Federer Defends Cincinnati Title Over Fish

Roger Federer won his first non-major final of the year after losing 3 finals in a row (on 3 different surfaces: Madrid to Rafael Nadal, Halle to Lleyton Hewitt and Toronto to Andy Murray) in Cincinnati on Sunday over American Mardy Fish. The title was his 53rd overall, tying Bjorn Borg on the all-time list at 5th. It was Federer's 17th ATP Masters series title, tying Andre Agassi but still one behind Nadal's 18.

Federer has now won the Cincinnati title in 2005, 2007, 2009 and 2010. Next year it will become a combined male-female 8-day event (immediately following simultaneous men's and women's tournaments in Toronto and Montreal).

The match with Fish was a close, high-quality 3-set affair featuring 2 tiebreaks, one break of serve and only 6 breakpoints between the two players. The final score was 6-7(5) 7-6(1) 6-4. In the first set, Federer had 4 breakpoints and failed to convert any of them due to brilliant serving by Fish. Federer faced one breakpoint in the second set but was able to get through to a tiebreak. In the first set tiebreaker Federer held a 5-4 lead, but Fish played a brilliant point to even the breaker at 5-all and Federer played a loose point to be down 6-5. Fish won the first set on a service winner. In the second set tiebreaker Federer was much sharper, jumping to a quick 4-1 lead and never looked in danger of losing that breaker. The only break in the match came in the 9th game of the third set where, for once, after facing a break point Fish was unable to make a first serve and eventually lost the breakpoint and the game, and eventually the match when Federer served it out pretty easily on his second match point.

Who is Keyser Söze? And is he playing the USO?

 

So, tennis. Remember that?

 

Or a trimmed down version of what I care to comment on.

 

Big Rob reached the finals of Bastad before losing in three to Nico Almagro.

 

Nico admitted to having spent the night before thinking about how Sod might play and even said that he “tried to be him”.

 

I’m interested in how that works.  Is it like method acting?  Does it involve dolphins and jelly beans? Or dolphin-shaped jellybeans even?

 

Big Rob, meanwhile,  has now pulled out of Washington citing “personal reasons”.

 

Though not before this emerged.

 

 

…and the legend, evidently, wouldn’t let go.

 

They can be clingy like that.  Koala-bear clingy.

 

Coming into Russia’s Davis Cup Tie with the Argies, Kolya had this to say on his state of play:

 

"I haven't played for three months and have just had a couple of matches on grass, which I do not like," ... "So I cannot say right now how I am playing. Only time will tell."

 

Leaving aside his aversion to grass “which I do not like” much either, time did tell: a sorry tale of a 2nd round loss in Stuttgart followed by a 3rd round exit in Hamburg – an event he won last year.

 

That’s a loss of at least 400 points in Hamburg and counting, during what’s normally quite a prolific section of the season for him.

 

Word is he’s no longer being coached by Eduardo either. His wife Irena is. Make of that what you will.

 

Nole pulled out of LA citing “personal reasons” too.

 

The same event Muzzard just accepted a wildcard into.

 

It’s difficult to read too much into any of that. The trouble I find with this part of the season is no ones played enough tennis post-Wimby to be able to say anything substantive about their USO prospects and most of what’s going on isn’t broadcast here anyway.

 

 

There’s been the odd pic of a freshly-shorn ARod braving the Atlanta heat winning over Xavier Malisse. But to be honest I’m having a tough time believing that one’s even happening.

 

With that in mind it’s been curiously entertaining watching the whole Delpo situation unfold given that he hasn’t actually struck a ball in 7 months.

 

The train of thought goes something like this.

 

Delpo says he will be playing Thailand –> Which means Delpo might have recovered enough to play the USO –>Delpo will play the USO, or so it’s claimed –> Except, isn’t the USO a mandatory event? –> And Delpo hasn’t officially signalled his withdrawal either –> Which means what exactly?

 

Nothing mostly.

 

It also leaves us back where we started.

 

Thankfully Delpo took charge to confirm that whilst he’s improving he doesn't actually know when he’ll return.

 

Which is kinda what most people thought anyway.

 

Even so, a small part of me wishes he’d let the Twitter frenzy snowball even further – after all, Lord Lucan and Keyser Soze haven’t said they’re not playing the USO either.