3R IW'14: Dog vs Bull

Terenigma said:
Rosol revealed Nadal's weakness, Dolgopolov's moonball style was just disrupting his rhythm, he still hit a ton of winners off of those moonballs but the fact he had to move further back behind the baseline really put him off his typical baseline game. Thats what worked. A combination of the two and you might be on to something. Moonball to push him back then Hit a Rosol.
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Did Rafa hit alot of winners tonight?
 
Vrad said:
Did Dolgo reveal the pattern to beating Nadal? Just moon all your shots so He cannot use your pace against you?

Nadal is a good enough player that he could eventually find a counter to that, but I think it would be an interesting and unique strategy to use against him in the short term.
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LoL it doesn't work against Nadal. It only worked today because Nadal's not in good form and Dolgo's played very well.
 
insideguy said:
Did Rafa hit alot of winners tonight?
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The poster i quoted implied that Rafa couldnt use the pace of the moonballs but i was just saying that he had no problem generating pace/winner style shots off of them. Wether he made them or not was not my point, it was more than he could deal with the moonball style but you need to compliment it with a more attacking winner style play. Like Dolgopolov did.
 
Highlights of this match will be even more explosive than usual given that it went the distance for once. Still can't get over that extreme forehand retrieval near the end of set 3 from Dolgo.
 
The-Champ said:
Nobody can replicate the legend :D
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Let me try.

Rafa although in best hardcourt form ever in his life thanks to stemcell and bionic limbs that he got over the offseason really wished to give this match to the Ukrainian because all of the troubles in his country recently. Also rafa has never been able to get to Joshua Tree National park because he always gets to semis here. His great wish it to visit Joshua Tree and pose by a tree like U2. Also Rafa wants to get some extra time on the beach in Miami where he has never won to complete his masters series sweep.:)
 
Backspin1183 said:
LoL it doesn't work against Nadal. It only worked today because Nadal's not in good form and Dolgo's played very well.
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That was a good match from Dolgopolov? I'd hate to see a bad match. He served at 40% for the match and kept spraying errors. They were both really bad.
 
Backspin1183 said:
When did you start watching Nadal matches? And how the hell would I protect him?
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The way Dolgo needed to exert a very high level of play coupled with superb backhand, Nadal still able to go head to head on rallies which we don't even know who will win the point.

As I mentioned earlier in my post, no 1HBH player can beat Nadal today.
 
NADALRECORD said:
I'm not saying Nadal lost on purpose, but this is the perfect loss because now Nadal can play Miami (and not worry about wearing himself out before the clay season). And Nadal has never won Miami before, so very ideal opportunity. I earmarked Miami as non-slam priority number one for 2014.
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I disagree. It would have been better for him to gain confidence with a win here. I don't know what would constitute a "perfect loss" anyway. Still, we should be hearing back from Nadal hopefully soon enough.
 
Any balls within Nadal's reach could still win the point. Dolgo only needs to exact a powerful extreme shots to get the point.

I don't think Nadal played badly today.
 
watungga said:
The way Dolgo needed to exert a very high level of play coupled with superb backhand, Nadal still able to go head to head on rallies which we don't even know who will win the point.

As I mentioned earlier in my post, no 1HBH player can beat Nadal today.
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Nadal is beatable when he doesn't play that well. You don't have to be 2h BH player to beat him. Darcis did last year. Wawrinka in AO final.
 
NADALRECORD said:
I'm not saying Nadal lost on purpose, but this is the perfect loss because now Nadal can play Miami (and not worry about wearing himself out before the clay season). And Nadal has never won Miami before, so very ideal opportunity. I earmarked Miami as non-slam priority number one for 2014.
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Are you for real madafaka ?
 
Backspin1183 said:
Nadal is beatable when he doesn't play that well. You don't have to be 2h BH player to beat him. Darcis did last year. Wawrinka in AO final.
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Nadal has one win in his last 6 hardcourt tournaments. And it was a 250 in Ausssie. He can be beaten by many people on hardcourt.
 
The thing that struck me about Nadal today and in the first set of the Australian Open final is that he looks a step slow to the ball, particularly wide to his forehand. This is even when he's not lurking in the backhand corner looking for forehands. If he's lost some pace it makes it so much harder for him.
 
If we can be honest....Rafa hasn't fully recovered from his loss to Stan yet. He already showed bad form in Rio where he faced 2 match points against a nobody and he barely escaped Stephanek a few days ago. He is in a slump, he will bounce back.
 
booson said:
I don't get it. Nadal played at Acapulco last year, didn't he? Didn't he lost that 500 points too?
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I am no expert in this area but if a player doesn't play a prior year tournament, they lose all the points they collected in that tournament. If he won Acapulco last year, then yes, he wouldn't have lost any points. Then I was incorrect in my statement as he merely kept his points by playing a different ATP 500 and winning it.

For ATP 1000, you get 180 ranking points for QF. Since Nadal was champion last year (got 1000 points), those points are deducted from his points tally. Then, whatever points he had collected this year, are added. Since he lost before QF, My guess is he will lose around 900 points or so.
 
Djokovic2011 said:
Comments like this are really uncalled for and even make me feel a little uneasy. This place sure goes crazy whenever Nadal loses a match. If he loses at the FO this year it will be like a free-for-all.
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Definitely one of the best members around, always keeping it real and trying to look at things objectively from many angles despite your allegiance to Djokovic.

Well played in general.
 
reaper said:
The thing that struck me about Nadal today and in the first set of the Australian Open final is that he looks a step slow to the ball, particularly wide to his forehand. This is even when he's not lurking in the backhand corner looking for forehands. If he's lost some pace it makes it so much harder for him.
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Maybe some minor niggles or age is catching up to him. With someone like Nadal, even a step lost is huge as he relies so much on his speed and court coverage. He was moving well in Fed match at AO. Not sure if it was adrenaline or just his natural confidence against Fed.

Someone like Fed can work around a bit on the slowness and reduce the impact due to his touch & net skills. For Nadal, it's difficult.
 
Backspin1183 said:
Nadal is beatable when he doesn't play that well. You don't have to be 2h BH player to beat him. Darcis did last year. Wawrinka in AO final.
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Haha. Thanks for the laugh, I needed it.

I thought everyone loses when they don't play that well or does it apply only to Nadal?
 
This is one of thoe matches where i really struggle to see the appeal of Nadals game. The guy made no attempt to play attacking tennis. Just constant moonballs. I started watching this match half way through the first set and didnt see Nadal hit a clean winner for over 30 minutes. I am pleased that Dolgopolov won. Attacking tennis must prevail over this defensive 'pong' c**p being served up by Nadal.
 
Nice to see Dolgo finally break through in a big match against the mighty Nadal. He played out of his mind. Dude is super talented, he just has problems with consistency.

Dolgo is fun to watch when's on his game. Hopefully, there is no letdown vs. Fognini.
 
Day Tripper said:
This is one of thoe matches where i really struggle to see the appeal of Nadals game. The guy made no attempt to play attacking tennis. Just constant moonballs. I started watching this match half way through the first set and didnt see Nadal hit a clean winner for over 30 minutes. I am pleased that Dolgopolov won. Attacking tennis must prevail over this defensive 'pong' c**p being served up by Nadal.
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To be fair by no winners you excluded the put away shots following good first serves in the one two punch. On an off day Nadal tends to use his top spin moonball to draw errors. Dolgo hit so many DTL FH to the open court long or wide. Nadal also missed some of his own attacking shots. What Dolgo showed was DTL BH moonballing was a valid strategy to pin Nadal to his BH corner. For some period they all were playing on 1/3 width of the court doing BH drills as it seemed. What made my day was that Nadal looped his shots long or wide. I don't recall seeing that.
 
monfed said:
2nd serve points won in the 3rd set by Nadal = 11% Winners = 3 . :lol:

Hey NADALRECORD, is that the best 3rd set you've ever seen Nadal play? :lol:
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Where did you get your stats?
I got: 3 W's in the first set (11 % 2nd serves won)
4 W's in the 2nd set (something high 2nd serves won)
10 W's in the 3rd set (17 in total, hence 10)
 
sbengte said:
In Nadal's case, certain things just don't add up, no matter which way you look at it, for instance his (mostly mysterious) severe career ending injuries followed by a period of absolute dominance which have repeated in cycles over the years.
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This is no-nonsense.

Curiously, no 6-months mysterious "injury" recently and no robotic supernatural stamina subsequently :confused:
 
Backspin1183 said:
LoL it doesn't work against Nadal. It only worked today because Nadal's not in good form and Dolgo's played very well.
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oh it works....nadal is as 1 dimensional as anyone can get.

Think how he plays when he is down....moonball
think how he plays when he is up.....moonball
 
Well that was a surprise loss I say. Dog played hit & miss tennis and it payed off.

NADALRECORD said:
I'm not saying Nadal lost on purpose, but this is the perfect loss because now Nadal can play Miami (and not worry about wearing himself out before the clay season). And Nadal has never won Miami before, so very ideal opportunity. I earmarked Miami as non-slam priority number one for 2014.
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Czfzlin.gif
 
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insideguy said:
I want to try to imitate him but its not possible. LOL. Some one try!
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[trying]
This is the best thing to have happened to Nadal since he can now fully focus on Miami and gain points. After he wins Miami, he can start his clay court preparations going for his 9th straight RG. Nadal is going to be a lock for this Wimbledon, since his knee problems are completely healed and with his third channel slam in the bag, his confidence will be at an all time high, so I'd like to see who will stop him from defending his US Open title. So Nadal will be going for the Rafa Slam at AO '15 as I predicted and that will set him up nicely for his 10th RG, which no creature in the universe, past or present has come remotely close to........
[/trying]
 
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