That was one inspirational tennis match last week. It certainly looked to me that the courts were speeded up if only marginally. Maybe even more. Djokovic was certainly on the defensive more than he normally is as Roger consistently got the quick drop on him. He was rocking Djokovic into a position where he was so out of position that he couldn't use his usual modus operandi of the slick escape.
The serving was key and it is an indication that the surface was less sandy than the usual fair being dished up on the ATP tour. Roger was able to serve his way out of serious jams several times by pulling out the big serve and the intelligent serve as the great equalizer. Djokovic on the other hand showed that his serve is just marginally less effective on a quicker court because of his inability to capitalize by attacking the net effectively.
Roger's serving was also indicative that in general the serving concept has been lost somewhere in the shuffle and the engineering of the modern game. Serving when behind in the count is an extremely important and tactical part of the game. It is reminiscent of baseball pitchers pitching when they fall behind in the count…to still be able to come up with the necessary goods to get the batter out. Roger used placement, spin and speed intelligently to mix up his "pitches" to retire Djokovic swinging.
With Indian Wells coming up the natural question to ask of oneself is…what about the courts? I still find the spectacle of Roger's attacking tennis in the final of the Dubai mesmerizing. It was a sensational performance. Indian Wells will be a stiffer challenge as you can imagine that the field is going to be so much deeper…and the courts so much slower.
Federer is the living proof you know…and he is also the end of the foreseeable line. There are no other players that are fundamentally sound enough to be capable of playing this kind of tennis. Beware of the quantum drop when he retires. Don't forget who told you so. The founder of "stick man" tennis. "Old man" tennis. Phooey.

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