Federer in Paris and London

Looking at Federer's chances in 2012, one gets the feeling that, maybe, some things are just meant to be for Federer!

Rather strikingly, the Olympics is coming to London after ages. Could a Wimbledon- Olympics double be on the cards? (which would almost be a Wimbledon- Wimbledon double, wouldn’t it, since the Olympics final is at Wimbledon? To make it even more perfect, the final is 3 days before Federer’s birthday.)

London has of course been good for Federer over the years. That is an understatement. His game has shone on the green grass of Wimbledon and at times, been even more incandescent on the indoor courts in London.

Well, Paris hasn’t been very bad for him either.

After all, Federer is the only person to win the slam in Paris, the Masters in Paris, the slam in London (it is SO funny to call it that) and the year ending tourney in London. The complete set of the four most prestigious titles in these two cities. Quite an achievement.

Let’s just say that it’s safe to rule him out as the author of “Down and Out in Paris and London” (Though, before his famous triumph in Roland Garros in 2009, he might have written “Down and Out in Paris” or even “A Tale of two cities” possibly starting with “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. It was the green grass; it was the red clay…”)

Federer has his work cut out, if he wants to win W and/or OG. He may be able to win yet another WTF, comparatively easily.

I am glad he is still playing.

Is one of those books by the same author as "Homage to Nadal"?

Seems to me though if Federer's still waiting for another slam triumph by the end of the year it'll be his version of "Hard Times".

Impossible to imagine a double for Federer. What I saw in his recent Rotterdam semi with Davydenko is that Rog gives the opponent too many free points and isn't as aggresive. Winning 1 of the 2 is not beyond him however!

JM. Yes, but the Fed-Davy match showed that Rog was still prepared to fight back, after twice looking down and out. Not sure there've been many of the come-from-behind victories by Fed in recent years - he either wins convincingly as a strong front runner or loses fairly straightforwardly.
OK, some might say Davy froze, but it was clear that Fed was willing to scrap which surely bodes well for the immediate future.
As for the Olympics, let's pray for rain and the Wimbedon roof closed. Fed seems to like playing "indoors".

I fully agree with this sfp! Federer has never been a fighter of the Nadal- or Djokovic type. Most of his wins came because he was simply a lot better than his opponent, and in that sense did not need to 'fight' that much.

Esp. in the smaller tournaments (anything not a Slam!), he hasn't put up much of a fight when behind. That's also why his record in Masters events for some quite some years already has been poor.

Do you think he will be trying harder this year to win e.g. Indian Wells or Miami, or will he again 'let it go' if it is getting tough?

IW and Miami are well placed apart and have one round fewer than they used to have, so no excuse for everyone not giving their all. Nole and Rafa have mountains of points to defend over the next few weeks so there is a good opportunity for Fed - and particularly Murray - to close the gaps at the top.
Murray, indeed, has had two successive very poor years on the American spring surface, but I would surprised if he failed again this year.
I don't think by the end of the year we're going to see such big points gaps between the top four as we have at present. Nole, surely, cannot do so well. Maybe Rafa won't do so well, while Fed and Murray are poised to do better than 2011.

"Could a Wimbledon- Olympics double be on the cards?"

No. Beating Del Potro, doesn't suddenly make you the world's best as Murray has alos found out

I'll be surprised if Roger wins any Slams or The Olympics if the Top 2 are around

Have to echo with banbrotam, as the wait for Roger's next slam now reaches 2 years and counting the odds of him pulling it off again seems to lessen with each passing slam. I do still believe that his best chance would be wimby. I think his best hope of beating his rivals is still on the grass of wimbeldon. Whether that rival be Andy, Novak, or RAfa. His serve and slice backhand play so much better there than on most courts.

If anything Roger's performance in Rotterdam did not make me anymore optimistic about his chances. Frankly Davydenko choked away another win against FEd. Which is not unusual for a player of that generation against Roger (ie see Roddick, Ljuby, etc). Roger was the #1 seed and none of the other top 4 showed up, he should win Rotterdam. And the fact that it took a monumental choke job by Davy to give him that title does not make me think that Roger has upped his level in anyway.

Always interesting to compare the Sampras and Fed careers as, because of their birth dates, you just have to go back 10 years to do the maths.
Pete went almost two years (2000 to 2002) without winning a single tournament before coming up with his 14th slam at the 02 USO.
During that period he was smashed in straight sets by Hewitt and Safin at the US finals of 00 and 01. I reckon few would have reckoned that Sampras still had a GS left in him. But he managed it.
Fed, on the other hand, is still winning tourneys and, if not beating, giving the top guys terrific matches. So there's always a chance he could still pull off another GS.
Do I hope he does it? Sure. Will he do it ? Don't think so.

Apart form Nadalovic, Murray, under Lendl, is also closing the gap between himself and Federer. A bit of luck, or one of these three, not firing on all cylinders, would give Federer a good chance to win one or two more slams.

Federer did not need Rotterdam, but had indicated in one of his interviews, that the reception from the crowd, did inspire him to bring out the best in him.

Davydenko did choke, as he does, but he did play well against Gasquet.

Federer has had issues with 'early ball strikers' on slower hard courts, even with an older Agassi.

DelPo, OTOH, had no excuse, losing to Federer, rather tamely.

The key for Federer is essentially the slow bounce and faster surfaces. In Roterdham like in all indoors surfaces, Federer has 2 weapons: BH and FHs. in all other surfaces he only has his FH to hurt.

Next week will be the next test. The field in Dubai is impressive! From the top 10, eight are participating! Only the Spaniards are missing with Ferrer playing in Acapulco and Nadal 'recovering from injury'.

In addition to the top 10 members, there are players like Gasquet, Dolgopolov, Youzhny and Davydenko.

Which player(s) would Djokovic like to avoid most you think?

well Djokovic will want Murray and Federer to land in the same half for starters. Probably also like to avoid Del Potro in the QFs (Fish and Tipsarevic look the easier options there). It is a very strong-looking field, so should be an interesting tournament.

I don't think any of the top players, especially the No 1, particularly care about avoiding anybody. They expect to play and beat anyone who comes their way.

Djoko now has the near-impossible task of defending all the points he won up to the semi-final at the French. Should he go out early in any tournament he could recoup some points by playing Monte Carlo, although he might just accept the fact that can't do as well as last year and save himself for the Slams.
The French is the only Slam where he can gain some points this year so Djoko will want to be ready for that.

sirfredperry wrote:Djoko now has the near-impossible task of defending all the points he won up to the semi-final at the French. Should he go out early in any tournament he could recoup some points by playing Monte Carlo, although he might just accept the fact that can't do as well as last year and save himself for the Slams.
The French is the only Slam where he can gain some points this year so Djoko will want to be ready for that.

HIs task is to retain as many points as possible (same as defending and same as adding)...so not much different than last year actually for him. Going deep in all tournaments he enters will secure his stay at the top.

sirfredperry wrote:Always interesting to compare the Sampras and Fed careers as, because of their birth dates, you just have to go back 10 years to do the maths.
Pete went almost two years (2000 to 2002) without winning a single tournament before coming up with his 14th slam at the 02 USO.
During that period he was smashed in straight sets by Hewitt and Safin at the US finals of 00 and 01. I reckon few would have reckoned that Sampras still had a GS left in him. But he managed it.
Fed, on the other hand, is still winning tourneys and, if not beating, giving the top guys terrific matches. So there's always a chance he could still pull off another GS.
Do I hope he does it? Sure. Will he do it ? Don't think so.

I agree that their birthdays make their progress easy to compare. I wrongly did not believe that Sampras had a slam left in him in 2002, but there are two main reasons why I don't believe that the fact I was wrong about Sampras makes me wrong about Fed when I think it unlikely he'll win another (although I don't think he's done making finals).

First, the attritional style of play is far more bedded in than in 2002; Sampras was still able to rely upon his ability to win cheap quick points with his S&V game at the US Open in 2002. Fed cannot do that so easily against his top rivals unless he's on a rich vein of form which rarely lasts for more than a set or two.

Second, the draw fell for Sampras in a way that it is extremely unlikely to do for Federer at a slam because the other members of the top 4 are far more consistent and have better track records in big matches than the top players in 2002. Below is a list of the first 17 seeds at the USO 2002 which Sampras won. Of the top players Sampras faced and beat Haas, who was an excellent player but pretty much never won a big match against a big player all his career, and then his US Open bunny Agassi who he must have been delighted to see facing him in the final. Safin lost to Kuerten, Hewitt lost to Agassi, Kafelnikov lost to Hrbaty and Henman would not have troubled Sampras. In today's slams you can pretty much guarantee that at least 3 of the top 4 will make the SF's so anybody who wants to win will have to beat one, probably two, of them. If Fed is going to win another slam the draw will have to fall open for him like it did for Sampras back in 2002.

Finally - Federer is unlikely to have his determination boosted by some daft tw*t like Rusedski writing his obituray in a mid-tournament press conference.

1 Lleyton Hewitt (Semifinals)
2 Marat Safin (Second Round)
3 Tommy Haas (Fourth Round)
4 Yevgeny Kafelnikov (Second Round)
5 Tim Henman (Third Round)
6 Andre Agassi (Final)
7 Juan Carlos Ferrero (Third Round)
8 Albert Costa (Second Round)
9 Carlos Moyà (Second Round)
10 Sébastien Grosjean (Second Round)
11 Andy Roddick (Quarterfinals)
12 Thomas Johansson (Withdrew)
13 Roger Federer (Fourth Round)
14 Jiří Novák (Fourth Round)
15 Guillermo Cañas (Withdrew)
16 David Nalbandian (First Round)
17 Pete Sampras (Champion)

Tenez wrote:

sirfredperry wrote:Djoko now has the near-impossible task of defending all the points he won up to the semi-final at the French. Should he go out early in any tournament he could recoup some points by playing Monte Carlo, although he might just accept the fact that can't do as well as last year and save himself for the Slams.
The French is the only Slam where he can gain some points this year so Djoko will want to be ready for that.

HIs task is to retain as many points as possible (same as defending and same as adding)...so not much different than last year actually for him. Going deep in all tournaments he enters will secure his stay at the top.

He does not have to defend all his points to stay No. 1 as Tenez says, and you could have said the same about Federer in 2005-2007. The fact that Djoko ground out that Aus Open win suggests that he's game to carry on winning against the best and that the mantle of No. 1 is not as heavy on his shoulders as it seemed at times on Nadal's.

B'star. Gosh, didn't realise Pete S was as low as 17th seed for the 02 USO. Pretty safe to say that Fed won't be so low come this August. Also see what you mean about the standard of those top 17. 2000-2002/3 was a strange time - kinda post-Pete and pre-Rog. Lots of number ones followed by hardly any new number ones from 2004 to 2011.

This is a good site comparing their respective career.

Though Pete ended 6 years in a row as number one....Fed's record at the very is very impressive too.

http://www.tennis28.com/studies/Federer_Sampras.html

Excellent post by barrystar, of course if Roger was facing the same top 5 talent of 2002 (Henman, Kafelnikov, safin, hewitt, and Tommy Haas) even in their primes I would take Roger hands down. But the problem Roger faces is that the strength at the top of the tour right now and how consistent murray, nadal, and Djoko are at getting to the finals means that he will probably have to win back to back 5 set wars with 2 of the 3 to take a grandslam. That may be a bridge too far for Roger at 31.

Still, I think Roger just needs a lucky draw, it happens in tennis, even in an era as strong and consistent at the top as we are currently seeing. One or two upsets of the big 4 and Roger is there as Mr. Consistent to sweep up another slam. He doesn't have to beat the whole field. Yet, the problem is still there if the other big 4 guys are just as consistently getting to the semis and finals then you aren't going to have a draw open up for you like Pete in 02.

It may or may not happen, can't rule it out. But I think it is at the stage in his career where as barrystar has pointed out he may need a little luck in the draw like Pete got in 2002. But unfortunately for Roger in the current era the big 4 guys just don't lose very often in slams to players ranked below them to make that happen. That is why the Korda's and Johansson's of the world don't win slams in this era.

Socal. Very good point about the consistency of the big four. Last year, apparently, was the first in the Open era when four guys - guess who?! - all got at least 20 wins in the four GS. Previous record was three guys.
Was a time when the odd "lesser" player got to a slam final (Gonzo, Baggy and - more recently Sod and Berdbrain) - but they are hardly even making semis now.
Can't imagine a Schuettler or a Clement even getting to a quarter these days. When was the last time a top four guy lost early in a Slam?

Probably French 09, Djokovic lost in third round,
Murray lost in US 2010 in third round
Those are quite early s'pose.

sirfredperry wrote: When was the last time a top four guy lost early in a Slam?

Very simple. The last time was when talent or a player in form could beat a physical player. It's no longer the case.

Tenez wrote:

sirfredperry wrote: When was the last time a top four guy lost early in a Slam?

Very simple. The last time was when talent or a player in form could beat a physical player. It's no longer the case.

Or maybe when Robin Soderling was in the top 4?

sirfredperry wrote:Socal. Very good point about the consistency of the big four. Last year, apparently, was the first in the Open era when four guys - guess who?! - all got at least 20 wins in the four GS. Previous record was three guys.
Was a time when the odd "lesser" player got to a slam final (Gonzo, Baggy and - more recently Sod and Berdbrain) - but they are hardly even making semis now.
Can't imagine a Schuettler or a Clement even getting to a quarter these days. When was the last time a top four guy lost early in a Slam?

Exactly, Sir Fred that is why I am frankly baffled when people fail to appreciate the incredibly consistent top 4 we have. Would they prefer a helter skelter world of one slam wonders like the women's tour is currently having? The structure of tennis tournaments makes it extremely difficult for players to get a slam if you have a consistent and dominant top 4 guys. That is why the one slam wonder phenomenon is so rare on the men's tour today. For Roger to win a slam I think he needs to have an upset of a big 4 guy in his half. If this happens and Roger has an easy road to the final and gets anyone other than Nadal he has a very good shot. But as you see he needs to have a couple of variables be satisfied:

1. He has to be playing and serving particularly well

2. Needs an easy road to the finals or at least semis

3. Needs a big 4 upset in his half

4. Gets someone other than Nadal in his path

Now these are all doable variables but the fact that most or all of them have to be in place means Roger is going to need a couple of breaks. I just don't think at 31 he could pull off what Djoko just did. I don't think he could play murray in a marathon 5 setter and then comeback and beat Nadal in an even more brutal five setter. But he is in the picture, just needs a couple of possiblities to line up for him. Used to happen all the time in tennis before the consistency of this current group of guys.

Socal. Good point about the consistency. Kinda answering some of the questions raised on the current Djoko-GOAT? topic, it could be argued that Djoko is having to win his slams against the very best of the rest.
No Clement/Schuettler/Baggy final opponents for Nole. At three of the last five slams he's had to beat two of the top four to win it. This is not to decry anyone who has won a Slam but merely to point out that some paths to glory are a little easier than others.

sirfredperry wrote:Socal. Good point about the consistency. Kinda answering some of the questions raised on the current Djoko-GOAT? topic, it could be argued that Djoko is having to win his slams against the very best of the rest.
No Clement/Schuettler/Baggy final opponents for Nole. At three of the last five slams he's had to beat two of the top four to win it. This is not to decry anyone who has won a Slam but merely to point out that some paths to glory are a little easier than others.

Precisely, Sirfred. If Murray were to win a slam in this generation it would be a big deal. A bigger accomplishment in my mind than Johansson or Korda one offing a slam or even Roddick getting the last chance slam of 2003 at the USO. The nature of tournament tennis dictates that the most difficult era to win slams is in a period with a dominant group of 2-4 players at the top, a top heavy draw by definition makes it much more difficult for a player on the periphery to sneak in there. I mean as talented as JW tsonga is unless he is playing out of his mind for a fortnight what shot does he have of possibly having to beat Murray in the quarters, Rafa in the semis, and then Novak in the final. Slim and none even if they let him bring a doubles partner with him.

sirfredperry wrote:No Clement/Schuettler/Baggy final opponents for Nole. At three of the last five slams he's had to beat two of the top four to win it. This is not to decry anyone who has won a Slam but merely to point out that some paths to glory are a little easier than others.

Slam finalists ('outsiders') since 2001... (most of the data from ATP).

Clement 2001 - W/L 37-29
Johansson 2002 - W/L 29-24
Schuettler 2003 - W/L 73-31
Roddick 2003 - W/L 72-19
Gaudio 2004 - W/L 37-24
Safin 2005 - W/L 27-11
Baghdatis 2006 - W/L 37-21
Gonzalez 2007 - W/L 37-24
Tsonga 2008 - W/L 34-14
Del Potro 2009 - W/L 54-16

From 2001-2009 (10 years), there have been three finalists/winners who won more than 50 matches. I can go further back, if necessary. Roddick, Safin, Moya and Ferrero are ATP #1s in their career at some point in time.

The point is that there will always be outsiders, a lot of factors contribute to it.

Does it mean an 'era' is 'weak'? IMVHO, no.

The current 1-2-3-4 are very consistent, hence the predictability to slams now.

sirfredperry wrote: No Clement/Schuettler/Baggy final opponents for Nole. At three of the last five slams he's had to beat two of the top four to win it. This is not to decry anyone who has won a Slam but merely to point out that some paths to glory are a little easier than others.

Baghy gave Nole a tougher match than Naadal in last year's Wimbledon. That's why I don;t see it at all like you. Nadal is a piece of cake for Nole. He can beat him on one leg.

socal1976 wrote:The nature of tournament tennis dictates that the most difficult era to win slams is in a period with a dominant group of 2-4 players at the top, a top heavy draw by definition makes it much more difficult for a player on the periphery to sneak in there.

More difficult for the outsiders (including Murray), easier for the top 2. Djoko for eaxmple, will have to play 1 tough match to win a slam. Rafa is usually an easy match for him the last couple of years, as is Murray for the most part. So unless he has to play Fed, he's currently on a fairly comfortable path to a slam victory.

Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Rarely has it been easier for the top 2 to win slams/get to finals. Equally with the lack of opposition outside the top 4, rarely has it been easier for the top 4 to get to the slam semis.

Tenez wrote:

sirfredperry wrote: No Clement/Schuettler/Baggy final opponents for Nole. At three of the last five slams he's had to beat two of the top four to win it. This is not to decry anyone who has won a Slam but merely to point out that some paths to glory are a little easier than others.

Baghy gave Nole a tougher than Naadal in last year's Wimbledon. That's why I don;t see it at all like you. Nadal is a piece of cake for Nole. He can beat him on one leg.

Yes Novak really thrashed Nadal in their last meeting. Unfortunately Nadal could only win 4 games!

JuliusHMarx wrote:

socal1976 wrote:The nature of tournament tennis dictates that the most difficult era to win slams is in a period with a dominant group of 2-4 players at the top, a top heavy draw by definition makes it much more difficult for a player on the periphery to sneak in there.

More difficult for the outsiders (including Murray), easier for the top 2. Djoko for eaxmple, will have to play 1 tough match to win a slam. Rafa is usually an easy match for him the last couple of years, as is Murray for the most part. So unless he has to play Fed, he's currently on a fairly comfortable path to a slam victory.

Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Rarely has it been easier for the top 2 to win slams/get to finals. Equally with the lack of opposition outside the top 4, rarely has it been easier for the top 4 to get to the slam semis.

Really Julius did Djokovic have to play one tough match to win the AO, come on Julius what about the semi with Murray. I supposed that was just easy pleasy for Novak. Or how about the USO a certain Novak Djokovic down 2 Match points to Federer. And then playing a 4 plus hour battle in the final. In your post you seem to discount the difficulty of the Novak v. Murray h2h is pretty close and competitive.

Berdy, Soderling, and Tsonga the socalled lack of competition you indicate have all played in Grandslam finals. And are actually very accomplished players than some of the players that have won slams in the one-slam wonder era. On a medium hardcourt (default tour conditions) I would favor all three of them in a majority of matchups against both Korda and Johansson in their primes of course. Although that is a hypothetical that I can only rely on having watched all 5 players.

Socal - Djoko's toughest match at the AO was Murray, but Murray hasn't beaten Djoko for nearly 3 years, apart from a retirement (OK, they don't play that often). But you seem to have missed, or chosen to ignore, the bit where I wrote "for the most part".
The final set of the final was tough, but Djoko should have wrapped it up in 4. Rafa is very rarely a tough match for Djoko these days.
You also seem to have missed my comments on Djoko/Fed being Djoko's tough match.

The fact is that the top four are more or less strolling through to the slam semis, unless one has a really bad day.

Murray has reached 5 consecutive slam semis, more than Sampras, McEnroe, Agassi etc - are we about to elevate him to their level. Even Sampras in his pomp was getting knocked out of 3rd rounds, 4th rounds of hard court slams - because of the strength in depth.
And back when the courts played differently, grass court and clay court specialists played a big factor - not any more, because they don't really exist anymore.

The top 4 have it easy at the moment to get to the semis. Of course, with Murray, I'm pleased about it, so I'm simply stating it, not complaining about it.

As for the 3 players you mention - Tsonga, maybe, although he could just as easily throw away the match to whoever he's playing. Berdych and Soderling? Don't see that at all. Both have a losing record to Ljubicic, and you don't rate him at all.

JuliusHMarx wrote:Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Expect Murray to beat Rafa from now on. I am pretty sure of that.

Tenez wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Expect Murray to beat Rafa from now on. I am pretty sure of that.

Im quoting you on that.

Tenez wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Expect Murray to beat Rafa from now on. I am pretty sure of that.

Not sure about in a 5-setter. Murray keeps saying he's going to get fitter, but maybe he won't be able to. Maybe his peak fitness/stamina level is a bit below Nadal's. Also the more Murray keeps missing out on slams, the more pressure/mental demons he has to overcome - I don't think self-belief/clear thinking in critical matches is one of his strong points.
I don't think Andy's quite good enough to keep getting to slams semis all the time, especially once a few youngsters step up to the mark, so he may soon even lose the chance to play Rafa.
Hope you're right though - I just want a Britsh slam winner in my lifetime!

Julius, Murray is in my opinion the toughest matchup for Djoko right now. Fed is still dangerous and Novak has had his way with RAfa.

As to the guys outside of the top 4 I will restate my thesis. I think Del Po, Berdy, Tsonga, and Soderling are all better players than Korda or Johansson ever were. The difference and what makes this era tough is that for one of these guys to win a slam they could very likely have to beat 3 of the top 4 in succession in 5 set matches. If you take the slams each of these players have won or competed out of the picture. And lets say compare Del Po, Berdy, Tsonga, and Soderling their career winning percentage and titles against Korda and Johansson, and having watched all six guys play I would favor the younger guns. Taking into account that most of the younger guys are in their primes or on the cusp and that their career titles numbers will most likely go up.

Therefore, I don't see the competition outside the top 4 as being soft, I just see this as being a case of the top 4 being that good.

Do you think that Johansson would have a slam right now if he had to do what Tsonga had to do in wimby 2011. Beat fed in the quarters, then beat Djoko in the semis, and then beat Nadal in a final? Do you honestly believe that?

socal1976 wrote:Do you think that Johansson would have a slam right now if he had to do what Tsonga had to do in wimby 2011. Beat fed in the quarters, then beat Djoko in the semis, and then beat Nadal in a final? Do you honestly believe that?

No, but he wouldn't have won if he'd had to play Sampras, then Kafelnikov then Hewitt - but they all lost in earlier rounds. (And Agassi didn't play). This was back when great players still had tough early rounds.

Do you honestly see Chris Lewis reaching the final of Wimbledon in the era of Connors, McEnroe, Lendl and Wilander?

I remember Safin saying at the time that the reason why tennis was more competitive than ever before was that the Number 100 could beat any one of the top players on his day. Maybe he was exaggerating, but his point was that strength in depth was the measure he used. Nowadays the Numbers 5-10 can hardly beat the top players.
And please don't try to tell me Murray is an all-time great - but even he strolls through to slams semis these days - 5 in a row, with not a sniff of actually winning one.

JuliusHMarx wrote:

Tenez wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Equally Rafa should take care of Fed and Murray fairly easily, which leaves him with 1 tough match against Djoko.

Expect Murray to beat Rafa from now on. I am pretty sure of that.

Not sure about in a 5-setter. Murray keeps saying he's going to get fitter, but maybe he won't be able to. Maybe his peak fitness/stamina level is a bit below Nadal's. Also the more Murray keeps missing out on slams, the more pressure/mental demons he has to overcome - I don't think self-belief/clear thinking in critical matches is one of his strong points.
I don't think Andy's quite good enough to keep getting to slams semis all the time, especially once a few youngsters step up to the mark, so he may soon even lose the chance to play Rafa.
Hope you're right though - I just want a Britsh slam winner in my lifetime!

Murray can last a 5 setter. no problem. He just needs to make sure Nadal does the running.

I didn't say murray is an all-time great but he is easily, easily the best player never to win a slam, by a country mile.

And don't duck the comparison either. Do you believe in a hypothetical situation I provided (best we can do minus time machine) do you believe that if Korda and Johannsson were forced to play the next tier of talent today, (Del Po, Berdy, Sod, and Tsonga) that the older guys are better than these players? But the olders guys taking opportunities that were presented to them were able to win slams in the one slam wonder era. Those types of opportunities don't exist for the next tier guy. Even Del Po, the one slam he won he had to beat a close to prime Fed and a Nadal in his prime, albeit coming back from injury and on his least favorite grandslam surface.

socal1976 wrote:Do you believe in a hypothetical situation...

No, I don't. They're hypothetical and thus, to me at least, seem a bit pointless, since you can never know the answer.

Yes but julius compare their win loss percentages and the tournaments they won outside of that one charmed fortnight. I watched all six of those guys play a lot. And on either fast or slow conditions I would take the next tier of today's supposedly weaker second group over slam winners Johannsson and Korda. We haven't even broached Murray. Murray is light years ahead of both guys and even he hasn't yet won a slam in this very difficult era.

We've had this conversation before, it doesn't really bear repeating.

Ducking the question again Julius. You of course have every right to participate in posting on things that interest you. But you continually portray the next group of players after the big 4 as soft. And you seem to think that the big 4 have it easy with the players that follow them in the pack. As long time tennis fans I watched all six of the players in question play. Group 1 The old time team Korda and Johansson, both one time slam winners in the late 90s and early 2000s. Group 2 the next tier wonders: Berdych, Tsonga, Soderling, and JMDP. You claim I besmearch other eras and players I don't like, but that is precisely what you do to next tier guys of today.

I would bet my bottom dollar that when their careers are done at least 3 out of the 4 players in the soft touch second tier of today will have more wins and titles than either Korda or Johannsson. And I can comfortably deduce that on fast or slow conditions today's second tier guys would have a field day against these two slam winners of the very recent past. Further evidence of the strength of the current era.

Again I only bring this up because of your portrayal of the next tier guys in today's generation not being up to par. That is completely incorrect they are more than up to snuff when compared to the next tier of previous generations.

I raise points that get completely ignored and then I'm told I'm ducking the question, which is hypothetical anyway. Oh well.

You've not answered the question Julius.