He Is Borg, Royalty on the Grass of London
By HARVEY ARATON
Sports of the Times
July 6, 2007
Wimbledon, England
My favorite line of this Wimbledon tournament came courtesy of Venus Williams yesterday after her quarterfinal victory over Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia. She was talking about the stubborn fight that her sister, Serena, put up Wednesday against Justin Henin with her left calf muscle and left hand taped and sore.
“She didn’t even have a backhand,” Venus said. “She went Borg on her backhand.”
Borg on her backhand — what wonderful alliteration, as well as an indication that Venus knows her tennis history, that Bjorn Borg sometimes took the left hand off the racket to slice through the backhand, if only from watching rain-delay theater here, where Borg tapes have long been locked and loaded (on my cubicle television screen, the 1980 famous tie-breaker match, as I write this).
It has been more than a quarter-century, or 26 years, since Borg last played Wimbledon, and his mystique remains greater than for any other player. He hasn’t hurt it by showing up only once since John McEnroe ended his five-year domination of the grass courts, seven years ago for the red-carpet treatment in a parade of champions at the Millennium tournament.
“In the beginning, I couldn’t go back because it was too precious,” Borg told The Evening Standard of London in May. “I didn’t want to go close to my house, my stadium. That would be too much pain for me.”
He is 51 now, in full middle-age bloom and reportedly past well-chronicled personal crises. Time for another visit to his house, to his stadium, sans roof. Borg is scheduled to fly into London tonight and attend tomorrow’s and Sunday’s matches. In effect, if not acknowledged, to preside over Roger Federer’s anticipated equaling of Borg’s five consecutive Wimbledon titles.
That’s if Federer, who returned briefly to Center Court yesterday after an absence of 139 hours, or almost 6 days, doesn’t wind up as the ultimate victim of what tournament officials have called the wettest Wimbledon in 25 years, instead of his second-seeded rival, Rafael Nadal.
It was a minute after 3 yesterday afternoon when the green door on Center Court opened and out strode Federer, alongside Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain, for the quarterfinal match into which Federer walked over the injured Tommy Haas. Federer had last played in the third round last Friday evening, beating Marat Safin in straight sets. Then he sat back in his dapper sportswear while rain and questionable scheduling made a mess of the tournament, especially Nadal’s, whose advancement from third round to fourth spanned five dizzying days, counting Sunday’s traditional day off.
By late yesterday, after rain suspended play with Federer shakily engaged in a 5-5 first set with Ferrero, about to serve at deuce, it was time to wonder if the unprecedented inactivity, an advantage at first, was turning into a potentially lethal liability.
“Yeah, there’s no question he’s probably not going to be as sharp coming off a five-day layoff than playing every day,” said Andy Roddick, who didn’t play a point in his delayed quarterfinal against Richard Gasquet of France.
Keeping their possible semifinal tomorrow in mind, not to mention his 1-13 career record against Federer, Roddick added: “I’m not worried for him. I think he’ll do O.K. I’m going to spare the tears on that one.”
Assuming Federer and Roddick reach the semifinals, will Federer have had enough grass-court matches to have the service-return timing down during two weeks when Roddick’s first serves have been winning him easy point after point? Will Jimmy Connors, who once vowed to chase his tormentor, Borg, to the ends of the earth, factor in the Borg-Federer connection as Roddick’s coach?
•
Fatigued from the French Open, Federer did not play a Wimbledon tuneup last month. He got the walkover against Haas, a dangerous opponent, but that created the yawning gap in sustained competition that will stretch toward a seventh day after yesterday’s 37 minutes on court.
Nadal has essentially caught up heading into his quarterfinal today against Tomas Berdych. He needed to dig out of a two-set hole against Mikhail Youzhny yesterday, after his narrow escape against Robin Soderling in the third-round match that went on for more days than it will take to play the British Open later this month. But Nadal is younger, stronger, perhaps in his element now, playing every day, grinding it out, as he does it every spring across Europe on clay.
This is Federer’s surface, his house now, his stadium. But under these conditions, with no rest between rounds, with rust to work off, maybe there is no favorite anymore.
“Nobody has an advantage,” Goran Ivanisevic said yesterday in the players’ lounge as it rained again. “It’s going to come down to who is mentally stronger.”
•
Six years ago, Borg called to thank Federer for halting Pete Sampras’s run of four Wimbledon titles in the fourth round. Federer then lost to Tim Henman in the quarters and Henman, in turn, was defeated by Ivanisevic in a semifinal that took three days to complete. Ivanisevic, a wild card, claimed his only Grand Slam title in five tumultuous sets over Patrick Rafter before a rowdy Monday common-man crowd.
Ivanisevic, the more emotional man, a left-hander, like Nadal and McEnroe, thrived in the chaos. In the context of this Wimbledon, not a good omen for a classic stoic champion, Federer, as the Swiss tries to attach himself to Borg, the attending Swede.
Sports of the Times
July 6, 2007
Wimbledon, England
My favorite line of this Wimbledon tournament came courtesy of Venus Williams yesterday after her quarterfinal victory over Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia. She was talking about the stubborn fight that her sister, Serena, put up Wednesday against Justin Henin with her left calf muscle and left hand taped and sore.
“She didn’t even have a backhand,” Venus said. “She went Borg on her backhand.”
Borg on her backhand — what wonderful alliteration, as well as an indication that Venus knows her tennis history, that Bjorn Borg sometimes took the left hand off the racket to slice through the backhand, if only from watching rain-delay theater here, where Borg tapes have long been locked and loaded (on my cubicle television screen, the 1980 famous tie-breaker match, as I write this).
It has been more than a quarter-century, or 26 years, since Borg last played Wimbledon, and his mystique remains greater than for any other player. He hasn’t hurt it by showing up only once since John McEnroe ended his five-year domination of the grass courts, seven years ago for the red-carpet treatment in a parade of champions at the Millennium tournament.
“In the beginning, I couldn’t go back because it was too precious,” Borg told The Evening Standard of London in May. “I didn’t want to go close to my house, my stadium. That would be too much pain for me.”
He is 51 now, in full middle-age bloom and reportedly past well-chronicled personal crises. Time for another visit to his house, to his stadium, sans roof. Borg is scheduled to fly into London tonight and attend tomorrow’s and Sunday’s matches. In effect, if not acknowledged, to preside over Roger Federer’s anticipated equaling of Borg’s five consecutive Wimbledon titles.
That’s if Federer, who returned briefly to Center Court yesterday after an absence of 139 hours, or almost 6 days, doesn’t wind up as the ultimate victim of what tournament officials have called the wettest Wimbledon in 25 years, instead of his second-seeded rival, Rafael Nadal.
It was a minute after 3 yesterday afternoon when the green door on Center Court opened and out strode Federer, alongside Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain, for the quarterfinal match into which Federer walked over the injured Tommy Haas. Federer had last played in the third round last Friday evening, beating Marat Safin in straight sets. Then he sat back in his dapper sportswear while rain and questionable scheduling made a mess of the tournament, especially Nadal’s, whose advancement from third round to fourth spanned five dizzying days, counting Sunday’s traditional day off.
By late yesterday, after rain suspended play with Federer shakily engaged in a 5-5 first set with Ferrero, about to serve at deuce, it was time to wonder if the unprecedented inactivity, an advantage at first, was turning into a potentially lethal liability.
“Yeah, there’s no question he’s probably not going to be as sharp coming off a five-day layoff than playing every day,” said Andy Roddick, who didn’t play a point in his delayed quarterfinal against Richard Gasquet of France.
Keeping their possible semifinal tomorrow in mind, not to mention his 1-13 career record against Federer, Roddick added: “I’m not worried for him. I think he’ll do O.K. I’m going to spare the tears on that one.”
Assuming Federer and Roddick reach the semifinals, will Federer have had enough grass-court matches to have the service-return timing down during two weeks when Roddick’s first serves have been winning him easy point after point? Will Jimmy Connors, who once vowed to chase his tormentor, Borg, to the ends of the earth, factor in the Borg-Federer connection as Roddick’s coach?
•
Fatigued from the French Open, Federer did not play a Wimbledon tuneup last month. He got the walkover against Haas, a dangerous opponent, but that created the yawning gap in sustained competition that will stretch toward a seventh day after yesterday’s 37 minutes on court.
Nadal has essentially caught up heading into his quarterfinal today against Tomas Berdych. He needed to dig out of a two-set hole against Mikhail Youzhny yesterday, after his narrow escape against Robin Soderling in the third-round match that went on for more days than it will take to play the British Open later this month. But Nadal is younger, stronger, perhaps in his element now, playing every day, grinding it out, as he does it every spring across Europe on clay.
This is Federer’s surface, his house now, his stadium. But under these conditions, with no rest between rounds, with rust to work off, maybe there is no favorite anymore.
“Nobody has an advantage,” Goran Ivanisevic said yesterday in the players’ lounge as it rained again. “It’s going to come down to who is mentally stronger.”
•
Six years ago, Borg called to thank Federer for halting Pete Sampras’s run of four Wimbledon titles in the fourth round. Federer then lost to Tim Henman in the quarters and Henman, in turn, was defeated by Ivanisevic in a semifinal that took three days to complete. Ivanisevic, a wild card, claimed his only Grand Slam title in five tumultuous sets over Patrick Rafter before a rowdy Monday common-man crowd.
Ivanisevic, the more emotional man, a left-hander, like Nadal and McEnroe, thrived in the chaos. In the context of this Wimbledon, not a good omen for a classic stoic champion, Federer, as the Swiss tries to attach himself to Borg, the attending Swede.
posted by greenpagan at 5:50 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home