Joe Smith

Unfortunately for the future of humanity, there are more than a few religious lunatics like Stanley among us. It is a fascinating psychological question how religious fanaticism can utterly disarm the rational […]

Wow, I didn’t realize that his recent record against big 3 was 7-2. That’s amazing!

Dominic’s best is now good enough to beat Novak on a HC. He brought something very close to it against Rafa in QF, and was a bit under-cooked against Zverev but still prevailed. Djokovic, meanwhile, is past his […]

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Well done to Novak on making an 8th AO final! Roger gave him everything he could, but there just wasn’t much there after the first six games or so. Hopefully he can recover quickly from what ails him and be ready […]

Yes, I agree. Those two Rafa matches were incredible tennis entertainment; this one, not so much.

The match so far is much as I had thought. Fed showed in the first half of the first set that he has more than enough game to play with Novak on this surface. He’s fighting some kind of injury, but still in much […]

It’s all a matter of his health. If he can heal up the groin or whatever it is, he will be just fine. He did beat Novak handily just two months ago on a slow hard court. And don’t tell me this is a Bo5, as if it’s […]

Based on his play in the last match, I think it’s likely that Fed will withdraw. He won’t play unless he thinks his body gives him a good chance to win.

“Adoration of the other is surely better than adoration of the self!”

Good one. But please tell me: what, exactly, did you find so offensive in my original post? (not my speech)

What are you talking about, Amy? I said it was a win over a great opponent, which I truly believe! I also picked Rafa to win this match and the other day I called him the greatest competitor tennis has seen! […]

Well done, Dominic Thiem! A great win over a great opponent! We’ll now have had a young’un in three of the last four slam finals. Definitely a changing of the guard! Maybe this is the tournament that one of them […]

If Rafa wasn’t playing well, he wouldn’t have forced an extremely good Thiem to two tie-breaks. Nadal is playing fine; Thiem is just a little bit better so far. It’s not over yet.

I agree. Nadal isn’t playing badly so much as Thiem is playing great and forcing Rafa into shots he isn’t comfortable playing. Thiem now in the driver’s seat with a 2-0 lead.

Incredible set of tennis from Thiem to take a 1-0 lead. Can he keep it up?

Wow. Rafa breaks but Thiem breaks right back with some unbelievable shots. Rafa leads 5-4, on serve. At this rate, the match is going to go over 4 hours.

What a start to the match. Thiem putting a bit of pressure on Rafa’s serve but can’t convert a BP. Rafa yet to win a point on Thiem’s serve.

Sorry, Sanju, my mistake. You’re also right that most of those Fed-Nadal matches were in 2017. But the point still stands that Novak is a very bad match-up for Rafa on HC. And -I would argue- Fed’s record over […]

Like everyone else, I think Rafa-Thiem will be close. Every year, I think: this is the year Thiem finally overtakes Nadal at slams. Obviously, that will be easier to do on HC than clay. But I’ve reached the point […]

That’s one of most incredible statistics about Fed. 22 years, some 1500 ATP matches, and never once quit a match. It almost makes me re-think the claim I made the other day about Nadal being the greatest […]