Roger Federer ousted out of Rogers Cup, falls to Tsonga again

There have been a couple of now memorable matches played between the icon, Roger Federer, and the exuberant, excitable Jo-Wilfried Tsonga over the past little while. 

Think of Wimbledon, earlier this year. Tsonga came back from two sets down to record a thrilling five-set victory over Federer, denying the Swiss yet another title at the all-England club. Or the Rogers Cup two years ago, when Federer had Tsonga on the ropes, up 5-1 in the final set, only to lose the match in a tie-breaker. 

But this? Nothing like this has happened before. For Federer, Thursday night’s loss to Tsonga in third-round action at the Rogers Cup will be memorable for all the wrong reasons.


Tsonga and Federer began by splitting two close sets and then the bottom fell out on the Swiss star and No. 3 tournament seed in the third. Tsonga rattled off the first five games of the third set and eventually knocked Federer, a two-time champion, out of the tournament with a 7-6 (3), 4-6, 6-1 victory.


The capacity crowd tried to cheer on Federer in the third set, but Tsonga’s level was too high. On a cool night, Tsonga broke Federer’s serve in the second and fourth games of the final set and for a time there, it wasn’t even certain if the Swiss great would get a game. 

In the end, the powerful Frenchman served out the match in routine fashion. Tsonga, the 13th seed, will now meet Spain’s Nicolas Almagro in the quarter finals. Almagro knocked off France’s Richard Gasquet in the other evening match by a 7-6, 6-3 count.


According to Federer, there were significant differences between his two losses to Tsonga, in Montreal, at the Rogers Cup.


“Two years ago he didn't really deserve the victory,” said a candid Federer. “I believe he played a lot better today, and he deserved it today. Two years ago I think he was lucky to pull out the win. 

Tonight he played well and he played extraordinary shots as we know he can do. I was not able to do that.


Tsonga had a similar take on this most recent encounter, noting: “I really played good tonight. I was opportunistic. I didn't miss any opportunities I had. I was able to break before he did. I'm very happy the way I won this match.


Afterward, Federer was surprisingly stoical about the result. When asked if he was surprised by the result, Federer answered: “I mean, he beat me at Wimbledon, so I don’t know how much of a surprise it is.


“He’s playing well. I thought if he was going to play well again - and me not at my best - he could do it again.”

Nor was Federer prepared to blame the changing weather conditions for the loss.



“I didn’t think it was particularly windy or cool,” he said. “It was fine.

“Sure, it’s different playing under the lights all of a sudden again. It hasn’t happened in a while actually. It might be the last match I played under the lights was against him in Rome. That was on clay. Before that, probably Miami. So it takes some getting used to.”


For Federer, it marked yet another disappointing loss in a year in which he has won just a single title - in Doha at the start of the year. The only other time this season that he didn’t reach at least the quarter finals in a tournament came in Rome in May when Federer lost in the third round to Gasquet.


But there is always still the U.S. Open and as Federer noted, there is still time to get ready: “New York is in one month. I feel it is far away.


“If you want to talk about the U.S. Open, I can tell you I feel good mentally and I’m playing well.”

Federer became the third member of men’s tennis Big 4 to fall in the early rounds of the Rogers Cup, joining No. 2 Rafael Nadal and No. 4 Andy Murray on the sidelines, a point Tsonga stressed in his interview, post-match.

theglobeandmail.com

I don't have much to say on the matter, other then I think I'm going to wipe this match from my memory and start looking forward to the U.S. Open in a couple of weeks (as well as Cincinnati next week).

Kim Clijsters withdraws from Cincinnati Open

Tennis.com reports that defending champion Kim Clijsters will withdraw from the Western & Southern Open following an abdominal injury that forced her out of the Rogers Cup in Toronto.

Clijsters, 28, has a partial tear in her left stomach muscle. After retiring in the second set of Tuesday’s match against China’s Jie Zheng, Clijsters said stomach muscle tightness bothered her during her warm-up and worsened when she started serving.

“Before the match, I got taped to try and protect the muscle as much as possible so that I wouldn’t make it worse,” Clijsters said in a press conference. “And during my match I just felt like, yeah, it just went worse and worse.”

The World No. 2 has had a spate of injuries this year, including her shoulder, wrist and right ankle. Since March she has withdrawn from five tournaments and retired in two.

She said she would “try to do everything to obviously be ready for the US Open,” where she’s the two-time defending champion. 

Today, tennis.com said her coach, Wim Fissette, told a Belgian newspaper she was merely “hopeful” about playing in the Grand Slam.

The Belgian player’s absence tinges an otherwise celebratory year for the nine-day W&S, which debuts a new combined format featuring simultaneous play between genders. Qualifying begins Saturday at the Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason.

Clijsters had not officially withdrawn from the W&S as of 3 p.m. today, tournament officials said.

cincinnati.com

No big surprise there and probably for the best if she wants to have any chance in New York at the end of the month.

Martina Hingis speaks horse riding with CNN

Martina Hingis' next challenge by CNN_International

Great little interview I had no idea she's had Cortino for 14 years.  Wow.  Beautiful horse.

Roger Federer through easily rematch with Tsonga in 3rd round of Rogers Cup

World No. 3 Roger Federer set a Wimbledon rematch with Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga after beginning his summer hard-court campaign with a 7-5, 6-3 win over Canadian wild card Vasek Pospisil on Wednesday afternoon at the Rogers Cup in Montreal. 

Federer's loss to Tsonga in the Wimbledon quarter-finals was the only time he had lost a Grand Slam match after winning the first two sets. He also let slip a big lead against the Frenchman on their last visit to Montreal in 2009.


“I will not think about that Wimbledon match as much as I might think about the match we had here two years ago,” admitted Federer. “Both matches were, so to speak, not normal matches. One, I was up (5-1) in the third and I should have won. I never lose those. In Wimbledon, I lost in five sets. Again, that doesn't happen often to me. So these two matches were strange matches.”

In his first main draw appearance since Wimbledon, Federer came up against the 21-year-old Pospisil, who had notched his first tour-level victory Tuesday against Juan Ignacio Chela to set up a second-round meeting with his idol. Pospisil managed to hold his own against the two-time Rogers Cup champion through the first 11 games of the match. 

Federer finally seized the lead as he capitalised on his first break point to secure the opening set and then broke open a 3-0 lead to start the second, which proved enough for the victory. The Swiss won 85 per cent of his service points and improved to a 40-8 season mark.

Federer, who celebrated his birthday Monday, said of playing his first match as a 30 year old: “It felt good. I'm still able to move. The match was tough because I was playing against a player I don't know so well. It was my first match outdoors on hard courts, although I played Davis Cup. It was a bit tough. 

“I believe I didn't play so well, wasn't aggressive enough. But also I must say he didn't give me the opportunity to do that. He was playing well. So I'm happy I came out of it and I will have a second chance tomorrow.”

Federer takes a 4-2 head-to-head lead into his next match against Tsonga. The No. 13 seed fired 15 aces to defeat Australian wild card Bernard Tomic 6-3, 7-6(1) Wednesday.

“This makes you come down to earth again and you have to face reality suddenly,” said Tsonga of playing Federer next.

“Even if I beat him in Wimbledon, that doesn't mean I will be able to beat him all the time. He's still the best player of all time. I have my chances, but it's going to be difficult, of course.” 

atpworldtour.com

Kim Clijsters out of Rogers Cup with torn stomach muscle

Kim Clijsters could miss out on the chance to defend her US Open title later this month after retiring against Zheng Jie at the Rogers Cup in Toronto.

The Belgian was a set up when she withdrew with a stomach problem.

Asked about her prospects for Flushing Meadows, she said: "I still have a few weeks until then so will try to do everything to obviously be ready."

Clijsters was leading 6-3 1-2 when she pulled out, showing some discomfort after hitting a forehand, and she later revealed she felt pain in her stomach during the warm-up and had it taped ahead of the match.

She added: "During the match it just felt like it went worse. I already had an ultrasound here on site and I have a partial tear in my left stomach muscle and a little bit of blood."

Clijsters, who has won the US Open for the last two years running, injured her right ankle in April and then withdrew from tournaments in Rome and Madrid with shoulder and wrist injuries.

Tuesday's match was her first match since returning from a foot injury suffered in the Netherlands in June which forced her to miss Wimbledon, and she now faces a race to be fit for the US Open, which starts on 29 August.

BBC Sports

Well, this sucks.  I was really looking forward to seeing her play again.

She seems to be cursed with injuries at the moment, and just cannot catch a break.

Sounds serious though hope it doesn't impact her chances of participating in the U.S. Open.

Get well Kim!.

Martina Hingis dismisses possible comeback, and comparisons to Wozniacki

Back in her heyday, before players stopped being intimidated by her wicked smile and crafty game, Martina Hingis won numerous points by skipping inside the court and short-hopping big blasts for winners.

Like most top players, she had hand-eye coordination to die for and before her fellow Swiss Roger Federer became famous for half-volleying forehand winners, she made a living off it against powerful Hall of Famers like Steffi Graf, Monica Seles, Venus Williams and Lindsay Davenport.

Form 1997 to 1999 when she won all of her five majors, Hingis ran down every ball in sight. She was one of the greatest defensive players ever seen, and could mix in a bit of offense too. But while she was a thinking person’s player, she did not paste the ball with much more authority then than current No. 1 Caroline Woznaciki does today.

In fact, they have similarities, with significantly better backhands than forehands, a willingness to extend opponents until they dropped from exhaustion, marginal serves and consistent returns. 

 

Hingis certainly was a better return of server than Wozniacki is now because she read the game better and was very competent at reflexing back returns. She also managed her matches with more acumen and had a better understanding of the X's and O's.

But Wozniacki already has a better serves than Hingis did and is naturally stronger so if she can find a way to add more pace to her forehand and show more guts at the Slams, she should find herself with at least one Slam title in the next year or two. 

 

But do not tell the now retired Hingis that “Caro” is even in her class. But the time that the prideful Hingis was 17 she had already won three Grand Slams. Wozniacki just turned 20 and has zilch.

“I think I had more game than her,” Hingis told me at the Mercury Insurance Open in San Diego: "I don’t want to be cocky about this, but I think I had more [weapons]. She’s a great fighter but I out played [opponents] and I took the ball earlier and didn't give them as much time. If she wants to win a Grand Slam, she’s going to have to take charge more. She doesn't have one great weapon. You need that one little extra thing to overcome.”

When I mentioned to Hingis what an extraordinary amount of confidence she had when she came on tour, she immediately shot back that, "you need to win to have confidence.” While Wozniacki was a terrific junior, she was not Hingis, who was already beating solid pros when she was just 14.

“She does the best with what she’s got,” Hingis said of the Dane. “Everyone is saying she hasn’t won a Slam but maybe it’s a question of time. Lately she's struggled more because there are probably more players at the Grand Slams who are better than her.”

Wozniacki will return next week at the tournament in Toronto, hopefully refreshed and ready to make a major push.  Despite her poor performances at Roland Garros and Wimbledon, it would not be stunning to see her win either Toronto or Cincinnati, as she’s a terrific hard court player who is more comfortable cutting loose at WTA Premier 5 events than she is at the Grand Slams. But it’s at the US Open when she will once again answer the question as to whether she’s worthy of the top spot.

Hingis proved her worth during her 209 non-consecutive weeks in the top spot, even though by 2000, the Williams sisters and Jennifer Capraiti were coming very hard, and Davenport had figured out ways to punch through her. 

 

It is often forgotten that Hingis won her first Slam title at the 1997 Australian Open at 16 and her last Slam singles title at the age of 18 in the same locale. What many do recall is that is that by the end of 2002, she was burned out, which is why she took an indefinite break from the Tour.

Recall that when the WTA came up with its excellent age eligibility rule that it was nicknamed the "Capraiti rule".  Maybe it should have been nicknamed after Hingis?

The Swiss is now just 30 years old and she looks younger than she did in 2002, when she frequently appeared exhausted, or in the summer of 2007 toward the end of her “second career” when she had just been informed that she had tested positive for cocaine at Wimbledon and that her then fiancée, ATP Player Radek Stepanek, had broken off their engagement. 

 

During that summer swing in California, Hingis was so desperate for answers that she actually asked the media what she should do with her game. 

 

Answers were given but none were accepted because by that point she had absolutely had it with the grind of the tour.

Her comeback was reasonably successful as she won two singles titles and climbed back to No. 6, but it did not satisfy her very high standards.

Now there is a lot of chatter about a possible third comeback so she could play mixed doubles at the 2012 Olympics with Federer. 

 

My impression at this point is that it's not going to happen unless Federer rolls out the red carpet for her, because she does not seem excited at the prospect of having to play at least a few months on tour in order to get her ranking back up in order to have a chance of qualifying. 

 

She already seems to feel pressure at the prospect, telling me that, “To play with Roger you’d have to being playing great, right?”

I said don’t worry about it, as those two would be so good together that only other phenomenal teams – say the Bryan brothers with the Williams sisters – would stand a chance of beating them, even today with Hingis only competing in pro-ams, senior events and World TeamTennis.

Hingis still has a very large fan base and every single one of them wants to see her make a comeback. Hell, if the 40-year-old Kimiko Date-Date can play top-55 ball, wouldn’t one surmise that Hingis could make a top 20 push at 30?

Maybe, but only if she wanted it really badly and she doesn’t seem to.

“She always been a marathon runner and kept herself in great shape. I don’t do that,” she said with a laugh.

Actually, Hingis is in good shape overall, but she needs to add lot more muscle in order to withstand one three set match after another in singles on tour. As she said, victories in World TeamTennis matches tempt her, but she realizes they play only 5 games, no-ad sets.

Hingis says she has learned to never to say never about comebacks, but the newlywed added that she’s comfortable with her life now, and more excited about new opportunities than she is about chances that she had and either took or let go.

Really, the only way that Hingis is going to play with Federer is if she stages a comeback in doubles. Lisa Raymond, who is still a top doubles player at the age of 36, once told me that Hingis was the best doubles player she ever faced.  

 

Clearly, with a good partner, she'd rise up the ranking quickly. You don’t think that she isn’t already better than the current doubles No. 1, the 36-year-old Kveta Peshke?  Think very hard again.

But go back to Hingis' statements about Woznaciki and try to catch the tone of her voice. She considers herself an all-time great and to her, all-time greats are no hold barred singles players.

“I was never really just a doubles player; my pride was higher than that,” she said.

 

tennischannel.com

Roger Federer excited to turn 30 at Rogers Cup in Montreal

As he approaches his 30th birthday next Monday on day one of the Rogers Cup in Montreal, 17-time ATP World Tour Masters 1000 champion Roger Federer insists that he has many good years of tennis ahead of him. Federer, who is No. 3 in the South African Airways ATP Rankings behind new World No. 1 Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal, said during a telephone press conference Wednesday that he is encouraged by the longevity of past players such as Andre Agassi, who won 15 titles, including two Australian Opens, after turning 30.

“I [have] inspiration [from] guys that played for a very long time, like Andre Agassi, Jimmy Connors, Ken Rosewall, Rod Laver, as it's very inspiring to see what they've been able to do,” said Federer.“People tend to say that after a certain time or when you have kids you can’t win any more. I don't want to say I'm a special case, but I've won so much, I feel like if I put myself in the right position, do all the right things, I'll definitely get a shot again of winning big tournaments.”

Federer, who won his lone 2011 title in the first week of the season in Doha, played down the significance of turning 30. “Birthdays happen. They're part of life. I'm happy I'm getting older. I'd rather be 30 than 20, to be honest. To me it's a nice time.”

A winner of the Rogers Cup in 2004 and ‘06, Federer added. “I’m excited to see how the Canadians are going to celebrate my birthday this time around. Sometimes they start singing 'Happy Birthday' during a match. I'm not going to play on Monday, but you never know if they're going to do something crazy another day.”

Federer, who reached the quarter-finals and final in his past two appearances in Montreal in 2009 and ’07, will play The Rogers Cup and the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati, where he is the defending champion, in preparation for the US Open, an event he won five straight times from 2004 to 2008. 

“Every time the US Open rolls around, I'm very, very excited,” expressed Federer. “It’s a great feeling coming back to New York. Honestly, I liked it from day one. It was one of those tournaments I right away I fell in love with.”

The 16-time Grand Slam champion last lifted the trophy on Arthur Ashe Stadium three years ago, defeating Andy Murray in straight sets. Though he hasn’t won a Grand Slam title since the 2010 Australian Open, the 16-time major champion believes he has several more opportunities to add to his Grand Slam haul. “My game is in a good place right now and I'm excited to see how I'm going to do at the US Open,” said Federer. “I don't feel it's my last chance, not at all. I see many more chances to come.”

 atpworldtour.com