Rafael Nadal vs. Andy Murray Wimbledon Semifinals

What will the score be?

  • Nadal in 3

    Votes: 31 25.6%
  • Nadal in 4

    Votes: 35 28.9%
  • Nadal in 5

    Votes: 8 6.6%
  • Murray in 3

    Votes: 6 5.0%
  • Murray in 4

    Votes: 28 23.1%
  • Murray in 5

    Votes: 13 10.7%

  • Total voters
    121
N

NadalAgassi

Guest
Murray really beat himself today with all those errors. Yet more proof the guy just cant handle pressure and isnt mentally tough enough to win a slam. Wasnt that pleased with Nadal's play to be honest. He played quite well but can play alot better. He isnt dominating play with his groundstrokes the way he normally does on grass.

I hope he raises his level for the final. He will have to in order to win.
 

defrule

Professional
Throughout the entire match I felt Murray would live and die by his serve.

If he can serve great all the time then perfect but realistically he can't and Nadal will capitalise on this. In Nadal's games even if he missed a first serve, you don't feel he is vulnerable to losing the point. Murray on the other hand, it feels like every time he missed a first serve, it was a huge opening for Nadal.

If you consider Djokovic, serving well helps a lot but in those times he's missing the first serve, he has the baseline game to hold ground against Nadal.
 

CMM

Legend
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TheTruth

G.O.A.T.
Well, if you thought Nadal would still win after losing set 1 and being down in his service game at 15-30 (which is when I posted this), you must have a lot of belief :)

Good job by Nadal though, and Murray lost it in the middle of the match.

Yeah, I did. I looked over at the TV set and I smiled. No palpitations. I was glad to see Andy doing good, because I didn't want him to get creamed. I can usually tell when Rafa's going to win or lose, so I stay pretty calm when he plays.

Plus, I'm not adverse to Rafa losing a match here or there. I refuse to get emotionally invested in something I have no control over. You win some, you lose some. That's life.

You have to have belief in life, and I have that in abundance.
 

TennisFan3

Talk Tennis Guru
Wasnt that pleased with Nadal's play to be honest. He played quite well but can play alot better. He isnt dominating play with his groundstrokes the way he normally does on grass.

I hope he raises his level for the final. He will have to in order to win.

True.

I didn't see Nadal's ground game on the same level as it was against Delpo. I have that match recorded in HD, and Nadal's off-forehands were stunning.

He will need "that" level against Djokovic. It is absolutely crucial that he doesn't surrender control of the middle of the court and retreat back. That has been his undoing in the last few of their matches..
 

bolo

G.O.A.T.
imagine if nadal numbed his entire body. he'd be unstoppable.

lol, post of the thread. :)

I may be the only one here who loves Rafa's spiny moonballs.

I like them too, like the one he hit when he was serving for the set. Beautiful arc. :) I also like it when guys with two handed backhands start wailing the ball cc, and the arc on nadal's cc fh progressively increases because he has less and less time. There was a good one of these in the delpo match.


This match really turned out the way I wanted it to. He loses a close set unlike last year, but the other sets he wins in an easier fashion because he is even more aggressive with his game. His serve picked up after the 1st set as well, up from ~57% to the normal 65% by the end of the match.
 
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lol, post of the thread. :)



I like them too, like the one he hit when he was serving for the set. Beautiful arc. :) I also like it when guys with two handed backhands start wailing the ball cc, and the arc on nadal's cc fh progressively increases because he has less and less time. There was a good one of these in the delpo match.


This match really turned out the way I wanted it to. He loses a close set unlike last year, but the other sets he wins in an easier fashion because he is even more aggressive with his game. His serve picked up after the 1st set as well, up from ~57% to the normal 65%.

Murray first serve % and forehand were better than usual in the first set and Nadal's first serve was lower than usual. Those things reverse in the next 3 sets and you the get the predicted outcome, a Nadal win. Hamos. :)
 

bolo

G.O.A.T.
Murray first serve % and forehand were better than usual in the first set and Nadal's first serve was lower than usual. Those things reverse in the next 3 sets and you the get the predicted outcome, a Nadal win. Hamos. :)

yeah, murray's went back to the normal ~55% by the end of the match too.
 

Bud

Bionic Poster
I just re-watched the match on the flatscreen on NBC (due to their crappy delay). Those last 3 sets by Nadal were some awesome tennis. His BH ROS looked fantastic.

His level of play looked much better than when watching it online this morning.
 
I don't know why people are whining about Murray making UE's on his forehand, he's never that aggressive with his forehand so he's bound to make errors.
 

bolo

G.O.A.T.
I just re-watched the match on the flatscreen on NBC (due to their crappy delay). Those last 3 sets by Nadal were some awesome tennis. His BH ROS looked fantastic.

His level of play looked much better than when watching it online this morning.

really difficult to tell level of play while watching on streams imo unless the stream quality is exceptional, and that rarely happens.
 

bolo

G.O.A.T.
I don't know why people are whining about Murray making UE's on his forehand, he's never that aggressive with his forehand so he's bound to make errors.

we count on him making ue off being aggressive on his fh in our predictions when he plays nadal. He can't let us down. :p
 

Rickenbacker4003

Hall of Fame
I give Nadal a very good chance to win on Sunday vs Joker as opposed to the FO final if he had made it to the final. Nadal is a better grass court player and his confidence is coming back to where it was last year. Joker's confidence looked dented by the loss to Federer and he looked frustrated with himself throughout this fortnight. He looks more beatable here at Wimby where at FO he looked untouchable. I give Nadal the edge on Sunday. If it were 4 weeks ago in Paris I would have given the edge to Joker over Nadal. If Nadal wins Wimby against the new #1 this erases the 4 losses this year in the MS.
 
we count on him making ue off being aggressive on his fh in our predictions when he plays nadal. He can't let us down. :p

Yep. We count on Federer's backhand UE'S aswell, and the odd desperate run around forehand mishit. Federer can hit the odd backhand winner to make BreakPoint happy.
 

quest01

Hall of Fame
It's hard to beat anyone who doesn't make errors. Nadal was too good, he even had more winners then Murray at 42.
 

Bud

Bionic Poster
It's hard to beat anyone who doesn't make errors. Nadal was too good, he even had more winners then Murray at 42.

That article is incorrect and switched a couple numbers. Murray had 42 winners/39 UE's. Nadal had 37 winners/7 UE's.
 

Tammo

Banned
Murray will be th enext Tim Henman, eexcept even worse. He will get to 8 SW19 semis' and never get to the finals.
 

Messarger

Hall of Fame
I thought the Nadal slice to Murray's forehand really threw Murray off his rhythm on that wing. At least for the second and third sets. Would like to see that more against Djokovic.
 

CMM

Legend
CMM, how do you feel about the final? :)

I don't know. Normally I would say that Rafa is going to win, but before the Rome final I said the same thing and Djokovic won in straight sets.
Even though he won against Murray I didn't like how he played. He focused on making very few errors and played a very safe match.
The Rafa that played against Del Potro was much more aggressive and great to watch, but in important matches he turns into a wall. :(
 

fps

Legend
I don't know. Normally I would say that Rafa is going to win, but before the Rome final I said the same thing and Djokovic won in straight sets.
Even though he won against Murray I didn't like how he played. He focused on making very few errors and played a very safe match.
The Rafa that played against Del Potro was much more aggressive and great to watch, but in important matches he turns into a wall. :(

It's what Federer began to do as the natural impunity and athleticism of youth faded.
 

fps

Legend
This was a good comment from Miles Maclagan Murray's former coach, about the match, from bbc sport website
Maclagan: "I think he needs to try and be more attacking more of the time because then it becomes a habit.

"If it is not your usual style you can't - whether it is Andy or anyone else - suddenly turn things on in the final or semi-finals of a Grand Slam.

"The way you play is almost a way of life, rather than tactics. Look at Rafa, people talk about his tactics but I'm not so sure he has any. He has just got his way of playing and thinks 'well, I'm the best in the world and if I play my way, I am going to win most of the time' - which he does.

"That's where it is difficult for Andy because he does have options - he can rally and he can serve-volley - but it takes time to put either properly into place.

"But in my opinion the first set was great and I think he needs to ingrain that kind of aggressive approach into his regular style."
 

Fedex

Legend
I am depressed. :( Hope Djokovic can beat him.

That's very mean of you.
Shouldn't you be excited looking forward to a great final?
This is Djokovic's first real test so expect some fantastic tennis.
Of course it's very disappointing about Murray but you can't help but admire Nadal.
Thought Murray was going to do it after that first set but he just collapsed.
Murray played far better in the French Semi against Nadal than he did the last three sets yesterday. He really kept his intensity up the whole match there.
In fact Murray played consistently far better in all his matches for months before yesterday.
If he'd kept that form up on grass, he would have had a chance but he just ran out of steam in the end.
Even if he'd beaten Nadal yesterday can you imagine how much Murray would have left in the tank to face Djokovic. I bet practically nothing.
He has to learn to pace himself better.
I think he should skip Cincy before the USO this year.
 
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Oceansize

Rookie
This was a good comment from Miles Maclagan Murray's former coach, about the match, from bbc sport website
Maclagan: "I think he needs to try and be more attacking more of the time because then it becomes a habit.

"If it is not your usual style you can't - whether it is Andy or anyone else - suddenly turn things on in the final or semi-finals of a Grand Slam.

"The way you play is almost a way of life, rather than tactics. Look at Rafa, people talk about his tactics but I'm not so sure he has any. He has just got his way of playing and thinks 'well, I'm the best in the world and if I play my way, I am going to win most of the time' - which he does.

"That's where it is difficult for Andy because he does have options - he can rally and he can serve-volley - but it takes time to put either properly into place.

"But in my opinion the first set was great and I think he needs to ingrain that kind of aggressive approach into his regular style."

Thanks for posting this. Maclagan really hits the nail on the head. He must have been trying to get Murray to do this when he was his coach, so i wonder if Murray was too stuborn to change.
 

Preacher

New User
A coupla years back I wrote that Murray hated his errors more than he loved his winners, and that he had to change that mindset. It came back to haunt him again today. He's been playing great. Miss a forehand? Never mind. Get the next one. You're on serve, game on. But no, he collapsed, consumed by the one thing he'd done wrong in the match up to that point.

Well said.

I'd just call him a string of swear words.
 

Magnus

Legend
His FH was great(along with his serve, BH and netplay)untill he missed that FH sitter in the 2nd set when he just started to meltdown. I still maintain that his problem is that he can't handle the pressure mentally, his game itself is fantastic.

After that sitter he missed, his FH collapsed badly, he started missing routine shots and made tons of unfroced errors and let Nadal cruise. He didn't even fight for his service games, his serve was failing him at crucial points and even his biggest weapon - his backhand, was not performing as it should. I expected Murray to lose, but I also expected a big fight, like Murray usually gives Nadal. This time I got to see a soulless Murray who gave up even when he was leading by a set.

Murray's CC FH to Nadal's BH was a mistake as well. Nadal's hit his BH to perfection and Murray kept going there instead of trying to attack the FH, a tactic that proved successful to quite a few players in the past. I hope Djokovic plays a smarter match by coming in, attacking Nadal's FH more often by changing direction, and mixing up his serve.
 
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