US Open day 7

Sheddie · administrator

US Open day 7

Sheddie · administrator

I posted all that before checking the scores...

Hewitt appears to be cruising against Djokovic, leading 6-3, 5-0. He's won 8 straight games I think.

Nalbandian-Safin has gone to 5 sets unsurprisingly. Safin took the 1st two 6-3, 7-5 but Nalbandian has hit back taking the next two 6-2, 6-3. It's now 2-2 in the 5th.

However, the big surprise is occuring on Arther Ashe. Agassi is 2 sets to 1 down against Becker. The German leads 7-5, 6-7, 6-4, 3-4. It's been a ding-dong clash. Agassi has had the best of things from the baseline with Becker making 65 unforced errors. However, the German's serve has kept him in the match, he's hit 22 aces and has clocked a serve at 142 mph. It went with serve until 5-6 in set 1 when Agassi threw in 3 errors and a double fault to concede the set. Agassi was an early break up in the 2nd but Becker broke back and it went to a tiebreak which Agassi won 7-4, using all his experience. Becker stormed to a 3-0 lead in set 3 with a double break. Although Agassi retrieved one of the breaks, Becker held on to take it 6-4.
It's now 5-5 and Becker has 15-30 on the Agassi serve. The German is having lots of success moving Agassi out wide.

David Ferrer has cost me 50 AM !

He lost in 4 sets to Mikhail Youhzny.

Sheddie · administrator

Hewitt leads 6-3, 6-1 can't see this one going on much longer.

Safin-Nalbandian is 3-3 in the 5th

Becker has broken Agassi and is serving for it at 6-5 !!!!! Could this be the end of Agassi's career or is there one more twist in the Agassi saga ?

Sheddie · administrator

No nerves for Becker, he's cruised to 40-0

He's now sealed the biggest win of his career, he's ended Agassi's career 7-5, 7-6, 4-6, 7-5.

That's a real shame for Agassi, no disrespect to Becker but given Agassi's career he deserved a more fitting finale then losing to an unknown German. After the Baghdatis win, I really thought he'd go deep into this tournament.

Hewitt has broken in the 1st game of the 3rd, leads 6-3, 6-1, 1-0.

RJA · Hall of fame

It would have been nice for Andre to have a better send off but I think that we can consider last years US Open as his last real stand. The performances he put in then at the age of 35 was magnificent and for a moment he really had Federer rattled in the final. This year has really been a good bye tour and not as it has been sadly clear that Andre's body was no longer capable of meeting the heavy demands of his play.

Sheddie · administrator

Lindsay Davenport survived a scare earlier against Katerina Srebotnik. Davenport lost the 1st set 6-3 but recovered to win the 2nd 7-5. She was 3-1 up in the 3rd but got broken back and at 6-5 had to save 2 match points before winning it in the tiebreak.

Hewitt leads 6-3, 6-1, 3-1 against Djokovic.

Nalbandian has levelled things at 5-5 against Safin, having been 2 points from defeat.

Sheddie · administrator

Hewitt wrapped up victory with ease 6-3, 6-1, 6-2, I expected it to be quite a bit closer than that. Djokovic made far too many errors from the stats: 46 compared to just 15 from Hewitt.

Safin knocked out Nalbandian, 8-6 in the final set tiebreak. Nalbandian was 5-2 down in that breaker and after he came back to 6-6 I really thought Safin might self destruct. A fantastic win for him. A tricky match for Safin tomorrow, when he faces a complete different challenge which Olivier Rochus will pose.

Sheddie · administrator

More surprising news on Arthur Ashe, Verdasco took the 1st set on a tiebreak against Roddick - 7-5 with just 1 minibreak. Could this be a double blow for American fans after Agassi losing.

Roddick has asserted himself in the early stages of the 2nd and broke straight away. He leads 3-0

Nadal-Moodie was on serve but Nadal has just broken to 15 for 4-3

imoen · Admin: Moderator+Tennis Legend

UltimateFlemingFan wrote:

More surprising news on Arthur Ashe, Verdasco took the 1st set on a tiebreak against Roddick - 7-5 with just 1 minibreak. Could this be a double blow for American fans after Agassi losing.

Roddick has asserted himself in the early stages of the 2nd and broke straight away. He leads 3-0

Roddick served terribly in that first set, his percentage was in the low 40s for most of it, when he normally serves in the 70s.

Sheddie · administrator

RJA wrote:

It would have been nice for Andre to have a better send off but I think that we can consider last years US Open as his last real stand. The performances he put in then at the age of 35 was magnificent and for a moment he really had Federer rattled in the final. This year has really been a good bye tour and not as it has been sadly clear that Andre's body was no longer capable of meeting the heavy demands of his play.

I agree, at the US Open 2005 we saw Agassi at his absolute best, the tennis he produced then was possibly better than anything before in his career. He had so many classic matches - v Blake, v Ginepri and finally that incredible final against Federer when both players reached near perfection in the first 3 sets. If Agassi had been playing against anyone other than Federer that day he would have won quite comfortable in straights. It's a shame in a way that he didn't retire then but it was so great to see him back in action at Wimbledon this year. I hope he goes into commentary, it'd be really interesting to hear what he has to say having competed against 3 generations of world-class players, many of whom regarded as all-time greats.

Did you see the Agassi-Baghdatis match RJA ? If so, how did you rate it in terms of quality compared to some of his epic matches last year ?

Sheddie · administrator

Roddick narrowly avoided becoming the 2nd big American name in a row to crash out of the tournament, beating Verdasco in 5 sets 6-7, 6-3, 6-4, 6-7, 6-2. The tournament organisers must have breathed a sigh of relief after that.

As Bethan says, Roddick didn't serve particularly well during the match, only at 67% overall when he's normally in the 70s. Verdasco served superbly - 78% accuracy for him. Roddick cranked up the speed gun to 141 mph but that's fairly average for his standards ! Verdasco crunched 78 winners to just 46 from Roddick but the telling stat was the unforced errors. Verdasco made 65 to just 29 from Roddick.

Nadal beat Moodie 6-4, 7-6, 7-6. Moodie made over twice as many unforced errors as Nadal and only won 54% of the points when he came to the net.

Jeff Tarango says it's going to be very interesting to see how Safin's fitness holds up, he played a great match against Nalbandian but he's got to potentially play 3 matches in 3 days with Rochus on Monday and then if he wins the 4th round on Tuesday.

Robredo outplayed Wawrinka to win in straights, Berdych came back from 2 sets to 1 down to beat Tursunov in 5 and Novak cost Andymonium 300AM by beating Malisse !

Sheddie · administrator

On Grandstand, Gaston Gaudio lost the first 7 games against world no 79 Marc Gicquel ! However, he's recovered to now lead 5-3 in set 2.

Lots of the top female players have struggled past lower ranked opponents in 3 sets in rd3 and it may be the case with Amelie Mauresmo. She leads Mara Santangelo 5-3 but has missed a set point and has just saved a break back point. Just now as I type she's sealed the set 6-3.

The big surprise is on Arthur Ashe, Serena Williams is leading Ana Ivanovic 6-2, 3-2. I really thought that Ivanovic would be the player to bring Serena's run to an abrupt halt. She's hitting with a lot more controlled aggression this year and she's had the experience already of beating several big names in slams. However, it looks as though she's being outplayed right now. Serena has just saved 2 bps and it's now deuce.

Sheddie · administrator

Ivanovic has broken back and it's now 3-3.

Sheddie · administrator

Serena beat Ivanovic 6-2, 6-4. A really impressive win and she now faces Amelie Mauresmo in what should be a cracking 4th round match. Serena served really well and clocked a top speed of 124mph which is faster than some of the male players. The unforced error stats were fairly similar - 17 from Serena and 20 from Ivanovic. Serena hit more winners though and from the looks of things she was able to hold easier than the Serb.

A big shock was Gaston Gaudio losing to Gicquel, after being whitewashed in the opening set Gaudio took the next two 6-4, 6-4 but Gicquel hit back in the 4th winning it 6-1 and then took the 5th on a breaker.

Gasquet won in 4 sets over Chiudinelli.

Blake beat Moya 6-4, 7-6[6], 2-6, 6-3. Both hit exactly the same amount of winners and Blake made 1 more ue.

Federer was barely troubled by Spadea winning 6-3, 6-3, 6-0

RJA · Hall of fame

UltimateFlemingFan wrote:

RJA wrote:

It would have been nice for Andre to have a better send off but I think that we can consider last years US Open as his last real stand. The performances he put in then at the age of 35 was magnificent and for a moment he really had Federer rattled in the final. This year has really been a good bye tour and not as it has been sadly clear that Andre's body was no longer capable of meeting the heavy demands of his play.

I agree, at the US Open 2005 we saw Agassi at his absolute best, the tennis he produced then was possibly better than anything before in his career. He had so many classic matches - v Blake, v Ginepri and finally that incredible final against Federer when both players reached near perfection in the first 3 sets. If Agassi had been playing against anyone other than Federer that day he would have won quite comfortable in straights. It's a shame in a way that he didn't retire then but it was so great to see him back in action at Wimbledon this year. I hope he goes into commentary, it'd be really interesting to hear what he has to say having competed against 3 generations of world-class players, many of whom regarded as all-time greats.

Did you see the Agassi-Baghdatis match RJA ? If so, how did you rate it in terms of quality compared to some of his epic matches last year ?

Sadly I didn't see that Agassi-Baghdatis match. I was tempted to stay up and watch it but that day had been my 9th consecutive day at work and my 18th out of the last 19 and so fatigue and alcohol combined to make sleep all too attractive. From what I have been told however the match quality was not exceptionally high (although far from bad) but that the drama was unreal and that Agassi's spirit was as great as ever.

As for 2005, it possibly was the best Tennis of his career. The Blake match was astonishing in so many ways and for a while he had Federer on the ropes in the final. The only thing that cost him the final was that he was having to play at such a level of intensity to compete that it was simply impossible for a man of 35 (with terrible injury problems) to maintain that level over a five set match.

Anyway he will be remembered as a great player and a true legend of the game. I doubt that any tennis player will ever again make the kind of impact with supporters around the world that he did. Even as hard hearted cynical sod I don't mind admit that there was a tear in my eye as he adressed the crowd for the final time.