Thursday, March 7, 2013

Desert Paradise

Both tours have returned for the yearly trip which is the tennis paradise of Indian Wells. There many story lines this year Rafa Nadal has not played a hard court match since Miami last year although his comeback has had two titles on the clay of the Golden Swing, Novak Djokovic and Victoria Azarenka have both not lost a match this year on way to two titles each. While Andy Murray has not played a match since losing in the final of the Australian Open and has not won a match at Indian Wells since 2010.

Women's Early Matches to watch: Draw
Laura Robson vs Sofia Arvidisson to play Julia Goerges.
Madison Keys vs Melanie Oudin to play Sam Stosur
Fran Schivone vs Maria Sharapova- Round 2

Doubles Pairings to watch: Draw
Sveta Kuznetsova and Flavia Pannetta
Petra Kivtova and Yanina Wickymayer
Julia Goreges and Yaroslava Shvedova
Andrea Petkovic and Angelique Kerber

Men's Early Matches to watch: Draw
Go Sodea vs Ryan Harrison to play Rafa Nadal
Ernest Gulbis vs Feli Lopez
Bernie Tomic vs Tomaz Belluci to play Richard Gasquet
Marcel Granollers vs David Nalbandian
Mardy Fish can play either Ben Becker or Bobby Reynolds in his first match since last years US Open.

Double Pairings to watch: Draw
Ferrer and Robredo play Isner and Querrey in the first round.
Grigor Dimitrov and Freddie Nielson in the totally random department
The Murray Brothers!
Feli Lopez and Milos Raonic
Tommy Hass and Xavier Malisse
Marc Lopez and Marcel Granollers- Marc won the title last year with Rafa.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Tennis at MSG


This being my first exhibition I didn't really know what to expect. Were the matches going to be serious matches or hit and giggle fun. The balance seemed to be found through both matches with cameos from Red Foo, Ben Stiller  and an adorable little girl. They were introduced at the start of the event after Fernando Verdasco's girlfriend Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model Jarah Mariano delivered the match balls. The players then came through the crowd to stand on pedestals as they were introduced before Serena and Vika started their match. One thing that I did not know before hand was that the ladies were set to play best of three with a supertiebreaker while the men had a full three set match.

The tone of the matches was actually the opposite of what I expected them to be with the ladies match with the slight detour for Red Foo and some lefty rallying was the more serious of the two matches. Although considering that the last match that either Serena or Vika had played was against each other was the Doha final. The Rafa and Delpo match was much more lighthearted and had this very happy energy about it that felt like it just filled the building. This all started when there was a prematch picture with a group of young kids with Rafa and Juan Martin greeting each one of them before the pictures were taken. The first set of the mens match was proceeding much like a normal match except for the exceptional number of smashes, slices and the like. When they got to the second set things lighten up even more when they had a footie tennis header exchange. Then the fun really got started when Rafa went to get Ben Stiller out of the front row for what seemed to be a two against one until Delpo got a ringer out of the crowd. The little girl that he choose stole the show and even hit a winner on Rafa. While it wasn't always the most competitive or serious tennis it was really enjoyable to especially see Rafa on court in person running around with a smile that had dimples the size of one of the pothole outside on 34th street.