That Fed-Anderson match was really good. I always feel that Wimbledon usually peaks at the Quarterfinals, and it’s usually the case, with the occasional exception, like the 2008 and 2009 finals. What was incredible throughout that match, starting in the 2nd set, is that Federer played great. All the key points he either won with winners, or he lost because Anderson hit winners. Neither player was making too many mistakes, and certainly not on the key points. When Fed had a match point in the 3rd set, he lost that because Anderson hit a great winner. Same when Fed kept getting opportunities to break in the fourth and fifth sets. Not break points necessarily, but there were several games when Fed was up Love-30 on Anderson’s serve, but Anderson kept going for his shots and hitting them right on the line in a lot of cases. Fed didn’t lose that match, Anderson took that victory by playing really great Tennis.
Yes, agree in all respects. Anderson is not the player he was, and that’s a good thing.
My rule of “Quarterfinals at Wimbledon are the best” seems to be coming true in the Women’s Semifinals. Kerber won easily, and now Serena looks set in her match. That Kerber-Serena final could be a nice competitive match though.
And I hope the Djokovic-Nadal match turns out to be a classic tomorrow. The other match will be boring even if it goes 5 sets. I’ve never seen an interesting match with John Isner in it. Even the longest match ever, which I watched with morbid fascination back in 2010, was boring as far as the actual play was concerned.
Even if the Djokovic-Nadal match turns out to be a classic though, I’ve noticed that decades removed from it, no one ever talks about Quarterfinals and Semifinals. Finals are the only thing that gets talked about at length, on ESPN at least. This seems like an injustice to me. I’ve been watching Tennis since the 1983 French Open final between McEnroe and Lendl, and I’d say most of my favorite matches have been Quarterfinals and Semifinals. Michael Chang was usually involved. But none of those ever get talked about years down the road. With the exception of Aziz Ansari’s show on Netflix.
Yeah, it’s either service winner, forehand winner, or unforced error. There is nothing stylish or interesting about his game. I think we will see 2 or 3 tiebreaks at least.
That was 1984, actually. I think '83 was Yannick Noah’s year.
Mac was superhuman in the first two sets. He was half-volleying off the baseline against the greatest groundstroker of his day, chipping and charging on red clay. Wild stuff.
Pity he didn’t actually win that match!
Oh yeah, you’re right. During Yannick Noah’s year, I was living in hotels in Central France while my dad was being trained. I didn’t speak any French, but I could tell the French were REALLY excited about Yannick Noah. I remember even when I was watching French Cartoons, a channel would break into the cartoon with breaking news about the French Open, annoying the seven year old me. And every nightly news broadcast featured a lot of french I didn’t understand, but it was full of French open coverage, usually featuring Noah.
I didn’t actually start following tennis until the following year (1984 French Open final).
It was 1984 and while I don’t think anyone would argue McEnroe as GOAT, he probably had the best year a player has ever had in '84. He was 82-3 and won 13 titles. He didn’t play in the Australian (lot of players skipped it back then) but he won Wimbledon and the US Open, and almost won the French.
At Wimbledon he played Connors in the final. They did not like each other. It must have been sweet for McEnroe because he destroyed Connors 6-1, 6-1, 6-2.
I miss McEnroe’s artistry. Federer is the closest thing we have to it now, but the game is so much more about power from the baseline now. McEnroe moved his opponent around and found a good shot to come in on, and what great hands he had at the net. It was fun watching him.
Not slamwise, but otherwise, yeah. I think at his best that year he may have been further above the field than anyone else has been.
Of course, if he’d beaten Lendl (and still gone on to win Wimbledon and the US Open as he did anyway), he’d surely have gone to Australia that December to finish the slam.
Yeah, the scheduling of the Australian as the last slam event is what kept a lot of players from playing. It was rather meaningless to them since no one was going for a calendar slam and the idea of total slams having meaning wasn’t cemented yet. The courts were apparently bad too.
Once they moved it to the beginning of the year and moved from grass to indoors, it gained in popularity.
I just read that Serena has only played one player in the top 50 over the course of this Wimbledon, and she’s in the finals. That’s pretty shocking, I think. The women’s game seems to me quite broken right now.
It reminds me of the era of Men’s tennis when Sampras, Agassi, Edberg, Chang and Becker and others were retiring or were close to retiring, and there was a feeling that anyone could win in any given tournament. Even Lleyton Hewitt or Medvedev or Philopusses, or Rafter or a bunch of other players. And then Federer and Nadal started winning, and that era slammed shut. I kind of miss it. Not the big servers who couldn’t do much else, but I do miss the wide variety of players like Medvedev, Thomas Muster, and others who could sometimes make deep runs in some tournaments but not in others.
Second set is also about to go to tie break in the Isner-Anderson match. I can’t wait for this match to be over so that we can get to the main event.
Whatever happens in this match, Anderson hasn’t done enough to defend his own service. He should have won this set twice over now.
Also, it’s hard to see the Nadal-Djokovic match starting before 6pm at this point, even if Isner wraps it up in the 4th. I thought about that yesterday, wondering why Wimbledon wasn’t planning to start earlier today. History suggested the Isner-Anderson match would be a long one.
5th set - I really hope one of these two breaks a serve and they win at 6 games. Otherwise this game could go on for hours. (3-2 to Isner right now, still on serve).
So I wonder if it does drag on if it will push the other match until tomorrow? It’s 7-6 now. It could easily continue for some time.
Yes, this looks to me like a blunder by the tournament director. This thing could have started two hours earlier.
Isner with game point now at 15-15 in the fifth set. Sheesh.
20-19 now. It’s comedy. This may not be finished today.
Some players have had careers shorter than this match.