Thiem's Time Has Come

George Turner

Hall of Fame
Its a good guideline. For those of us who think Thiem is close on hard courts his poor Elo tells another tale that throws cold water on any hopes for Thiem making SF or better at a major non-clay event.:oops: Of course at the same time it has him set to clean up on clay in 2018.:D

All depends if Nadal if fit. Thiem also wants to avoid Fiasco in the first round, he can spring an upset :p
 

Meles

Bionic Poster
We had Snow in Britain, people were out sledging!!

Unfortunately the supermarkets are empty because people decided to panic buy as if they were preparing for nuclear winter :mad:
You troll
tumblr_nt0ge5SQxV1sz6cszo2_1280.gif
 

van_Loederen

Professional
daaamn, had to retire with an ankle or foot problem and will need MRI to decide if he'll play Miami. :mad:

his playing so much in recent weeks plus clay-hardcourt transition might have contributed to this. :mad:
 

Meles

Bionic Poster
daaamn, had to retire with an ankle or foot problem and will need MRI to decide if he'll play Miami. :mad:

his playing so much in recent weeks plus clay-hardcourt transition might have contributed to this. :mad:
Achilles heal. It was a freak injury on serve and volley off 2nd serve. Just a stumble. Hopefully they manage his schedule right for clay season as Thiem can ill afford to miss it.:confused:
 

Meles

Bionic Poster
He just faked it to avoid Fed
or Chung or Bendy at the time.;)

Its a troubling injury given it really didn't have a direct cause which implies the Thiem Achilles may be his Achilles heal for some time.:confused: Will be interesting to see how Fed feels after Miami and Nadal's Monte Carlo/Barcelona results.
 

van_Loederen

Professional
hopefully he'll tank in the semis, at Lyon.

playing the week before a Slam can be good preparation, but also saps energy.
from what we've seen, after playing 4 matches during that week, players can be good enough for RG semis, but then they would get tired.
(well, Wawa made the RG final last year that way, but his half of the draw was very weak and Murray in the semis was in bad shape himself. in the final he was toast.)
 

Meles

Bionic Poster
hopefully he'll tank in the semis, at Lyon.

playing the week before a Slam can be good preparation, but also saps energy.
from what we've seen, after playing 4 matches during that week, players can be good enough for RG semis, but then they would get tired.
(well, Wawa made the RG final last year that way, but his half of the draw was very weak and Murray in the semis was in bad shape himself. in the final he was toast.)
Thiem must play Lyon and his best course is just to make quick work of the scrub draw. He's still not sharp enough to win RG. His stamina will be fine and Wawrinka has had tremendous success at RG post Geneva.

Wawrinka was in the weak half last year and he could have been fresh as a daisy and Nadal would have wasted him.
 

van_Loederen

Professional
Wawrinka has had tremendous success at RG post Geneva.
the year he won RG, he had played only 2 matches the week prior. both 3-setters. a workload that seems like the perfect prep for certain player types.
Meles said:
he could have been fresh as a daisy and Nadal would have wasted him.
doesn't mean that he wasn't far from fresh. already in his SF he just outlasted a weak and tired Murray.
one may argue with his advanced age last year, but playing a lot the week before a Slam i think can only bring you so far.

i'm not criticising his decisions, i'm just afraid that after a subpar clay season his strategy was from the outset to just play oneself into good form and then have a good run at RG.

Thiem is younger than Wawa was, and he certainly did lots of cardio workouts after his early Rome exit,
but if he decides to go all-out in Lyon, i would see this as him having similar goals to Wawa's of last year - and for similar reasons.
Meles said:
He's still not sharp enough to win RG. His stamina will be fine [...]
playing Lyon in order to become more match sharp is understandable in his situation indeed,
but the state of his stamina is unclear after his showings this clay season.
Meles said:
Thiem must play Lyon and his best course is just to make quick work of the scrub draw.
even then i wouldn't want to see him in the final on saturday.
 
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Meles

Bionic Poster
....
Thiem is younger than Wawa was, and he certainly did lots of cardio workouts after his early Rome exit,
but if he decides to go all-out in Lyon, i would see this as him having similar goals to Wawa's of last year - and for similar reasons.

playing Lyon in order to become more match sharp is understandable in his situation indeed,
but the state of his stamina is unclear after his showings this clay season.

even then i wouldn't want to see him in the final on saturday.
Seems to have worked out and the best Thiem fan won.:D Thiem did not hit top gear until the latter stages of the final of Lyon.
 

Meles

Bionic Poster
This thread nearly prophetic, freaking Sandgren.:rolleyes: Thiem had impressive hard stats and was making a run at IW until he fractured his ankle in the first set with Cuevas (the only match he's lost this year after winning the first set, 28-0:D)
 

Zebrev

Hall of Fame
Meles was right all along about next gen, today it will be proven. Those forecasting 5 more years of big 4 dominance will have to recalibrate after the match concludes.
 

van_Loederen

Professional
Seems to have worked out and the best Thiem fan won.:D Thiem did not hit top gear until the latter stages of the final of Lyon.

i did not follow all his matches at Lyon closely, but from what i saw it quite seemed like he was half-training. blasting around, practicing/trying patterns and not investing so much mental energy. that's also why he lost quite some sets there, i think, but by the deciding sets he would always be so much in the match that his opponents had no real chance anymore.

with that said, i still thought that his preparation was not optimal.
i've read here that some think he kinda failed or pissed his pants in the Madrid final, but i think he was mostly tired. (Z would have been the favorite anyway though.)
after the injury he wasn't that fit yet - and proceded to losing in R1 Rome, if to a strong player.

playing the entire Lyon tourney happened mostly out of need, i still think.
his RG QF + SF were also relatively easy btw. but even in case he directly outlasts Nadal physically today,
we'll still have to wait what his schedule will be next year in order to refute me. :cool:
for now i can still pull the relativity card, stating he made the final despite his schedule/preparation. :p
 
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