their opponents play less than their B games. Both guys also have to focus on the big moments and winning the break points. Thiem's last match against Novak had tons of squandered chances.

 

[mouse]

How the hell did the line judge miss that?

 

[mouse]

So that call has eventually cost Kei the game. It was miles out, so no idea how they didn't see it between them

 

[Front242]

I have 311 tabs open on Firefox. What the actual F**K? :snicker

 

[Front242]

Pretty much the crap error filled match I expected.

 

[Front242]

It has everything, bad serving, lots of errors and even a MTO :nono

 

[Great Hands]

Crappy match honestly. Lot of intensity, yes, and some great points because of it. But tons of errors.

How anyone can describe that match as 'crappy' is beyond me. There were loads of great shots and great rallies fro both players. drop shots, lobs, overheads, passing shtos, and so much n the line. and so much drama conisdering it was only a 2-set match at a massters. fanstatci stuff. boy, you are hard to please!uzzled. if that was 'carooy', how would you desricbe all the other tennis matches that have been played this year?

 

[Great Hands]

Crappy match honestly. Lot of intensity, yes, and some great points because of it. But tons of errors.

If you look at the stat, Novak has 0 differential and Rafa has -8 differential. However, the match was very exciting and highly competitive.

Yes, it was, and that's because the winners and unforced errors stats are, imo, largely irrelevant. They tell you nothing about the actual quality of the shots or the rallies.

A rally can end in a winner - say a big serve, then big FH into the open court - one two punch. A short, boring point of no interest whatsoever. Maybe the FH wasn't even very good, but it was a winner because the other player is a crap mover and couldn't get to the ball. But that goes down as a winner.

Then you can have an amazing long rally, with loads of amazing shots that would have been winners against most players in the world but the two players are so good they keep getting the balls back (there was a lot of those in the Novak-Rafa match today), you could have a whole stream of high quality shots, and then someone makes an error at the end of the point, and the whole rally gets reduced to 'unforced error', ignoring all the brilliant shots that came before the error.

It's about the actual quality of the shots and the quality of the rallies, and the winners/unforced errors count doesn't tell you about this at all.

Another example - someone is injured during a match, they can hardly move. So the other player will hit a ton of winners. Doesn't mean it's a good match. A match will also have more winners if it is serve dominated (i.e. aces or mopping up after the serve on shot 3 of the rally), but these matches can often be less interesting.

 

[pavlik89]

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuqDTfYH3nQ[/video]

 

[El Dude]

A couple things to softly conclude from today.

1. The youngsters aren't quite ready for the big time, and Nishikori is the gatekeeper, the threshold they must pass to get into the elite. Kyrgios and Thiem couldn't do it. Yet.

2. I encourage Rafa's fans to have hope from today, but for me it just cemented how much better Novak is than everyone. He started off wobbly and Rafa still couldn't capitalize. It is hard imaging Rafa taking the extra step he needs to make to beat Novak, but I suppose its possible. But if Rafa had won today I would have called him the favorite to win Roland Garros, but for now Novak is still the guy to beat.

3. David Goffin...just as Kei is the threshold between the elite and second tier, Goffin is the threshold between the second tier and the top 20 guys. I don't envision him being better than that, but could see him hanging out in the #8-15 range for the next five years. He seems consistently very good but never great.

 

[Great Hands]

some people seem to be obsessed with tennis being attacking. i can enjoy first strike tennis, but i can aslo enjoy longer rallies involving amzing defense, and players winning points by manevering their opponent over seveal shots, or by getting their opponent to amke an error by clever shot selction, variaitons of pace, spin, placement of the ball etc. in fact,, i enjoy these sorts of rallies more than i enjoy out and out attack.

also, so many people seem obssed by winners. maybe a rally ends in an error, but the opponent caused the error by their play (even though these are often classed as ue, event hough their not really, it's just people aren't picking up on what the opponent did to cause the eroor (murray does this a lot, he's great at getting opponents ot make errros).

is there anyone else out there who actually enjoys defense, longer rallies, attemps to outmenevre opponents etc more than out and out attacking tennis? or am i the only one on the planet?

 

[mrzz]

Yes, it was, and that's because the winners and unforced errors stats are, imo, largely irrelevant. They tell you nothing about the actual quality of the shots or the rallies.

A rally can end in a winner - say a big serve, then big FH into the open court - one two punch. A short, boring point of no interest whatsoever. Maybe the FH wasn't even very good, but it was a winner because the other player is a crap mover and couldn't get to the ball. But that goes down as a winner.

Then you can have an amazing long rally, with loads of amazing shots that would have been winners against most players in the world but the two players are so good they keep getting the balls back (there was a lot of those in the Novak-Rafa match today), you could have a whole stream of high quality shots, and then someone makes an error at the end of the point, and the whole rally gets reduced to 'unforced error', ignoring all the brilliant shots that came before the error.

It's about the actual quality of the shots and the quality of the rallies, and the winners/unforced errors count doesn't tell you about this at all.

Another example - someone is injured during a match, they can hardly move. So the other player will hit a ton of winners. Doesn't mean it's a good match. A match will also have more winners if it is serve dominated (i.e. aces or mopping up after the serve on shot 3 of the rally), but these matches can often be less interesting.

Generally, I agree with your post. But I saw the match, and even before I saw the stats, I thought the level was not high. The end of each set was much better, and there were some fantastic points, as I said in my post. But in general, sorry, the UFE's were just UFE's.

Yes, some fantastic rallies, but most rallies were cross court exchanges. The intensity was interesting to see, Nadal's reactions were very quick, but how many points ended with an amazing winner? Not many.

If all the match was like the end of each set, ok, but it wasn't the case.

But, I agree with GSM in one thing, some points, as the one he mentioned, were worth the ticket by themselves (there was one return of sever on the ad court from Djokovic, when he broke back in the first, I guess at 3-4, that was absurd).

 

[Great Hands]

some people seem to be obsessed with tennis being attacking. i can enjoy first strike tennis, but i can aslo enjoy longer rallies involving amzing defense, and players winning points by manevering their opponent over seveal shots, or by getting their opponent to amke an error by clever shot selction, variaitons of pace, spin, placement of the ball etc. in fact,, i enjoy these sorts of rallies more than i enjoy out and out attack.

also, so many people seem obssed by winners. maybe a rally ends in an error, but the opponent caused the error by their play (even though these are often classed as ue, event hough their not really, it's just people aren't picking up on what the opponent did to cause the eroor (murray does this a lot, he's great at getting opponents ot make errros).

is there anyone else out there who, like me, actually enjoys defense, longer rallies, attemps to outmenevre opponents etc more than out and out attacking tennis?
i know people who actualt go to tennis mattches are like me, cause the longer rallies with the azinf defnce are the ones that tend to make crowds get exxcited an ooh and ahh. but the views i've expressed above don't seem to be prevalent on tenis forums.

 

[Great Hands]

Generally, I agree with your post. But I saw the match, and even before I saw the stats, I thought the level was not high. The end of each set was much better, and there were some fantastic points, as I said in my post. But in general, sorry, the UFE's were just UFE's.

Yes, some fantastic rallies, but most rallies were cross court exchanges. The intensity was interesting to see, Nadal's reactions were very quick, but how many points ended with an amazing winner? Not many.

If all the match was like the end of each set, ok, but it wasn't the case.

But, I agree with GSM in one thing, some points, as the one he mentioned, were worth the ticket by themselves (there was one return of sever on the ad court from Djokovic, when he broke back in the first, I guess at 3-4, that was absurd).

I thought the earlier parts of the sets had some great stuff too. There were errors, yes, but all matches have some errors. You ask the question 'how many points ended in an amazing winner?'. As I mentioned, Novak and Rafa would have ended a lot more points today with 'amazing winners' if they had not been playing each other.

The number of amazing 'gets' from both players today was extremely high (especially from Novak). I lost count of the number of times I thought 'Rafa's won this point', only for it to go on for several more shots. Rafa sometimes hit as many as three shots in a rally that I'm certain would have been winners against almost anyone else in the world (except perhaps an in-form Murray, the other all-time great defender of our era).

Anyway, glad you enjoyed some of the match. I do think that to describe the match as 'crappy' is rather harsh. But each to his own and all that.

 

[mrzz]

Yes, crappy is harsh. I was in a bad mood when I wrote it.

Again, your points are all valid. I just got annoyed with the bad patches. Maybe, being a Federer fan, I got tired of flashes of brilliance followed by patches of, hmm.. sub-par play.

I am still in a bad mood and you are being extremely rational and polite: It is not fair.

 

[Great Hands]

titel: are there any ohter tennis fans out there who do not need their tennis to be attacking?

some people seem to be obsessed with tennis being attacking. i can enjoy first strike tennis, but i can aslo enjoy longer rallies involving amzing defense, and players winning points by manevering their opponent over seveal shots, or by getting their opponent to amke an error by clever shot selction, variaitons of pace, spin, placement of the ball etc. in fact,, i enjoy these sorts of rallies more than i enjoy out and out attack.

also, so many people seem obssed by winners. maybe a rally ends in an error, but the opponent caused the error by their play (even though these are often classed as ue, event hough they're not really, it's just people aren't picking up on what the opponent did to cause the eroor (murray does this a lot, he's great at getting opponents ot make errros).

is there anyone else out there who, like me, actually enjoys defense, longer rallies, attemps to outmenevre opponents etc more than out and out attacking tennis?
i know people who actualt go to tennis mattches are like me, cause the longer rallies with the azinf defnce are the ones that tend to make crowds get exxcited an ooh and ahh. but the views i've expressed above don't seem to be prevalent on tenis forums.

 

[Great Hands]

I am still in a bad mood and you are being extremely rational and polite: It is not fair.

:lolz:

Sorry about that! - I will try to correct this, using my knowledge of what I've seen on online forums:

You are an ignorant idiot. Anyone who describes that match as crappy deserves to be shot and then go to hell. My views are far more important than yours, I don't like you because your opinions are different to mine, and therefore you must be a lesser human being.

How did I do - was that better?

 

[mrzz]

Now you need to tell me your favorite player. I cannot answer properly without knowing it. Damn, that's so bloody coward!

 

[Great Hands]

mrzz, i hope you got that i was joking!

 

[Great Hands]

Now you need to tell me your favorite player. I cannot answer properly without knowing it. Damn, that's so bloody coward!

Of course you need to know my favourite player, because we are all defined as human beings by which is our favourite player. If you like a different player to me, we must throw insults at each other and make sure to disagree on everything!

By the way, my favourite player is no.133 Adam Pavlasek. I think he is the GOAT and anyone who disagrees with me is a jerk.