Australian Open 2010 - Day Five, Round Three

[illuxtris]

We finally got to finish the movie Cha-cha-chà today, but it also means I missed the Feli/Roddick match. :( I don't know if I should be sad or not, because well, Feli lost and I don't like watching matches where the guy I root for loses (not that I thought he'd win, but yeah).

ATP
A Roddick (7) def F Lopez 6-7 6-4 6-4 7-6I heard Andy wasn't at

Comments

[anemonerose]

I can comment on the Roddick/Lopez match, because I watched that one in its entirety (I've been pretty lucky because Andy's been playing before I need to go to bed - I'm in the central US and we're 16 hours behind Melbourne, which makes watching this tournament difficult to say the least! - so I've been able to watch all of his matches thus far, although I have to resort to taping tonight's because it's not on until way too late). While it's true that Andy wasn't his usual aggressive self, Lopez was actually playing really well, so there were some nice, long rallies, and all around good play. Andy also isn't dominating with his serve as usual, which was letting Lopez into his service games. I think Andy's mindset atm is that he's really physically fit, so he's willing to play as long as necessary with the thought that the opponent will wear out. That wasn't really the case with Lopez - he was looking pretty good overall - and I think Andy finally decided that enough was enough and stepped it up and finished the match. Plus Lopez's

[illuxtris]

lol we're quite the opposite because Melbourne is right around my timeline so I just have to adjust to being three hours behind. :D

Well, Feli did defeat a few good players en route to playing Andy, so I'm not surprised he was bringing it to the match. My friend did say that when she was watching, she saw him look a bit on the defeatist side, so maybe that's when his forehand went on a sudden vacation.

I don't think Andy can afford to play passive on his Gonzo match though, because Gonzo has these massive forehands that just...annoys me when he's playing players I like. :D

[anemonerose]

A bit late, but I wanted to say that I completely agreed with you re: Andy playing passively against Gonzalez. I think he was doing a bit of that (plus Gonzo was just playing really well!), which is why it probably ended up going five sets. That matchup made me super nervous, even more so than the Cilic match did. I would have liked to see Andy win vs. Cilic, obviously, but if he's injured (and I like to think he wasn't bringing that up as an excuse; he tends to give props where they're due, and they were certainly due to Cilic) then it's probably for the best. He's best on grass anyway - there's really no hope for him at the French. :-P

[illuxtris]

Gonzo is a difficult match up for anybody when he's on fire. At least in my opinion. :D Those forehands are freaking deadly.

I'm not even sure Andy mentioned his shoulder injury...I haven't read his post match presser. But I doubt he blamed that for his loss, because he did get up from being two sets down! It was a fantastic fight for someone who's injured.

LOL, I have yet to see any active American player do really well on clay. :D Andy's run last year to...um, quarters? in RG was actually quite good considering this track record.