Wednesday
Baghdatis vs. Ljubicic: I thought before this match started that Baghdatis was a chance at winning this match especially with the fact that Ljubo isn't known for his outstanding performances at Slam events. Marcos went in there and was ready to go straight away and was holding his own early against Ljubo.
This match was on court 21 which is right in the back of the venue and there was the Greek and Cypriot support which was very vocal and the Croatian fans and as it's a very small court it created a very festive and good atmosphere for this match.
One feature for Marcos that was working well apart from his forehand was his dropshot that exposed Ljubo's lack of movement around the court and Ljubo was missing volleys as well. Baghdatis was inspired by the Greek support and continued on the good form after winning the 1st breaker easily.
The match was still progressing the same way Ljubo trying to get back into it, but making errors on his groundstrokes, while Marcos was moving him around with his forehand and keeping good length on the backhand and took the 2nd set.
It was fun both sets of fans were giving a bit of cheek to each other and I had the feeling that Marcos will win in 3, but when they got to the breaker, he played a very sloppy breaker and got done easily, then he focused and broke Ljubo' serve easily and then continued on to a comfortable victory in the 4th for a match against Robredo, and when I saw that draw I thought he could easily take him out as I am not hugely impressed by Robredo in general.
Gaudio vs. Fish: Yes, the match between the Cat and the Fish. Before the match I was of the view that if Gaudio can keep good length here he will win and expose Fish's lack of speed around the court and the other faults in this game. The 1st set Gaston was not really there and Fish was serving very well and he was serving a lot to the backhand of Gaudio which he wasn't reading initially.
Then in the 2nd set Gaudio started to return better and then when he was able to make the rallies longer then he became in the dominant position and exposed Fish's lack of speed and won the next 2 sets by using good depth, mixing up the speed of his shots and using good lobs and passing shots, though of course Gaston being the player he is, he made it hard for himself.
In the 4th set he was up 4-1 with 2 breaks and wasn't making many unforced errors and had everything in control, then he loses both breaks and the set ends up in a tiebreaker and this time Gaston plays a very good tiebreaker and produced some very good angled forehands as Fish was trying to move forward and the backhand was working very well. This was a fairly good performance which probably surprised people that he has been able to win 2 matches in a row on the hardcourts and now to prepare for Hrbaty.
T.Johansson vs. Calleri. This match was going to be close, but I thought Johansson would edge this for some reason. The Swedes were there drunk, happily and faithfully cheering on Thomas who appreciates the support and on the other side where a few of the Argie fans and it was a good atmosphere. Calleri wasn't returning as well as he had been against Mirnyi and Johansson didn't seem to shake off a sluggish start like he did against Luczak.
The 1st set was close, but Calleri somehow always manages to throw in a silly game somewhere and that costs him, he was moving more into the forecourt in the 2nd set, some of the time was because the shot was there and the others it was because he came in on a low ball just because he does, as much as like Calleri he couldn't be confused as a tactical genius.
The 3rd set had a familar pattern of holding serves easily, then Calleri played his sloppy game and managed to lose the momentum and the 3rd set. Later in the match Calleri manages a great feat which I will go into detail later. Calleri starts being more aggressive and hitting some very good winners and volleys and Johansson isn't up to scratch then takes the 4th set.
Johansson gets an early break when Calleri manages to serve 4 double faults in a row and I am just there shaking my head as Calleri had only served 5 df's for the match, but 4 of them in a game I mean come on. ToJo was serving for the match and had managed to choke and Calleri got it back to 5-4 on serve then held on. During the 5th set there was a massive wind that lifted the on court umbrella and almost hit Calleri. Then in the last game at 15-30 on Calleri's serve, Johansson got a dead netcord and then it was over for Calleri. He was so pissed off, he grabbed a ball and belted it out onto the railway tracks. It was close, but not a great match per se.
Cañas vs. Verdasco. This one was a match that I didn't fear too much for Cañas actually, why I am not so sure, but I figured he would be alright. Verdasco is on fire in the opening set, he was serving very well and using his huge forehand to dominate the rallies and he was taking advantage of the short balls that Cañas was giving him and stormed to the first set.
The 2nd began very much in a similar way Verdasco moving his serve around, and keeping Cañas off balance, and then when they got into rallies, he was using the forehand and hitting deep with his backhand and making minimal errors at this stage. Cañas was getting a bit shitty questioning some linecalls, then he was done for coaching, though I am not exactly sure what Gumy had done that was any different from before.
He was down 2 breaks at 4-1 in the second and then Cañas started to get tough and work his way back into the match, hitting better length of shots, running down more shots and Verdasco was still being aggressive, but when Cañas broke back twice there was the definite shift in the match and he took the second set 7-5.
After that Cañas was never in trouble as Verdasco had some problems with his back and took a time out for treatment, but Cañas was dominating him then and ran away with the last 2 sets. I was happy with the fight that Cañas showed, but that's a given really and then he overwhelmed him as he is able to do with his determination.
Gonzalez vs. Andreev. The battle of the big forehands which was out on a smaller court and the Chileans were there in force as always. This wasn't a bad match per se, but the feeling was there that Gonzo was always just that a little bit ahead in this match. He definitely started a lot better than he did in the Acasuso match and he had to against a better opponent.
The thing that Gonzo was doing well was using the drop shot effectively to bring Igor into the net and he showed that he wasn't in great form when it came to play at the net and the thing that impressed me about Gonzo's play was the lack of unforced errors and there wasn't as many ridiculous attempts at winners as usual, but he played an intelligent match and the best thing was both of them running around their backhands to hit huge forehands and moving themselves into interesting court positions.
Nalbandian vs. Ventura.
Well David came out and started very well against a very nervous Ventura who couldn't hit a thing in in the 1st set and Nalle wasn't making it easier, he is definitely on his game today unlike when he played Ferrer and everything especially his opponent was irritating the hell out of him. The 1st set was a bagel and then Ventura started to become more competitve, but David was moving into the ball well and making Ventura cover a lot more court with good angles and this is an improvement from before.
All the Ace Ventura comments from the crowd are coming out and they are lifting him and after the 2nd set, he starts to make less errors and is hitting some very good winners from his forehand and his backhand is holding up, there were some good dropshots as well, then they were trying to out finesse each other at the net. Ventura deservedly took the 3rd set and Nalle's level just dropped a bit, but there wasn't the sense that this could be a 5 setter.
Nalle wakes up again and refocuses and put the youngster in his place and wins the 4th handily. This was the 1st time I have seen Ventura play and I like what I saw he will do well in the clay season, he has a good game for the surface and after he wasn't nervous he was a good opponent in this match and after he signed quite a few autographs which is always good.
The last match for this day was the most disappointing the Ferrero vs. Zabaleta match. I was looking forward to this one, even thinking about alternate transport because I might be late from the match going overtime. I was there with a group of South Americans and I saw Emilita from MTF no far from us and getting prepared for the match.Usually I prepare notes from these reports, but in this case it was better that I didn't do that as the reality wasn't very good in this match.
It was one of those days that we have all had in our lives that are hard to forget. Ferrero played well in the way that he was solid and hitting the ball fairly well, but Mariano who had huge support in the crowd and not just from the local ladies, and yes I was asked about him by a few for some some reason, it just didn't happen for him.
He didn't serve that well only at 50% he needed it to be in the 60s at least, but he just made error after error. The first set went quickly and I thought Ok, I'll write that one off and now it's time to grind and fight it out. They were hitting some good shots and Mariano started to try and lengthen the rallies, but when the opportunity came to finish the rally, he would hit the top of the tape with drop volleys when moving forward or hit long.It was very hard for Mariano and this was not a case of him giving up at all in this match, it was just everything he tried didn't work for him on the day.
Yes, the backhand is weaker and he made errors of that side, but his forehand wasn't working so well either and Ferrero well I can't say he was back to his best as he wasn't tested. One thing that could pretty much sum up the match for Mariano was that he won 50 points for the match and he made 44 unforced errors.
Even after he lost the last set 6-0 we all stood up and clapped him because in a moment like this it's important to show that no matter the result that you have to stay to the end and take these kinds of defeats, and Mariano was so dejected obviously, he wanted out of there as quickly as possible and just went through the tunnel.
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