Barcelona: “Dasco-Sizzlehands”

This picture’s doing funny things to my eyes. Is that trophy levitating?

Verdasco d. Soderling 6-3, 4-6, 6-3

I’m going to take this one squarely on the chin – I obviously thought he didn’t have it in him. A charge to which I can only plead that he mostly doesn’t have it in him. At least not when it matters most.

I’m not going to argue Soderling wasn’t all there.

There was certainly an uncharacteristically high number of short balls landing in the vicinity of Dasco’s forehand (of all places) and a scandalously high percentage of misdirected overheads that almost suggested a certain squeamishness about finishing off a point.

Though credit where it’s due and all that – a lot of that was simply down to Dasco weathering the storm and converting on the opportunities presented to him – like those five or so forehand zingers he fired off those short balls Soder-Pop kept sending his way, Nadal-like in their curvature.

But then neither am I about to argue in favour of extrapolating all sorts of clay-court jollification for Dasco over the coming weeks.

Dasco’s forehand is truly an awesome feat of engineering. It puts him a cut above the more traditional clay courters (of which I’ve had a lot to say on over the past few days), but perhaps therein also lies the rub.

Most of the time it seems like he can’t make up his mind about what exactly to do with it. Like it shouldn’t even be there. He wants so desperately to be Daveed Ferrer, yet is cursed with a marginally flatter version of Rafa’s forehand – only with more pace.

Like a trigger-happy Gulbis trapped inside a clay courters body, what sets “Dasco-SizzleHands” apart is at once also the source of the angst I suspect must plague him at his most critical moments – hardly surprising things should go to pot, as often as they do.

Such obvious incongruity has it’s benefits of course: it allows you to coax your opponents into a false sense of security before zapping their carefully honed image of the player they think you are with strokes you’re not meant to possess.

It’s the type of thing the arthouse critics tend to love, but remains, unfortunately, the exception to the rule.

Mundane as it might sound, such grotesqueries aren’t the way of the world - a greater degree of coherence is what, I suspect, ultimately fosters the consistency that carries players through many more matches than the relatively few transient higher profile victories they might score on the back of that one party trick.

Not sure where that leaves Dasco-Sizzlehands - doomed just like his namesake?

Certainly hope not.

(Photo: AP)

Barca Roundup and Something Inspiring

-- I’m not inclined to apologise for the lack of Barcelona coverage.

The truth is, I’ve hardly been following Barca – my default position being that, with Rafa out, this should be Robin’s for the taking.

With nothing more than Dasco and (until this morning) lil’ol Thiemo de Bakker standing between Robin and the title, victory here would not so much serve as a signature-win, as losing would be a telling loss.

It’s not that Dasco can’t hurt Soderling, more that he’d need him to have a bad day. And right now I’d say he’s having rather more of those than Robin.

-- Sod’s learnt to slide on clay.

I kid ye not.

As little as I’ve seen of Barca, I did manage to catch parts of his match against Thiemo de Bakker today. And sure enough, there it was. Clear as day.

It was one of those moments of discovery when time itself appears to stand still - with Strauss’s “Sunrise” score playing in the background.

Trouble is, it currently looks about as natural (and as much of a stunt) as this.

Still, I can’t but help admire that he thinks it important to try.

-- My (very public) reservations about French tennis aside, Tsonga almost had me convinced these past two weeks that he’d “discovered himself” on clay.

His statements to that effect, his last two matches in Monte and second consecutive win over Angsty-Almagro in Barca this week, were almost too good to be true.

Which means, of course, that I suspect they were too good to be true.

I didn’t thankfully, get to see him fold against de Bakker yesterday, but from the reports I’ve read it was a torrid, sorry affair.

I’ve no doubt that he should be able to play on clay – it sits well with my view that clay court tennis has been rebranded over the past few years as a somewhat flatter, more aggressive affair, a not so distant cousin of hard (or indeed grass) court tennis.

In fact so sure am I of Tsonga’s ability on any surface, that I believe he’ll make the migration wholesale - foibles, warts and all.

***

So the Rome draws out. First impressions – Rafa and Roger in the same half, with a semi final face off in the works. That’s not exactly news of course, except no one seems to remember the last time this happened.

Scratch a little deeper, however, and you’ll quickly see that that’s only the (uninteresting) half of it. For this appears to me to be the most lopsided, systematically skewed draw since Daveed and Goliath squared off against one another in the “Valley of Elah Open” as the top two seeds.

In the blue corner:

• Fed to face Gulbis/Baggy in his opening match. Really? Really.
• Rafa most likely set to face Kohlschreiber in his. Yeah, His Right-Honourable Seed-Slayin’ self.
• Hell, let’s throw Sod and Big Berd in there too. I mean they can always be relied upon to capitulate, right?
• And just to prove to you we really are intent on painting every last bit of that town red, we’ll also throw in the Croatian Duo of the slightly improbable winner of IW and this year’s Delpo in for good measure too?

Meanwhile, over in the dead red corner we have:

• Djoko (who must be thanking his lucky stars),
• Tsonga/Dasco (not the toughest of tough cookies – at least not with the dough the French Tennis Federation use),
• Ferrero/Ferrer (clay courters have a place in tennis I believe, though I’m no longer convinced it’s in the clay court season),
• Muzza (in a self-proclaimed existential crisis)
• and..er...Janko Tipsarevic. Whom I only mentioned once in the past week because he can’t be a*sed to twitter.

(Photo: AFP)

Monte Carlo Fallout.

-- Rafa and Big-Berd have pulled out of Barcelona.

The heavens themselves (much to the chagrin of the Barcelona promoters) could be heard to breath a sigh of relief as Rafa, for the first time in five years, elected to pull out of Barcelona.

“I’m in perfect shape,” Nadal said Tuesday. “I feel very good but I don’t want a repeat of what happened last year. For my tennis to be at the right level, I have to be physically well and that’s my principal objective.”

…

“I’m being as cautious as possible so that I can play the maximum amount possible,” Nadal said. “It wasn’t planned. Tennis isn’t like football, you never know how many games you’re going to have to play.”

-- tennis.com

Perfect shape? Perhaps not, but still exactly the type of tempering of his clay court schedule many of us have been hollering out for. For too long it seems.

Perhaps, with the relatively sodden ten or so months he’s had, and with the eagerness that might foster to get back on dirt, 2010 ought to be an exception. But I’d go as far as saying that missing Monte from next year wouldn’t be the worst decision in the world either. Much like Federer has.

Why, of all people, should Rafa need any more than Rome and Madrid (both mandatory events) to find his feet on clay?

-- Berdych. This year’s Robin Soderling?

Not in terms of inflicting tsunami-like upsets on our generation’s best or narking Rafaelites off so very much - more in terms of late-blooming, suppressing daemons and establishing a more credible and worthy presence at the top of the game. Discuss.

-- Nalbandian out for two events with a hamstring injury. Possible return in Madrid.

Not what you want to hear after witnessing his anatomy-defying “hip” exploits over the past month.

Take solace if you can, however, in noting that it could be worse. Much worse.

Hip surgery remains a career-ender for the most part, ushering in a post-traumatic age where simply remaining competitive begins to make one resemble those foolhardy salmon that hurl themselves the wrong way up a waterfall.

Very often into the jaws of a hungry bear. Guys like Kohlschreiber for example.

I don’t detect anything nearly so grim in Daveed’s case but maybe, like Nadal, there’s something to be said on the benefits of a more staggered comeback.

-- Stosur demolished Bepa 6-0 6-3 to pick up her second career singles title and her first ever on clay.

“This is bigger than Osaka, and to do it here and on clay and be playing well all week and everything is just a great feeling,” Stosur said. “You can’t really compare the two, but this is definitely a bigger event, and I’m very pleased that I was able to play so well.”

-- tennis.com

Darn right it’s bigger than Osaka. Before the great WTA Premier switchover of 2009, Charleston was a tier one event, with an illustrious Champions Roll of Honour (Evert won here eight times) and a well-respected sponsor in Family Circle.

Sammy’s efforts have landed her a #10 ranking.

Much has been made of the dilapidated state of the draw, but only that pedantic analyst would elect not to grossly fanfare about her having largely followed up on her well-publicised intent to target singles – and who knows, maybe pick up a title or two? And I currently have him in a headlock.

She’ll find it considerably tougher going repeating her great run of RG 2009, especially given the way in which the presence of the Belgians might affect things, but she’s as well placed to score a high profile upset as she’s ever been.