Marat do the Right Thing

Day 9 was only about one thing and one thing only John McEnroe playing doubles and no more. Ok, seriously I wasn't sure what to think about this match beforehand I knew Safin was a big chance to win as for one he isn't scared of Rawdick's firepower and the pressure wasn't on him at all. Trying to get a ticket to this one wasn't easy, but through resourcefulness we managed to get inside the arena.

Just before I write about the match, there is something that has been made clear to me during my time here. Roddick is not very popular especially with many of the players, when fans asked me who I thought is going to win the tournament. I said I am not too fussed as long as it's not Agassi or Roddick, hardly anyone disagreed with me when it came to Roddick.

Got into my seat and here comes the match report no ESPN propaganda here. The first set was over very quickly Roddick was solid, not doing anything great, but Safin made 16 unforced errors and hardly any winners in that 1st set, he broke Roddick but lost it straight away. I am thinking that were was a guy that looked like Safin, but he should have been charged with impersonating a tennis player.

The second set begins and I am saying he better improve the depth on his shots, or this will be over quickly. Safin breaks for 2-1 and is beginning to make less errors and hitting better depth on his groundstrokes. He had a chance for a double break at 3-1, but Andrew saves. Safin is changing the spins and varying it quite well. 5-3 to Safin and he has 3 set points on the Roddick serve, which he converts and children we have one set all.

Safin starts serving in the 3rd set and he is moving the ball around very well and Roddick is doing a lot of legwork, though he hasn't had a hard match during the tournament, so it shouldn't be effecting him too much. On serve at 3-3, Roddick had 0-30, but Safin hits a huge forehand and wins the next 4 points to hold serve. Then at 6-5 on Roddick's serve Safin has two set points and takes it on the second and wins 7-5. He is playing some quality tennis and Duckboy has been doing his usual and he is starting to get frustrated.

The fourth set has more of the same Safin playing tennis and Roddick relying on that canon serve which has been quite good and he has had 1st serve percentages over 60 for the whole match. 2-1 to Safin and he had a break point hits a Becker like volley but Pandy hits the ball in the open court for a winner. At 3 all 20-0 the linesman misses a bad fault and Pandy cries about it and continues at the change of ends, Gilbo is angry about it as well. Nice to see things even out in the end don't they? They make it to the tiebreaker and Safin plays a very poor breaker and Roddick played it well and wins 7-0.

I know Marat has a very good 5 set record that not many people would associate with him, and I thought he could do it. Though he played a very lazy tiebreaker and seemed not to be moving as well as previously. Roddick starts serving in the 5th which is a huge advantage. Roddick is hloding easily, whilst Safin was taken to deuce in the first service game and saved a break point in the 2nd. Safin gets a bad call, but doesn't do anything about it. 4 all and it's 0-30 on Roddick's seve, he gets to 15-40 on a mishit backhand and he has 2 breakpoints. Roddick error and Safin Breaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaks and is serving for the match.He was down 15-40 and I am thinking don't throw it from here, you can smell the line. Huge ace to get 30-40 and then after that he decides not to lose a point and comes through 6-4.

Huge effort by Safin who had the overwhelming crowd support, and I high fived my friend who got me the ticket, and this Austrian guy I met outside who hates Roddick more than I do. I saw Denis afterwards and said thanks man Marat has made my week with that result. I can see why Marat wasn't impressed with Duckboy and he was the better player overall and his court demeanour was excellent and held himself together well.