The Arse Whupppin' of The Swiss

Well, there ya go. To be honest, having watched Nadal baste the draw for two weeks, I had some serious doubts about whether The Roger had much of a chance this year. After all, Nadal is 22, officially in his tennis prime--he's supposed to be clobbering opponents now. Add to this the fact that the conditions for week 2 of Roland Garros seemed mostly cold and heavy and you have a formula for Fed's new-ish attacking strategy coming to naught. I can remember playing on green clay when it was cold and slow--I can't imagine how maddening that sinking sensation must be on super-slow red clay.

A note, however: For much of the fortnight, McEnroe was talking about Adriano Panatta, the last truly attacking player to have much success on clay (he beat Borg at the French in the 1970s, before Borg took over). Not easy to find anything on this volcanic Italian, but I have. Headsup for that post shortly.

I'll also do a breakdown of the Fed-Nadal later, once I de-TIVO the match-o. But the upshot: Nadal can't be beat right now on the red stuff, and to make matters worse for Fed, it's clear that he's still wonky from being ill last year. His energy level is about a 6 while Nadal's is an...11, going on 12.