Weeks 21 & 22 - French Open - R4 Andy vs Tomas Berdych

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

Weeks 21 & 22 - French Open - R4 Andy vs Tomas Berdych

MiloTheCat · Lower Club Player

shame about the rain - Tomas was showing sign of frailty - felt the match had swung (a little at least) towards Andy.

Armchair · County player

Well this is a complete misery to watch. It's not just the scoreline but the Roland Garros visionmixers have obviously specialised in golf, fishing anything except tennis.

I mean could we see the serve or the lines............

Deep deep misery on all levels.

LadyTigress · County player

6-4 7-5 to Berdych.

Armchair · County player

Well it's dark, cold, wet, you're losing and there's an audience of about 200 in the stadium.
It's very hard to find the positive in this situation hmm

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

I thought from the start that Andy was just not in the mood today, he looked grumpy from the start. I told my husband before it started - when Lloyd was saying how "everybody" expected Andy to win, that I thought he might well not, so my blood pressure has been fine for this match. It goes haywire when I am willing him on, but today I felt about as flat as he appeared to feel.

Ah well, go home Andy and get some practice on the grass. You have a heck of a lot of points to defend there.

seagull · Hall of fame

Well today I took my 7 year old to a tournament with all the top juniors in the county.

Let me tell you if he had behaved on court like Andy did today he would not be going to another one in the near future. Absolutely awful body language in the 3rd set....who gives a damm if the ball is bouncing low on the wet court, just get on with it.

Pathetic display from Andy who once again has no 5th gear if an opponent is blasting winners in a Grand Slam event.

Getting tiresome now and for the first time tonight I can understand why people don't support Andy because that was just embarrassing.

seagull · Hall of fame

Armchair wrote:

Well it's dark, cold, wet, you're losing and there's an audience of about 200 in the stadium.
It's very hard to find the positive in this situation

How about you are playing in the 4th Round of a Grand Slam with a tie against Youzhny awaiting for the winner. He could have ground it out and made Berdy come back tomorrow

Armchair · County player

seagull wrote:
How about you are playing in the 4th Round of a Grand Slam with a tie against Youzhny awaiting for the winner. He could have ground it out and made Berdy come back tomorrow

How right you are, I haven't yet learn't how to give my cynicism it's full weight
with the use of a couple of smilies.

MiloTheCat · Lower Club Player

Very poor display after the rain break - thought Tomas looked fragile - but Andy gave away so many cheap points when it looked like he could have broken.

From the tactics viewpoint - I thought Andy looked in two minds between being aggressive and passive.

Many on this forum have been hoping he'd become more aggressive but this time it wasnt the smart option. It almost looked like he was hitting hard because he didnt care about missing.

clayfan · Lower Club Player

Andy hit too many poor, nothing balls and was rightly punished for them. True he did not seem in the mood, but he always looks like that, and there was no doubting he was getting upset at times, */!!##*!

He seemed to complain that they had added more top surface and it had been done unevely. He had difficulty sliding into shots. But it was the same for both players. Same old failing I am afraid. When up against a player on a roll, Andy's game is proved lacking. His uncustomary errors and poor returns didn't help much either.

Not too bad a week though, compared to his last few months. Hopefully he will make a better transition to grass now he is coming back early.

Ratty · County player

clayfan wrote:

Same old failing I am afraid. When up against a player on a roll, Andy's game is proved lacking.

I have to agree. Murray is a world-class player, and clay is his weakest surface. BUT .... the other top guys seem to have him figured out. It's a bit like Fabrice Santoro - his unorthodox gamestyle could upset the best players at first, but once they knew what to do, he was toast every time.

For example, Berdych has always been notorious for his flaky temperament and crash'n'burn gamestyle. Yet there he was playing with controlled aggression throughout, and always looked the likely winner. He just hit the ball too hard.

(It was like Sharapova outhitting Henin earlier, but in that match Henin managed to grab the initiative back again by upping her own game.)

And there just seems to be too many of these big hitting guys who pose a major threat. In fact, 9 in my estimation: Federer, Djokovic, Del Potro, Soderling, Berdych, Verdasco, Tsonga, Cilic, & Gonzalez. To win a slam you probably have to beat 2 or 3 of them, and it just looks kinda unlikely somehow.

There, so now Murray will definitely win Wimbledon ....

smile

wolf · Tennis legend

I didn't watch the match, but a couple of quotes from the BBC report do stand out:

"I would say that he didn't give me too much pressure in the rallies, I was really comfortable," said the Czech.

"I mean, almost with all the points, all the shots, I had plenty of space to do everything that I wanted. That's why I won in straight sets."

"My coach told me when the match was suspended that Andy looked like he didn't want to play.

Same old, same old then.

johnnylad · Tennis legend

Obviously he went to 5 sets and 4 sets twice but Andy's ace count has been pretty impressive this tournament - perhaps that bodes well for the grass?

Still deperately needs that first serve in more tho

LadyTigress · County player

I thought the match was postponed till today, and also family members took over the tv when the rain started coming down, so I missed the entire third set. Let's give a modicum of credit to Berdych's game here though - considering his usual muppetry, he's been halfway consistent this season. But I think this match proves that Andy is not yet back to his best, at the very least mentally if not physically.