Roland Garros Day 5: Thursday, May 29 - Order of Play

[Federberg]

^Yup! Sad to say but Thiem is playing Gasquet-lite right now. Not sure if there's a surer path to disaster than that! :snigger

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Way better from Thiem. Gets a BP.

 

[Federberg]

Wow wow wow! He must have heard!

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Wow wow wow! He must have heard!

Well, he seems like a smart kid. What he was doing was never going to work. So he started hugging the baseline a bit after the returns, and it worked for a game. Let's see how he handles his own serve.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

DF to lose the set. There are some positives for Thiem though. One thing he has to understand is that everything will come back, so position yourself correctly for the next shot. There was lazy footwork there in the last game and that is inexcusable for a young guy.

 

[Federberg]

The only other time I've watched him I was impressed with his mentality. Let's see if he's learned his lesson from the first set. If he makes it tougher for Rafa in the following sets it could be a sign that we should take him seriously

 

[Riotbeard]

LOL yeah, just saw tennis.com live scores and baffled that Donald Young won. Good to see Dr. Ivo moving on too. Probably the best he's done at a slam in years.

Young has quietly bulked up and gotten back into the top 100. Might be putting it together finally. We'll see.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Amazing pass from a tough position from Thiem.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Nadal gets out of a game where he faced a BP and got a time violation warning with a nice S&V.

 

[brokenshoelace]

Thiem has a one-handed backhand? Peter Bodo picked a player with a one-handed backhand to beat Nadal in the second round of Roland Garros?

In fairness to the kid, he's obviously talented. But like many one-handed backhand players, especially on clay, he's often forced to stand too far back.

 

[brokenshoelace]

Nadal with some garbage pace on the first serve. Everything else is looking good though.

 

[brokenshoelace]

So easy for Nadal when he's playing semi-OK to play against these one-handed backhand players. The gameplan just automatically falls into place and it's pretty straightforward for him to move them around. That's why guys like Gasquet, Dimitrov and Wawrinka have often had to produce monster hitting on the run, from way back, to make things interesting against him. That's actually something that's always hurt Federer against him, especially in his later years, where he was unable to produce that sort of pace on the run and thus once Nadal got on top of the rallies it was over.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Good experience for the kid . He has nothing to lose so if I am him, I would just play on the baseline no matter what, see how it works out. You are losing from 20 feet behind the baseline anyways.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Minus the first two points, perfect game to play against Nadal. Sustaining it is another issue obviously.

 

[tented]

See, kids? This is what you can accomplish when you run through forests carrying tree trunks.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Bad miss from the kid. That would have been two BPs.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

He breaks anyways . Two lame forehands from Rafa.

 

[Riotbeard]

Thiem brakes on a bad miss from rafa. Now the key, is to not get spooked if and when you get broken back...

 

[Riotbeard]

That is something about rafa this year. Very capable of being intimidated, and might choke away a few shots. Even in matches where he is overall playing pretty well.

 

[tented]

Thiem brakes on a bad miss from rafa. Now the key, is to not get spooked if and when you get broken back...

Tell that to Rafa when he plays Novak!