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Australian Open 2017 OT

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Dispatch

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He's generating good spin, his problem has more been depth. I don't think he has quite the forehand power to do both depth of court and high spin at the same time, he's had to pick one or the other so far. I don't know whether that makes much difference though, because Federer never had problem reaching Nadal's shots, just doing anything useful with them.

That might be true, but I know it's much more difficult to handle a shot that has good depth. I admit I'm rooting for Fed, so maybe I'm just looking for reasons for him to win.
 

RedAssedApe

Banned
I wouldn't call a 11-23 overall record and a 2-9 record in grand slams matches a "rivalry". Nadal will crush Fed with the way he gains momentum in the later rounds.

Still, it will be an absolute treat to watch two of the greatest play for it all again for what might be the final time.

its still a rivalry even if the results look one sided. the top players who are/have consistently playing/played each other for titles can be considered rivals. i.e. roddick v. federer was a rivalry

I don't know that rafa has actually shown anything in the matches he's won where it looks like he's back in form. That's the thing that probably scares Fed fans the most though.

I kind of want to root for Dimitrov. Finally live up to that Baby Federer moniker heh. But yeah Nadal v. Federer would be the best sports story. Especially if Fed could actually finally beat him after a decade of losses. Not to mention the parallels with Sampras beating Agassi, being old, coming back from 6 months off, etc.
 

BorkBork

The Legend of BorkBork: BorkBorkity Borking
its still a rivalry even if the results look one sided. the top players who are/have consistently playing/played each other for titles can be considered rivals. i.e. roddick v. federer was a rivalry.

Agassi v. Sampras is a rivalry. Roddick v. Federer is lop-sided domination. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that.
 

Speevy

Banned
Nadal can beat Federer when they're both at their best, but Nadal is not at his best.

Let's hope there's something wrong with Nadal's form so we can at least have a five setter.
 
Form won't decide who wins. It'll be the conditions, between Fed and Nadal. Low bounce Fed could certainly win. High bounce Nadal wins. Aussie open is bouncy. I expect Nadal to beat Fed easily.
 

RedAssedApe

Banned
Form won't decide who wins. It'll be the conditions, between Fed and Nadal. Low bounce Fed could certainly win. High bounce Nadal wins. Aussie open is bouncy. I expect Nadal to beat Fed easily.

are they? roger himself has talked about how the courts are faster this year and how it might explain how some players made it farther in the draw then expected. i would expect the courts to be less bouncy if they are faster
 

leng jai

Member
Form won't decide who wins. It'll be the conditions, between Fed and Nadal. Low bounce Fed could certainly win. High bounce Nadal wins. Aussie open is bouncy. I expect Nadal to beat Fed easily.

The AO hasn't been considered bouncy since they ditched Rebound Ace in 2008.
 

JBwB

Member
Just under one hour until the semifinal between Rafael Nadal & Grigor Dimitrov begins.

Should be a fairly interesting match.
 
Looking forward to the match tonight and I'm not sure what to expect. It's interesting how much everyone's perception has changed. Prior to the tournament no one would have given Nadal a chance of making the final and now I think most probably have him as the favourite.

I still think Dimitrov can go all the way. It just depends if he can break the trend of young promising players stumbling at the final hurdle or being yet another stepping stone for one of the big 4 to get another slam.

Either way, Nadal is in great shape heading into Clay court season next week. He'll be the favorite at the French even if he's only 75% healthy

Yeah Nadal has a great chance of adding another French to his tally. Maybe this Australian open will decide which player ends up with he most slams? That's a big part of why there is so much excitement for the math and so much tension between fans. At this point it isn't totally decided who is the best player of all time and if Nadal catches up to or overtakes Fed than that could change everything. It's pretty exciting seeing history unfold in front of you like that.
 

Kensuke

Member
If this was an earlier round I might have given Dimitrov a chance, but there is no way he's keeping Nadal out of the final.
 

oti

Banned
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
 
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ GRIGOR TAKE MY ENERGY ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
 
He's coming for you Roger

giphy.gif
 
are they? roger himself has talked about how the courts are faster this year and how it might explain how some players made it farther in the draw then expected. i would expect the courts to be less bouncy if they are faster

Hmmmmm, players say these kinda things every year, and argue about it. If Fed is saying it, it probably is faster. But he I think players also who like fast conditions wanna psych themselves into believing its truer than it actually is.

They do all the numbers somewhere that tells us how much faster or slower it is than last year, I've seen the Wimbledon comparisons, year to year, how the speed changes before.

It might be faster but it's still the Australian Open, doesn't seem fast enough for Fed to beat Nadal, at all. Aussie open, even if faster this year, is usually owned by defensive players, Djocko, Agassi.

I called Nadal handling Dimitrov with ease, pinning him back into the backhand keep it high there. He'll do it even more brutally to Federer. Federer, in the last 5 years has only beaten Nadal when the condistions are very specific. Either very fast, or very low. Fed is basically a god when it's both. That's what he is the most fine tuned for. Few years ago, either Paris or Shanghai, Nadal only took 3 games off Fed, cuz of the insanely low bounce.

Australian Open isn't really going to give Fed those conditions. Poor guy, even the last Wimbledon was decided on conditions. Wet slow day, made it pretty easy for Novak. Believe it was the same thing the year before, more so, where he didn't let Murray play in the semis, but serve was ineffective on final on a overcast slight rainy final.
 
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