Australian Open Tennis - the end for 2007

As I expected, Gonzalez didn't quite come through. He lost a quite tight 3 setter against the world's #1 Roger Federer.

I think both these guys probably would have beaten any other players and certainly did a good job with the other contenders.

It was an OK match, and the first set was really close with Gonzalez leading by a break for part of it (Federer broke back immediately). Until that point, I had hopes that it would actually be a great match.

Still, except for the first set, Federer was holding serve more easily (lots of love games) and threatening more on Gonzalez's serve. Except for the odd point, we never quite saw Gonzalez open up as he did in so many other matches. We knew it would be different against Federer, and Federer's speed, somewhat under rated meant that he was getting to balls that a lot of the other players wouldn't have. 7-6, 6/4, 6/4 was a little better than Roddick's semi-final of 6-4, 6-0, 6-2.

Ah... my best news is that a Canadian got a title this year at the Aussie Open. Daniel Nestor got through a solid 6/4, 6/4 win with his partner Elena Likhovtseva. I've followed Daniel Nestor since he was 19 and played Davis Cup for Canada. Ranked 400+, he beat the then #1 player in the world Stefan Edberg in 5 sets. Good day for Canada. :)

Australian Open Tennis - a great year

I'm been a tennis fan since the late 80's and the first match I remember seeing (just as I was starting to play) was the 1989 French Open final. Michael Chang versus Stephan Edberg.

This year has been very interesting with the injection of Fernando Gonzalez into the mix. Sure, sure, he's been around a while, and he IS #10, but no one, and I mean no one expected him to roll over Hewitt, Blake, Nadal and Haas the way he did. It was almost like they weren't on the court with him.

We expect this kind of thing from Federer, after all, check out the semi against Roddick. It was painful to see such a dominating performance, especially against a guy as good as Roddick.

Still - that means we get a final with Gonzalez and Federer. Gonzalez is the only guy playing well enough to challenge Federer at the moment, and if he can continue playing the way he is, it will be a fantastic final. I'm expecting Gonzalez to go away, but in last night's semi-final, just as Gonzalez wins match point, the Australia day fireworks go off - a sign maybe? Here's hoping for a match that goes down in history, no matter which way it goes. I'll be cheering for Gonzalez.

Unfortunately, the women are nowhere near as interesting, with Serena Williams playing only 4 tournaments all last year and yet comes along and beats everyone, including Maria Sharapova, the world's #1 - and in one of the most dominating wins in the last decade. It's sad that there is so little depth in the woman's game.