Madrid Masters 2016

First topic message reminder :

I'll update with the men's draw when it's out on Saturday, but the main news so far is who's in it - Djokovic is back after skipping this event for a few years and Federer has also decided to add the event to his previously bare schedule.

The women's main draw also starts Saturday, but without Serena who's played 3 events since last year's US Open. Some interesting opportunities at the top of the women's game coming up with Serena's defence of her French and Wimbledon titles looking shaky.

Men's Draw:
http://www.protennislive.com/posting/2016/1536/mds.pdf

Projected Quarter Finals
Djokovic-Tsonga
Wawrinka-Nishikori
Federer-Nadal
Murray-Berdych

Novak breaks him with a great anticipation knowing Murray was going to try to pass him with a BH cross court. Not good early signs for Murray.

Andy being smacked right and left.

He will go home in next 45 min if he does not wake up.

4:1 for the Monaco Prince.

It's like playing a console tennis game. The ball always comes back and it's always to a good length. Novak looking immensely confident and comfortable. How does Murray (or anyone) get him out of his comfort zone?

Power, just power, like Stan, Delpo, blow him off the court, slices, drop shots, etc etc.

He ain't special, just weak opponents

Djoko takes first set 6:2.

I've seen last week better Challenger Tour matches.

Jahu, I would hardly say wawrinka and del Potro have the perfect formula. Djokovic is 19-4 vs Stan and 11-3 vs del Potro.

Granted Stan had a crazy good day against Novak in French final but clearly it was a rare day given the head to head

Better intensity at the start of the second from Murray. Has to maintain that to make it even slightly interesting!

slashermcguirk wrote:Jahu, I would hardly say wawrinka and del Potro have the perfect formula. Djokovic is 19-4 vs Stan and 11-3 vs del Potro.

Granted Stan had a crazy good day against Novak in French final but clearly it was a rare day given the head to head

Slash, sure, but just one of the ways to beat Djoko, overpower.

He has lost from others too, but those were one off's, while a few of his big losses have been mainly when he was blown with power.

At least this second set seems more entertaining.

Where is LK btw to watch his Andy boy? Again at in-laws mowing the grass?

This is more like it. Shame he keeps gifting Novak set leads by starting each match like he hasn't played tennis before.

In all seriousness, hitting with Rafa seemed to massively help Andy's mindset against him yesterday. I wonder if Novak has any need of a practice partner? It seems to take Andy a set to get used to his serve for starters.

Hold your serve now and take the third.

6:2, 3:6, Andy can take this.

That set is the best I've seen Murray hit his second serve EVER! It's way quicker, way deeper. He's won 60% on second serve against Novak in that set. Unprecedented.

I know he's been working on it, making some technical changes, but wow what a difference.

Great fight back from Murray. Honestly can't see how anyone doubts that its Murray's serve that is why he has problems historically in this matchup. In the first set Murray was only winning 17 percent of his second serve points, and Novak was winning 83 percent of his second serves. In the second set Murray won a majority of points on his second serve and Novak was in 30s and Murray won that set. Really playing well Andy

Unforgivable miss at the start of that game, every final set, Murray falls behind every single time. This will be 6-0

Not even sure why, he doesnt play noticeably worse really, I think Novak just has some final set gear than noone else has, still had to make that fh

Second set 2nd serve points won Djokovic 33 percent and Murray at 60

Djoko melting slowly. Vaporize him

Well well done Murray for putting that thought to bed. Thats a much better response in the final set than of recent times

Andy back in the match, 2:2.

Ridonkulous!

What an incredible backhand down the line on Breakpoint for a winner two thirds of the ball is out and Murray's reaction was priceless.

Ridonkulous number 2 this time down the line with the FOREHAND FOR a crazy winner on the dead run.

Time warning for Djoko on his serve. Murray walks to umpire and tells him he should not have given it.

Break him now!!!!

0:40 break Andy, Djoko choking.

Thats the one Andy, crush the ball.

Utterly terrible, he commits errors on every break point. Novak will need to df twice to gift this to him

Murray's FH seems to be excellent today. Very impressive.

Good fight from Andy, but being No:2 he should of won this game.

Bizarre two lapses with Andy in the second set losing the advantage when he had a break lead. Also having 6 BPs to save to hold an epic last game. Murray played well from the start of second set on. Frankly, the level Novak was playing in the first set I don't think Murray's best could have changed the result anyway.

Cant even take gifts...
This is a rivalry that has lasted its course, hes a great player, but he is NEVER going to beat Djokovic ever again

Congrats to Djokovic. Well played Murray. Both,

Hats to Novak, this goes without saying, proves that MC meant jack squat. Im not sure I can take seeing these two play again, its been the same story for the last 3 years

temporary21 wrote:Cant even take gifts...  
This is a rivalry that has lasted its course, hes a great player, but he is NEVER going to beat Djokovic ever again

Oh come on he had his chances. Murray is going to beat Djokovic at some point in the future on the ATP tour unless he gets hit by a train or something. And judging by Andy's history of bad timing anything is possible. I am a Novak fan but that is just extrapolating too much from one match. I am sure in their 10 or 15 matches Murray will get at least a win in there. It is too far to say he will NEVER beat him again.

temporary21 wrote:Hats to Novak, this goes without saying, proves that MC meant jack squat. Im not sure I can take seeing these two play again, its been the same story for the last 3 years

Very similar to Djoko - Nadal. It's bloody annoying!

Not a hope. That last game is all you need to know. Even if he was gifted the break back there was a 95% chance hed have been broken the next game anyway. He was never really in that final set.

Until he fires his coach and gets someone who can remind him not ti give away cheap errors, there is NO reason to watch this rivarly any longer

temporary21 wrote:Not a hope. That last game is all you need to know. Even if he was gifted the break back there was a 95% chance hed have been broken the next game anyway. He was never really in that final set.

Until he fires his coach and gets someone who can remind him not ti give away cheap errors, there is NO reason to watch this rivarly any longer

You're going to miss a lot of semis/finals if you don't watch Djoko play Murray or Rafa.

Djokovic won playing within himself to a degree, he looked a little jaded to me given he's had much less than 24 hours to recover since playing that 2 HR match with Nishikori last night. I'm a slam situation he's always going to be fresher than this unless the weather interferes. For Masters events it isn't fair the 2ns semi is played 4-5 hours later when they play the final few rounds each day.
Anyway, good match from both but you never sensed Djokovic was going to lose, he just went AWOL and unusually quiet in 2ns set but then turned it on as much as needed in the 3rd. He's the best player in the world by some distance at the moment and must be a shoe in for RG barring disaster...although slams have a habit of throwing in unusual results of course.

Question: why does Andy drop to #3 if he has the same points as Fed?

http://live-tennis.eu/

This could be a victory with a price attached for Novak, as it means a SF against Andy at RG is on the cards.

JuliusHMarx wrote:

temporary21 wrote:Not a hope. That last game is all you need to know. Even if he was gifted the break back there was a 95% chance hed have been broken the next game anyway. He was never really in that final set.

Until he fires his coach and gets someone who can remind him not ti give away cheap errors, there is NO reason to watch this rivarly any longer

You're going to miss a lot of semis/finals if you don't watch Djoko play Murray or Rafa.

Yeah I know...

I wonder if any of them realise that they should be playing long rallies on break points agaisnt him? They dont have to be leathering it for 50 strokes, the number of times ive seen junk get a break youd be amazed.

lydian wrote:Djokovic won playing within himself to a degree, he looked a little jaded to me given he's had much less than 24 hours to recover since playing that 2 HR match with Nishikori last night. I'm a slam situation he's always going to be fresher than this unless the weather interferes. For Masters events it isn't fair the 2ns semi is played 4-5 hours later when they play the final few rounds each day.
Anyway, good match from both but you never sensed Djokovic was going to lose, he just went AWOL and unusually quiet in 2ns set but then turned it on as much as needed in the 3rd. He's the best player in the world by some distance at the moment and must be a shoe in for RG barring disaster...although slams have a habit of throwing in unusual results of course.

It was a bit strange in that Novak wrested control of the match so many times only to just get real sloppy and complacent and let Murray back in the match. Credit to Murray for fighting back with two breaks in the last set and making Novak save 6 BPs to serve it out. But you are right you got the feel even if Murray broke Novak and found away to get to even that it was only a matter of time till Novak would wrest control again.

HM Murdock wrote:Question: why does Andy drop to #3 if he has the same points as Fed?

http://live-tennis.eu/

This could be a victory with a price attached for Novak, as it means a SF against Andy at RG is on the cards.

"the most total points from the Grand Slams, ATP World Tour Masters 1000 mandatory
tournaments and Barclays ATP World Tour Finals main draws," - then some other rules if still a tie.

temporary21 wrote:Cant even take gifts...  
This is a rivalry that has lasted its course, hes a great player, but he is NEVER going to beat Djokovic ever again

And Rafa will?

HM Murdock wrote:Question: why does Andy drop to #3 if he has the same points as Fed?

http://live-tennis.eu/

This could be a victory with a price attached for Novak, as it means a SF against Andy at RG is on the cards.

Well Murray won this event last year when Novak didn't come in so by virtue of his points coming off and only being replaced by a finals appearances he gets penalized for not defending.

Yeah you are right about that but he did regain his own stride and momentum and more importantly further implanted himself (Novak) more and more in to the mind of his rivals as the inevitable champion at RG. Novak has to have the swagger and juice at maximum I think to improve his chances at RG.

Djokovic has won twelve of the last thirteen matches against Murray.  It seems that Djokovic knows how to beat Murray, and Murray expects to lose to Djokovic when push comes to shove.

??? Who mentioned Rafa? Strange...

temporary21 wrote:Not a hope. That last game is all you need to know. Even if he was gifted the break back there was a 95% chance hed have been broken the next game anyway. He was never really in that final set.

Until he fires his coach and gets someone who can remind him not ti give away cheap errors, there is NO reason to watch this rivarly any longer

He can't fire his coach - especially after the big brouhaha putting women's tennis coaches on the map and so forth. Anyway Murray is nearing the end of his career turning 29 next week. You can't teach an old dog new tricks. It's a question of making best use of what he has already got.

You are a Rafa fan and I was curious. Not strange...