Docalex007
Hall of Fame
Thanks, purge! Still not quite complete though... need some sad music.
Watching RF is like sitting through a Greek tragedy; the hero fatally flawed against his archenemy.
[2]Rafael Nadal vs [3] Roger Federer 2012 Australian Open Semifinal
- Thread starter kishnabe
- Start date
Thanks, purge! Still not quite complete though... need some sad music.
Watching RF is like sitting through a Greek tragedy; the hero fatally flawed against his archenemy.
Clarky21
Banned
A
aprilfool
Guest
Docalex007
Hall of Fame
Docalex007
Hall of Fame
Seven straight on Sunday. Very cool.
Screw that, I'm not pulling for Djokovic just because he's likely to beat Nadal again and stop him from winning another slam. I won't spite Nadal like that.
Go Murray!
double barrels
Rookie
really pulling to see a djoker nadal final now. wanted fed to win. his chances of getting another slam had to go down 5-10% now, he'll be 5 months older before he can try for another slam (wimby).
seems like federer's confidence against nadal outdoors is gone
seems like federer's confidence against nadal outdoors is gone
i do think fed doesnt get enough credit for the way hes still playing tho. apart from the motivation that is already remarkable in itself he keeps it up against all odds.
nadal has been and will always be the ultimate nightmare matchup and he will not go away, hes well past his physical and mental prime, the conditions dont suit him at all anymore (except for indoor HC), and STILL.. hes right up there. virtually one step away from winning the big titles. all it wouldve taken is one little push at the right time and the last 2 years couldve been very different title wise.
im really happy hes still there playing his kind of tennis. and as long as i can watch him play matches like he did here en route to that SF im not complaining. im actually afaraid of what will happen when he eventually does decide to quit. if tomic is all we have to look forward to in terms of tennis finesse there are dark times ahead of us
nadal has been and will always be the ultimate nightmare matchup and he will not go away, hes well past his physical and mental prime, the conditions dont suit him at all anymore (except for indoor HC), and STILL.. hes right up there. virtually one step away from winning the big titles. all it wouldve taken is one little push at the right time and the last 2 years couldve been very different title wise.
im really happy hes still there playing his kind of tennis. and as long as i can watch him play matches like he did here en route to that SF im not complaining. im actually afaraid of what will happen when he eventually does decide to quit. if tomic is all we have to look forward to in terms of tennis finesse there are dark times ahead of us
A
aprilfool
Guest
So you've rewritten the rules?
A
aprilfool
Guest
I will. Two timer wasters going neck to neck. It's perfect!
I could not see the game, I recorded it. Just saw a few games early this morning as I had to go to work. But, based on what Ive seen about Federer lately, he still has that great talent but commits errors in a more regular basis and gives out free points. And, if that is done in crucial moments of the match, that will cost him the match.
If Federer can maintain his concentration and reduce unforced errors, he can beat Nadal. This is my reasoning eventhough Im a Nadal follower and appreciate his style of play.
The good thing is that if the rankings dont change, we will see more Nadal-Fed matchups as they will be in the same side of the draw. This, considering they are not eliminated in the early rounds.
I really think Fed has at least two-three more years of quality tennis in him at this level.
zagor
Bionic Poster
I mostly agree, I still enjoyed Fed's tennis immensely this tourney, his game is still in good shape.
nadalwon2012
Banned
I didn't pay attention to the stats during this match. Focusing on the dramatic moments was enough. Looking at the match stats now, here are 3 things that stand out:
* Federer only had 10 more winners than Rafa. Even when Rafa beats Federer, I expect Federer to have a lot more winners than Rafa.
* Federer came to the net 57 times. That is a huge number for a 4 set match. Can't say Federer didn't attack.
* Rafa had 16 break points. 6 more than Federer! That is different to most of their other meetings.
* Federer only had 10 more winners than Rafa. Even when Rafa beats Federer, I expect Federer to have a lot more winners than Rafa.
* Federer came to the net 57 times. That is a huge number for a 4 set match. Can't say Federer didn't attack.
* Rafa had 16 break points. 6 more than Federer! That is different to most of their other meetings.
Oh, I don't like it either, I wish it would stop. But you can't call that an excuse why Fed lost, because he's played him 27 times and hasn't complained about it.
DjokovicForTheWin
Banned
Fed did complain about it during the match.
THUNDERVOLLEY
G.O.A.T.
Laver has the accomplishments to warrant such priase. Federer does not.
THUNDERVOLLEY
G.O.A.T.
^ Damn, that's such a desperation-soaked excuse.
LetsGoRoddick
Professional
Tough match because I am a big Federer fan but being the massive ******** that I am, the result is all good for me.
Big_Dangerous
Talk Tennis Guru
Same here. I think the new rivalry is Nadal vs Djokovic.
They now have a much closer h2h than Fedal.
A
aprilfool
Guest
Laver didn't have a rival whose game plan included intentionally slowing down his pace, something that is prohibited and strictly enforced in every other popular sport.
Our commentators have been dishing out the justifications to this over the years by saying that players don't mind because they need the rest after a rally with Nadal. That is ridiculous.It's Nadal that needs to rest after a typical rally.
It benefits Nadal in two ways. It breaks the concentration of his main rival who is famous for his brisk pace. Actually his pace is normal. It just seems brisk because the game is slowing down.
Nothing against Nadal personally.
Sid_Vicious
G.O.A.T.
That is just your opinion and you love shoving it down other people's throat with fervent arrogance, just like those Federer/Sampras fans do.
ruerooo
Legend
What in the world are you talking about? Roger breadsticked Rafa in the WTF just last year. The way he was playing in the first set, I was terribly afraid it might happen again. Do people here have no memories?
:shock:
THUNDERVOLLEY
G.O.A.T.
Oh, so winning the Grand Slam means nothing? That is the implication of your response.
Sid_Vicious
G.O.A.T.
What's the big deal? You continuously belittle Federer and Sampras's 16/14 grand slams as if they are nothing. If someone tries debate with you, all you do is continuously talk about how winning 4 majors in one season is the be-all-end -all of tennis achievement. You ignore everyone's arguments and continue to mention how Laver won 4 slams in one season over and over again. Very similar to a Federer fan going "16>>>11. LOL!" in response to anyone who disagrees about Federer being GOAT.
charliefedererer
Legend
Perfect analysis.
Conclusions/Questions from match:
1. Rafa still has it - it being iron will, unbelievable retrieval skills to match the crazy good dipping forehand and super reliable backhand. No sign of legs bothering him.
2. Roger finally has the game plan to beat Rafa. He finally has a reasonable topspin backhand again Nadal. He finally figured out he can't just take abuse from Rafa's forehand to his backhand - it's worth risking the big BH crosscourt to Nadal's backhand with the follow up backhand smacked DTL. (There is no sense hitting slice backhands to Rafa - he smacks those hit to his forehand crosscourt and runs around those to his backhand and smacks them either down the line, or if short at all, croscourt for a winner.)
3. As I mentioned before the match, Rog doesn't stand a chance to beat Nadal unless he serves well. He didn't serve well. Will he ever serve well again in a TOUGH, physical match after the first set?
4. There is another thread that questioned Roger saying in an interview that in practice he mainly works on his strengths. Most posters wondered why he would work on his forehand when his backhand was what glaringly needed more work. (note that Rog didn't actually mention what "strengths" mean.)
Well, his forehand let him down big time in this match. Way to many unforced errors. Has he lost the ability to consistently hit winners off the FH in a tough, physical match after the first set?
Looking ahead:
There is a pretty good chance Rafa and Rog will remain 2,3 for the next 6 months. I'm going to go way out on a limb here and predict Rafa winning at the FO. The potentially interesting matchup would be at Wimbledon. Can Rog serve and hit forehand winners there after the first set?
[Sadly, there is a also pretty good chance this was the last Fed-Nadal grand slam meeting with Fed playing well enough to have even a chance of winning. There is a pretty good chance he will soon "lose it" for a couple of months like last year - but this time never "find it" again.]
P.S.
Congrats to Nadal fans. What a force! Would love to see him knock off Djokovic in the finals.
Sid_Vicious
G.O.A.T.
I am sure he mean't to say 5 sets. He would be completely correct about that as well. The whole Fedal thing that started in 2007 is running on fumes now. These matches they play are garbage. Almost 5 years since Federer has beaten Nadal in a grand slam.
That is one poor rivalry. I feel ashamed that I thought it was greater than Borg/Mcenroe a few years ago.
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namelessone
Legend
Rafa never really lost the will to fight, in fact it was his sole weapon at times in 2011 but his game is very shaky. And how can you call Rafa's BH super reliable when most of his errors came off that wing, not to mention missing some sitters.
Rafa's BH wing is anything but reliable. Used to be in a time but nowadays it is breaking down with alarming ease. Fed's best moments came when his forehand wasn't hitting the netcord or going out and focusing his efforts(both fh and bh) on breaking down Rafa's BH.
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nadalwon2012
Banned
I was extremely happy with Rafa's backhand vs Berdych and Federer. It's better in 2012. It's not supposed to be as good as his forehand. He'd never lose a match if that were the case.
cc0509
Talk Tennis Guru
What is Federer going to change at 30 that will magically allow him to defeat Nadal in slams moving forward? The mental edge Nadal has in their match-up is too great now. If Federer made these changes earlier in his career before the mental edge for Nadal got too great, he may have had a chance, but honestly, now it is too late especially since he will only decline further as time goes on.
cc0509
Talk Tennis Guru
That is just an excuse, come on, you don't really believe that deep down do you?
cc0509
Talk Tennis Guru
No way. Fed has every shot in the book and is better in just about every part of the game. If he could screw his head on straight against Nadal he would beat him more often than not.
And this was a trash match from Nadal,and I expect him lose badly in the final. Just rinse and repeat what happened over and over last year and you have the result of the final already.
Oh,and smooches,Beasty.
That is what the biggest problem is. Roger has no self-belief when he plays Nadal, you can see it as soon as Roger steps on the court. Hopefully your man Nadal can change things with Djokovic before the mental aspect gets too great.
TennisLovaLova
Hall of Fame
THUNDERVOLLEY
G.O.A.T.
....oh, you mean how in this & other TW forums play host to numeros threads where Laver's historically recognised achievement is crapped on by those claiming his was a "weak era," or actually launch troll threads about how "inferior" Laver is to low-ranked current players (see Former Player forum) all in an attempt to (at the end of it all) lift Federer's status? Yeah, there's a lot of fair-minded members around here.
Funny how you skip over that.....
cc0509
Talk Tennis Guru
TennisLovaLova
Hall of Fame
As sureshs said one day, the key to fed's game vs nadal is his first serve winning percentage.
Today it was:
1st serve pct fed vs nadal
64% / 77%
Today it was:
1st serve pct fed vs nadal
64% / 77%
Clarky21
Banned
I agree with you,but I think it's too late for Nadal as well. Sunday will make the 7th straight final loss to The Egg in less than a year. I'm afraid that The Egg has taken up permanent residence in Nadal's head for good.
interjim
Rookie
Hmmm. Interesting points being made here this morning. Taped the match, but haven't watched it yet. Caught the result online before driving my son to school on the way to work, and told him about it. He's six. He said "that's OK, even though Roger is my favorite, Rafa with the crazy shirts is my second favorite." Though I was pushing strongly for Fed here, well, that's life. For my part, I do wonder how well Nadal will be playing when he's 30.
We'll check it out tonight.
We'll check it out tonight.
Did I say that? Thanks!
its not even just the "fighting spirit" alone in terms of mental assets. alot of people get that mixed up i think.
the one tremendously useful mental ability that rafa has against fed is that he can get himself right into the match off just 1 or 2 little situations and thus in the long run punish every wrong shot selection fed makes through a match.
and those situations always happen in fed matches. its like you sometimes feel that the big variety of shots that he has is actually his undoing against nadal. that hed be better off in this particular matchup if he was more limited in that area oO
but usually it doesnt hurt him when he loses a point here and there in that manner. rogs game and success largely builds up on just completely taking the opponent out of the match, preferrably from very early on. with super aggressive tennis, being right on the baseline, hitting massive winners and completely belittling you with his isnane variety and just showing you what he can do.
and against almost everyone that leads to people just shrugging their shoulders thinking "well what the hell can i do against that?" and losing faith in their own game.
but nadal even if he barely touched a ball on feds serve for 15 minutes you just give him 1 or 2 points that he shouldnt have won and hes right in there. out of nowhere. one misplaced drop shot in an otherwise 20 minute beatdown is enough for him to instantly catch fire. and thats always been a massive problem for fed since he always plays these points at some point maybe giving the opponment 30-15 instead of 40-0 on his serve with an unnescessary drop shot or whatever. but hes used to people not being able to take just that one moment to get all fired up because they will still be caught up in the 10 clean winners he nailed past them during the course of the last 3 games.
if you take hewitt for example who is unquestionably right up there as one of the biggest fighters the game has ever known. after fed really hit his prime hewitt was basically chanceless whenever they met. fed completely dominated him and nullified hewitts fighting spirit so that it wouldnt even show. youd wonder why he seemingly wouldnt put up as big a fight against fed than he would against all the others. feds game just wouldnt let him
if you ask players about what makes it so hard to play against fed alot of them say its his ability to just roll away and extend leads when he has them. like you thought you were hanging with him quite well and then you get broken and next thing you know hes serving for the set at 5-1 and you dont even know how that happened. and it breaks their spirit
not so with nadal. he will just wake up and come back from whatever score just because fed misplaced one dropper lol. thats just a remarkable skill that nadal has that goes beyond the sole "fighting spirit" thing. and it obviously helps massively against federers way of playing
the one tremendously useful mental ability that rafa has against fed is that he can get himself right into the match off just 1 or 2 little situations and thus in the long run punish every wrong shot selection fed makes through a match.
and those situations always happen in fed matches. its like you sometimes feel that the big variety of shots that he has is actually his undoing against nadal. that hed be better off in this particular matchup if he was more limited in that area oO
but usually it doesnt hurt him when he loses a point here and there in that manner. rogs game and success largely builds up on just completely taking the opponent out of the match, preferrably from very early on. with super aggressive tennis, being right on the baseline, hitting massive winners and completely belittling you with his isnane variety and just showing you what he can do.
and against almost everyone that leads to people just shrugging their shoulders thinking "well what the hell can i do against that?" and losing faith in their own game.
but nadal even if he barely touched a ball on feds serve for 15 minutes you just give him 1 or 2 points that he shouldnt have won and hes right in there. out of nowhere. one misplaced drop shot in an otherwise 20 minute beatdown is enough for him to instantly catch fire. and thats always been a massive problem for fed since he always plays these points at some point maybe giving the opponment 30-15 instead of 40-0 on his serve with an unnescessary drop shot or whatever. but hes used to people not being able to take just that one moment to get all fired up because they will still be caught up in the 10 clean winners he nailed past them during the course of the last 3 games.
if you take hewitt for example who is unquestionably right up there as one of the biggest fighters the game has ever known. after fed really hit his prime hewitt was basically chanceless whenever they met. fed completely dominated him and nullified hewitts fighting spirit so that it wouldnt even show. youd wonder why he seemingly wouldnt put up as big a fight against fed than he would against all the others. feds game just wouldnt let him
if you ask players about what makes it so hard to play against fed alot of them say its his ability to just roll away and extend leads when he has them. like you thought you were hanging with him quite well and then you get broken and next thing you know hes serving for the set at 5-1 and you dont even know how that happened. and it breaks their spirit
not so with nadal. he will just wake up and come back from whatever score just because fed misplaced one dropper lol. thats just a remarkable skill that nadal has that goes beyond the sole "fighting spirit" thing. and it obviously helps massively against federers way of playing
MichaelNadal
Bionic Poster
Hopefully Murray runs Majin Buu from side to side for about 6 hours.
Crisstti
Legend
True, but I have to say I had thought he was more of a troll than he is. After all, he didn't act like one in that crazy thread about Rafa saying Fed is ONE of the best players ever, nor did he say Rafa was trying to cheat with the challenge incident in the match against Berdych.
Very glad about the match
. Rafa was obviously very happy to win. Very happy to have a chance to play probably Djokovic, which is good, he really looked like he's looking forward to it.The match was very good, though they have played better ones. What mainly got my attention is how different they play to what Rafa has to play against Novak. Fed hardly ever hits down the line, usually he went cross court, so it's a very different challenge for Rafa. He actually hit more DTL than Fed did. Rafa did seem to mostly hit high percentage shots, I wish he had tried hitting a little more to the lines more, 'cause he's going to need it. Then, what he did worked fine here.
Felt very sorry for Fed in the handshake. he really looked like he was going to cry. If this had been a final and he had been cruelly forced to stay and talk in front of everyone, I think he would have
Good
. I don't know who I prefer to win in the another match. Rafa has a better chance if he plays Murray, but I like Murray better than Novak, plus, I would much prefer that Rafa would beat Novak than Murray in the final, since I want Murray to win a slam... I couldn't cheer for him against Rafa though...I'm not sure it looks too good for Rafa against Novak. Rafa was too tight in many moments, and lost a lot of break point chances. Could well have won in three sets (was very close to), but Fed had chances in all the sets...
No wonder the organizers want them in different sides of the draw!. The attention this match gets from everyone is just far away from any other match...
I wonder how many posts there were before the start of the match. Last night it was in the 650's already.
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