According to Robbie Koenig, Nadal is clearly due to recapture the French Open crown as no man can compete with him on clay over 5 sets. As I have learned over the past few weeks, there are no sure things in sport; that’s why they play the game and hand out trophies AFTER instead of before games begin. Unlike the sports pundits, I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for a few surprises in Paris. Maybe it won’t be on the scale of Soderling’s surprising elimination of Nadal in the 4th round last year, but I certainly hate foregone conclusions!
Even though Federer lost in straight sets today, I feel his play was the best we have seen from him on clay in a long while. Strangely enough, even though he beat Nadal last year, I liked Fed’s performance better this year because Nadal was not exhausted (as he was from his 4 hours + encounter with Djoko) and Feddy managed to stay with him throughout the match. Federer had his chances which is better than I can say for him in his usual encounters with Nadal on clay. Still Nadal is clearly the clay court G.O.A.T., and had a well-deserved win.
Here’s hoping that Fed and the others don’t accept Koenig’s assessment and put up a good fight in Paris. Mercifully we have 3 more weeks and then we can say goodbye to the red dirt, which is not soon enough for this Feddy Fan.