"It's better to burn out than to fade away"
There's nothing I like more than seeing a journeyman rise to the occasion.
'Unintimidated' doesn't quite capture the way in which Simon Greul stepped out on Arthur Ashe yesterday without apparently having read the script.
After having lost the first two sets you might have expected him to fade away.
Instead he kept up the free swinging, easy-reeling attitude of the first two sets racing quickly to a 3-0 lead.
Just look at the aggressive way in which Greul steps in to receive serve in the above clip. That's not an aberration. He did it throughout the match making over half of his returns from inside the baseline.
Fed closed it out in three, superbly I thought, given the competition. Don't see anyone beating him in this form.
Clijsters d. Bartoli 5-7, 6-1, 6-2
Clijsters looked flujstered.
I don't know whether it was Bartoli's notorious double-handed flatballing that broke up Kimmie's usually secure, free-flowing rhythm, but for a set and a half she really did look like she'd been out of action for two years. The amount of errors she leaked from that forehand was not at all like the player we've seen over the last month or so.
Lucky for her, Marion suffered a leg injury that seemed to be responsible for the drop in level over the next two sets.
Whatever else you might say about Bartoli, she's not one for 'bum' massages (every pun intended), and it might all have been so very different had that leg held up.
Lucky escape for Kimmie from a match-up I don't believe suits her very well; here's hoping she's expunged all her worst UFEs in this match.
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