Australian Open Thread.

[Guest Princess Leena]

News before the tournament starts:

 

Justine Henin-Hardenne has already withdrawn because of "personal reasons". I hope it's just because hubby cheated on her, and not even more sickness...

 

Maria Sharapova will win the women's event, and I won't care.

 

No notable news on the men's side.

 

The rebound ace courts are playing extremely fast (granting Lleyton Hewitt's wishes, who stupidly thinks he has any chance of winning). This only enhances Roger Federer's chances of winning.

[Rob Anybody 0]

Does Hewitt have a coach yet?

[Cuban Linx 0]

Lleyton Hewitt's inevitable failure at the Australian Open never fails to bring me joy each year. Hopefully Federer can get his 10th straight win over Hewitt, that would be nice.

 

Also Nadal's supposedly 'in doubt' for the Open again this year after retiring from the Sydney International, if that's true it just makes Federer's job even easier.

[Guest "Go, Mordecai!"]

Does Jelena Dokic still compete and fare well at the Slams? I haven't seen her and her amazing pair in a long time.

[naiwf 0]

Nadal apparently hurt his groin, but expects to play by Monday (riiiiiight). I think he decided to just take the rest of the week off and not risk another loss to a subpar opponent further damaging his shrinking confidence heading into the tourney.

 

Petrova and Kuznetsova also pulled out of their matches today, again proving that people shouldn't bother entering these warmups in early January.

 

JHH being out pretty much killed my interest in the women's half of things simply because Mauresmo won't repeat, Clijsters won't fight for her 2nd Slam, Serena's loss in the 1st week can only bring me so much joy and Sharapova skating to another Slam will just piss me off. The only thing that may be interesting is seeing which woman will sneak into that 4th SF spot since it's almost a lock Amelie, Kim and Maria will make it there barring injury.

 

As for the men I'm hoping the Fedbot takes #10 with or without a match against Nadal, who has already built in an excuse for an early departure. Man am I growing to hate that little cheater.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Play has commenced.

 

Go Andrew Roddick.

[naiwf 0]

I see Rod-dick is already in full dickhead mode less than a set into the first significant match of the year.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Andrew is always like that. And it works in pissing off his opponents.

 

Very high quality 1st set. Keep it up, Tsonga.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Does Hewitt have a coach yet?

He's been bugging the few mild-mannered former Aussie players that the little bastard hasn't pissed off yet, like Rafter and Pat Cash.

 

Rafter gave the excuse of "I did think about helping out Lleyton but it was impossible," Rafter told the paper. "I won't be in Melbourne for the Open because we're moving house and I can't get around it."

 

Lolz. I miss Rafter.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Does Jelena Dokic still compete and fare well at the Slams? I haven't seen her and her amazing pair in a long time.

She's still playing sparingly. But, only in very low-level events. They would be like the equivalent of Double-A baseball.

 

Poor girl is still having her mind screwed by her nutso family, and all those freaks from Serbia/Croatia.

[MFer 0]

Well as I'm finally going to bed, Serena's playing right now on ESPN(against who ppl on here would call a "jobber"). She's got some green outfit on(kind of a cross between lime-green and Deion Branch glove-green). Of course her ass looks good as usual(Fun Fact: Venus and Serena were born in Saginaw, a half-hour north of where I live).

 

Fun Fact for Leena: Malivai Washington's hometown of Swartz Creek is right next to mine.

[Guest Princess Leena]

I love Mal.

 

Santangelo really wasn't a jobber. She's top 30, and sometimes good, except a noted choker. Actually, quite impressive that Serena killed her.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Sharapova in danger. Please lose to this awful player.

[naiwf 0]

Pin punked out like a true Frenchie

[Guest Princess Leena]

Of course. She is terrible, after all.

 

Hewitt came back from 2 sets over Spanky Russell last night. Damnit.

 

The first "upset" occurred yesterday, in 4th seed Ivan Ljubicic underperforming in a slam for the 100th time.

 

Not much else of note. Except the courts are playing very fast this year, which stinks.

[naiwf 0]

Anything that works against Nadal works for me.

[Gert T 0]

Finally got to watch some Aussie Open today. Murray looked sloppy today. I look forward to see how Berdych will do, I think he can have a nice little run here.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Fuck Murray. I hope Nadal destroys him. As I want that Nadal/Blake QF.

 

Berdych is in the section where he can make a run, but he struggles to put together a string of high-quality matches. And he'll need to do that to get past Tursunov, King Davydenko and then Fat Dave/Tommy Haas.

[Gert T 0]

Yeah I think Berdych-Tursunov will be one of the better 3rd round matches and for some reason I think Grosjean will give your boy Fat Dave fits for awhile.

[Rob Anybody 0]

Fuck, Serena won. The first set looked so good.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Petrova vs. anyone good at a slam = pain.

 

I so called that before the match. Glad I didn't watch.

[Gert T 0]

Well I am too jingoistic not to at least hope Serena makes a pretty god run since she is the only US hope for the womens draw, although I would be surprised if she advanced past the quarters, since she has not played very much.

 

Might just pull an all-nighter with Federer on tap and Roddick-Safin at 3:30.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Jankovic was a Williams' killer in 2006. We need more.

[Narcoleptic Jumper 0]

Safin is about to play Roddick. should be interesting.

[pochorenella 0]

Safin vs Roddick was playing too late for me so I skipped it. From the results in looks like it was a terrific match with Roddick picking up the W in four sets.

 

All I've managed to watch completely this week are the three Federer victories so far, each one pretty easy matches for him, although Youhzny (sp?) played at a great, fast pace and worried me a bit on the third set after he got his break back and after saving three consecutive match points.

[Guest Princess Leena]

I didn't watch the Roddick match. As Marat is such a stupid asshole that wastes his talent. I'm glad Andrew won.

 

Plus, after the Serena win, I didn't want to watch anymore.

 

I'll be watching Ms. Hingis tonight, and that's all. Maybe watch Fernando Gorila eliminate Lleyton, which is always fun, but it starts at like 3am here.

[naiwf 0]

I'm not enjoying this tourney with Roddick, 'Pova, Serena & Nadal still alive, and Ivanovic getting spanked by Bepa last night. I feel like I haven't seen half of the remaining players, and the ones I have been able to watch (those listed above, as well as Blake, Fed and Hingis) were never really at risk of losing. Basically ESPN's horrendous coverage and all of the people I root against still being in the mix has made for a boring first handful of days for me.

[Gert T 0]

Yes, horrendous coverage such as that at 10 o'clock when the live coverage started Nalbandian down two sets to none was starting his third set tiebreaker against Grosjean, of course we didn't see it.

[MFer 0]

I heard on Fox Sports Radio that Sharapova was dropping F-bombs.

[Guest Princess Leena]

I'm not enjoying this tourney with Roddick, 'Pova, Serena & Nadal still alive, and Ivanovic getting spanked by Bepa last night. I feel like I haven't seen half of the remaining players, and the ones I have been able to watch (those listed above, as well as Blake, Fed and Hingis) were never really at risk of losing. Basically ESPN's horrendous coverage and all of the people I root against still being in the mix has made for a boring first handful of days for me.

ESPN's live coverage hasn't been that bad. But, they'll only stick with the people they want to see.

 

Otherwise, it's the tourney that's sucked the first week. So many blowouts. The wrong people winning.

 

If Serena gets by Jankovic, she probably makes the final. Ugh.