Roland Garros Day 2: Stan's Not the Man

Hey Y'all. Galileo here.

It rained today. The forecast in both London and Paris is not great, though Paris managed to at least end strongly. The good news is that if it rains early, it should mean it is more dry as we close. I also hope a fool's hope that somehow, if the tennis gods are listening, the more rain we suffer here the less rain we suffer in SW19. I particular hope that it does not rain on the day I go to Wimbledon, ahem.

Anyway, amongst the rain we had several great matches and several memorable moments. An awkward exchange here, courtesy of Ben Rotherberg's Twitter:



Djokovic and a ball boy had a chat:



My favourite moment of that occured when Djokovic handed him the Perrier and the kid says "really, for me?" I have to say the image of Djokovic holding the racket and the kid holding the umbrella is also hilarious.

We had a match go 18-16, too. It was strange, especially considering how many breaks there had been in the first four sets.

Nadal opened on Lenglen today. Earlier this year, Federer started not on Rod Laver Arena but another venue. It was a shocking, historic moment. This is more shocking because Rafa is the four times defending champion and the top seed here. He should have started on the show court but, as I heard someone point out, the French may not like his dominance of the event. They may not enjoy watching one man win it so much, especially one like Nadal. He is not as much of a showman as Djokovic or Federer.

But anyway, Day Two must be gone over and so I shall do that now...


MARQUEE MATCH: GARCIA-LOPEZ d. WAWRINKA 6-4/5-7/6-2/6-0
... And not in the third seed's favour. Yes, Wawrinka is out. He will not become the first man to win the Australian/French double since Courier in, I think, 1992. Mariano Zabaleta and GGL now have something in common. They are the last two players to beat the reigning Australian Open champ in the first round of the French Open, though Zabaleta achieved that first in 1998. Wawrinka did not play badly, but he could not find a way to get past GGL. He had a horrible draw and he paid the price for his bad luck. He is not in the same league as Fedalovic when you look at winning despite playing badly. Federer found a way against Tipsarevic in 2008 at the Aussie all those years ago, he found a way against Del Potro at the 2009 French Open and Falla in 2010. He wasn't playing his best, but he found a way. Nadal was down against Brands last year, down against Verdasco in Australia in 2009, down against Murray in 2007 in Australia. Djokovic has been down against Federer in US Opens, down against Wawrinka several times. They all find a way to play defensively, to find a way into the match, to find a weakness in that guy they can exploit. Wawrinka is not quite there yet. GGL simply out-hit him. Wawrinka did not play particularly badly, he just was not the best guy on the day and the last two sets are misleading in that Wawrinka was playing fine but the other guy was out of this world good. Wawrinka was forced to try things and that is when the errors started to rise. Once the errors started to rise [Vavsy hit about 70] the match really was over.
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Un autre match intéressant: DJOKOVIC d. SOUSA
...I though this would be a tougher opening test. Sousa is a titlist and top forty player. He knows how to play on the dirt, too. Djokovic hit 40 winners -- 9 aces -- to dismiss the Portuguese man. Sousa actually played some sterling defense, part of the reason he hit less than 20 winners. He ended up reacting to Djokovic, rather than being proactive. Djokovic looks very sharp, though he was broken when serving for the match. Now he must move on and face Chardy, who will have the crowd on his side. Chardy has never taken a set off Djokovic. They met for the first time in Australia in 2009, met twice at Wimbledon [last year Chardy got 7 games] and now once here at the French Open. All they need now is to meet at the US Open. To be honest, I cannot see the Frenchman doing much more than maybe making one set really close.
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ROSOL MOMENT: KLIZAN D. NISHIKORI
...I will talk about the first major upset of the tournament as opposed to the biggest one so far, as I have already talked about the big one. Several upsets on the first Monday, which is how it should be. Another horrible draw for a big seed here -- Nishikori landed Klizan. Once number 24, he is now 59 in the world and still dangerous. He refused to give the ninth seed any rhythm. He swung freely and from the hip the whole match through. He used that cannon of a serve to bully the pint-sized Nishikori, winning 74 per cent of his first serve points in the 7-6/6-1/6-2 victory. Klizan also moved the Japanese man around the court using that large forehand of his. It showed that the way to beat Nishikori is to give him no rhythm and to overpower him. He apparently does not have the strength to live with the bigger hitters. Nishikori looked physically troubled again in the final couple of sets. He also seemed to display an alarming lack of fight. For a ninth seed, it was a disappointing performance. Nishikori is not great on grass generally, either, so it looks doubtful he will challenge at Wimbledon, though anything can happen. Let's not forget Klizan has won two titles from two finals, both against Fognini and one was this month. Klizan has Haase next and, if he can keep it together, he should go through in four.
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ISNER-MAHUT WANNABES: BAGNIS D. BENNETEAU
...Would it be any other match? The Frenchman and Argentine battled for four hours and twenty-seven minutes to determine who had the right to progress to the next round. Despite home crowd advantage, it would be Benny who would crumble first. He finally fell to the Argentine 6-1/6-2/1-6/3-6/18-16. I'm surprised how many breaks there were in the first four sets, especially considering how they seemed unable to break in the last set. Benny finished with 66 winners -- 16 aces -- whilst his opponent hit 81 winners but just 5 aces. Incredibly they only hit 115 aces between them. Benny is definitely a nominee for the Elvis Award. He went down two sets to love in an hour, won only three games and was thoroughly out-classed. To come back from that is incredible.
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BLINK AND YOU MISS IT: NADAL/GINEPRI, ESP/USA
...Who wants to talk about the king? Nadal is good on clay. Very, very, very good. Best male player all time on clay and second best overall. Evert will never be beaten in that department. I went on Wikipedia to evidence this. We all know she won 125 in a row but here are some further stats: 71 of the 258 sets (or 28%) were 6–0. Only 8 of the 125 matches were three-setters. Evert did not lose a set on clay in 1973 or between 1976–78. She had runs of 76, 65, and 50 consecutive sets won during the streak. Not even Steffi Graf achieved that level of utter dominance anywhere. But I digress. Evert was Wonder Woman, but that was the seventies, a marvelous decade. In 2014, Nadal is the king of clay. It took Rafa an hour and forty minutes to decimate his opponent. If you take away all the fidgeting Nadal does, all the time he takes between serves and the countless number of other things he does to extend his matches for seemingly no reason, the actual play time was not long at all. On a separate note, I think the umpires need to call foot faults and also time warnings more often. I am especially annoyed about the foot fault. As long as Serena isn't playing you will be fine. Nadal hit 27 winners with just 15 errors in the match. Ginepri hit 41 errors and just 8 winners. The sheer gulf in class was always clear. Ginepri may have been top twenty in his time but this is Rafa's time. Nadal plays Thiem for the first time next and that will be more of a challenge. In fact, I boldly predict the Austrian will win at least 12 games.
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ELVIS AWARD: BENNETEAU, FRA
...For the comeback from two sets to love down, though it was fruitless in the end.
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HOME GROWN HERO: MANNARINO, FRA
...Mannarino was only on court for the French to cheer for 74 minutes. He was too strong for Lu. He hit 34 winners, six aces, and just 9 unforced errors. Yep- just 9 unforced errors. The Soisy-sous-Montmorency [nine miles from Paris] native proved to be too strong for the man from Taiwan. He reached the fourth round at Wimbledon last year and led by two sets to love before falling to Kubot in the end. He has a very watchable game with just the right amount of insane.
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Any other notes?

* - Pospisil slipped quietly away on a back court. The thirtieth seed has been anonymous this year and his woes continued with a loss to Gabashvili. He only won 9 games.

* - The doubles starts today, day two. The Bryans have a good draw, though they could meet Lopez/ Granollers in the quarters.

* - Benesova married Melzer and is now known as Iveta Melzer. They play in the mixed doubles against top seeds Spears/Peya.

* - How long has Lisa Raymond been playing? She is still here in 2014 and I am sure she was playing in the mid-nineties.

* - Jim Courier is commentating for British TV and I think he is fabulous. He is hilarious especially because his brand of humour is not one the British know very well -- it is new and fresh and very exciting. One of my favourite 'Courierisms' came last year when he said, "and the crowd goes mild." I hope it continues.

Go away rain -- the forecast is still grim for the next couple of days unfortunately.

Thanx all and visit WTABACKSPIN please.

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