Murray v Robredo

aria81 · Club Coach

RE: Murray v Robredo

timmoore46 · Admin:moderator + Club Coach

I think the livescore is jammed it's been 30 30 for a while......

Montana Doug · Futures qualifying

5-2.....Robredo about to serve for it.....

The wind is horrible....but Murray might be a little too passive....too often he is way behind the base line while Robredo is on the base line and stepping in. Just horrible to play in that wind and Robredo has the experience....Murray has come to net a few times, but not looking too comfortable in these conditions.....

timmoore46 · Admin:moderator + Club Coach

6 2, 6 2 dire...............

Many thanks for the updates and comments. Bed seems a good idea... next stop Indian Wells... is it indoors????

aria81 · Club Coach

GSM to Robredo.

Disappointed at the result but full credit to Robredo. A very tidy, professional performance to be honest and didn't let the conditions rattle him at all. He played a very smart match and Andy just didn't adjust at all.

Another learning experience for him though and lets him rest up for IW I guess.

Montana Doug · Futures qualifying

Rats...looked forward to this match all day.....but there will be many other days....commentators over here in the States were horrible....talking about Henman as if he had already retired at the start...."Henman had a good career etc"

-- Edited by Montana Doug at 03:24, 2006-03-01

Montana Doug · Futures qualifying

timmoore46 wrote:

6 2, 6 2 dire............... Many thanks for the updates and comments. Bed seems a good idea... next stop Indian Wells... is it indoors????

Nope....I used to live an hour West and it can be really windy there too....with sand in the air too.....desert....lol

aria81 · Club Coach

Montana Doug wrote:

Fock...looked forward to this match all day.....but there will be many other days....commentators over here in the States were horrible....talking about Henman as if he had already retired at the start...."Henman had a good career etc"

That's harsh. I bet they were less than impressed by his successor as well?

See, I'm disappointed obviously because I wanted it to be closer either way, but I'm not really downhearted on it. He played badly, it happens. The conditions sucked, he'll know from that match that he'll need to adjust his game to get better and to be honest, he just looked so confused on court that I felt pretty bad for him. It was like he couldn't understand where his game had went. I just think there is a lot he will take from this match-up that will benefit him later in the season.

On another note, and although I would have preferred it to have happened against another player, it's nice to see Robredo back in some sort of form again.

Montana Doug · Futures qualifying

Aria.....I think Robredo played really well. I have watched parts of a couple of matches today in this and Robredo handled it better than all of them. When he made the whiff after being lobbed I think Murray realized it was not his day. Just sad, but yeah, with Robredo losing five times in a row or something I didn't expect him to play that well.

Take your hat off to Robredo and Murray will have better days. The wind in the desert is just tough.

aria81 · Club Coach

Aye, Robredo played a very smart match. He just seemed to know that he didn't need to go for too much on every shot whereas Andy kept trying to paint the line. He served very well as well which was more than surprising to be honest - I thought he would be a little more erratic and Andy would have at least had a chance to break but it never happened. But like his groundstrokes, he didn't go for too much on the serve, positioned it well and just hit good solid ground strokes and got Andy on the run and forcing him to go for too much.

I said on the Rusedski board that in honesty, Tommy played like a guy who is 20 odd places higher in the rankings than Andy on the day and he deserved his win. I'm disappointed Andy didn't make more of a fight of it, but it wasn't a lack of effort, I just don't think he came to grips with the conditions at all and that will come with experience I guess.

Andymonium · Satellite level

tear

imoen · Admin: Moderator+Tennis Legend

Disappointing news, but as had been said it will be a valuable learning experience for Murray.

On the plus side not many people around him in the rankings are still in either so he shouldn't lose out too many places (if Massu, Malisse and Henman all go out before the semis he won't lose any places at all).

Bring on IW!

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

I came on the board with my comments all ready to post - but Aria81 and Montana Doug had already said them all!

Although we keep hoping, we can't expect him to win them all. Robredo is ranked 18 - and that is after a dip in form, he has been as high as 12 last autumn - he is five years older, and it seems the difference in experience showed. Too bad for Andy that he had to find his lost form for this match!

mkkreuk · Admin:Moderator + ATP qualifying

damn! he lost?! Only just saw the scores due to being late to school in the morning. Damn you robredo! At least he can rest up!

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

Just watched the match on Eurosport. Can't recall seeing too many matches so affected by the wind before. Robredo got the balance between being aggressive and being sensible about right and even he failed to control a lot of shots.

Andy never looked comfortable out there. The ball was moving about so much that he barely trusted himnself to take a big backswing on any shot. For the first set he traded forehands with Robredo, no sign of the sliced backhand, and throughout Robredo had the more reliable, and significantly bigger shot. A lot of half-court forehands from Andy that Robredo put away with ease. Whenever Andy upped the pace the ball landed yards out of court.

Three double faults in Andy's opening service game cost him an early break and while he served better after that, he never managed to create a break point opportunity against his opponent's serve. When he tried to block Robredo's serve back into play, it would land so short that Robredo had an easy put away. And when he took more of a swing he simply couldn't control the ball.

In the second set Andy tried a few different things, coming to the net to volley, sliced backhands, a drop shot - but this was an easy win for Robredo who looked impressive in challenging conditions. For a moment it looked as though the best play would be to serve and volley though one comical air shot from Andy on what should have been an easy smash showed just how much the ball was changing direction in flight.

It was slightly concerning to see Robredo appear to have a bigger game than Andy. But the wind was such a dominant factor in the match that all that can reasonably said is that Andy struggled to cope with the conditions. I know Miami tends to be windy and based on this showing I suspect Andy might have problems if he has to play in similar weather.

While disappointing, I do think that Andy has come out of these 3 US events with enough confidence to give himself a chance in the 5 Masters events before Roland Garros. If he fights hard throughout this period, I suspect he'll have some decent results amongst the odd disappointment. The most important factor is likely to be his rhythm on first serve. If anything his serving has been far worse this year than last. He has taken pace off the first serve but only achieved a 5% increase in first serve percentage.