Wimbledon 1913 and 2013 in Men’s Tennis: Pioneers of a Century Ago and Today

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One of the many surprises during Wimbledon’s first week was the defeat of the defending champion Roger Federer at the hands of the Ukrainian Sergiy Stakhovsky. The 116-ranked Stakhovsky, who has never before reached third round at Wimbledon in his career, ended perhaps the most impressive record in tennis, Federer’s streak of getting to the quarterfinals or better, 36 Slams in succession. While millions around the world viewed this match, very few of them knew that the two players have been involved in a major battle that lasted over 15 months on a different platform – and this time not as adversaries but rather side by side – one that will prove to be much more important for the development of the sport than their 4-set encounter on that Thursday afternoon. Before I explain further, let me start with a simple example: if a guy like Lukasz Kubot, ranked 130 in the world and no appearance in the second week of a Slam tournament in his 11-year career, is able to make more money (around $310,000) by reaching the quarterfinals in Wimbledon than he has made during the six previous months of 2013 up to that point, it’s largely thanks to Federer and Stakhovsky, along with a few other select individuals.

Both players are members of the ATP Player’s Council and have actively pursued for higher prize money distribution to players in the Slam tournaments. Although the Council did not obtain from the negotiations exactly what it was initially seeking (who does in negotiations?), there is no doubt that it came out as the winning side; and their biggest victory came at Wimbledon. Increasing a tournament’s prize money is nothing new in tennis, but the distribution pattern of this particular increase is unprecedented.

In a competitive environment, one of the concrete rules is that if the aim is for those few who rise up above the rest of the competition pool to provide top-quality goods and/or services, one must first and foremost make sure that so-called ‘competition pool’ has high standard of quality. It is precisely in this sense that the 2013 Wimbledon prize money increase excels beyond all the others in the past. In tennis, the quality of the tennis played by the highly-ranked players depends very much on the “push” initiated by the 100 to 150 players ranked below them. Thus, the example of Kubot proves how essential a role the prize money increase in Wimbledon plays to those players ranked below the top 10 that have often been forgotten in the previous negotiations of this type. But let’s leave the quarterfinals aside and go further back to the first rounds.

By reaching the third round of Wimbledon, Stakhovsky pocketed approximately $95,000 which exceeds half of his earnings prior to Wimbledon in all of 2013! Take a guess how much he would have earned for the same outcome had the prize money structure remained the same as last year: around $58,600! Now, try to imagine the extra bit of motivation that the extra $36,400 in prize money signifies to a player who has been journeying in the 50 to 150 range in the ATP rankings. In fact, we don’t even have to imagine: let’s revisit Stakhovsky’s comments on the issue, three days before Wimbledon began, in other words, at a time where he couldn’t maybe even dream of beating Federer and reaching the third round in the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. As a member of the ATP Player’s Council, when asked about some of the criticism directed at the $35,440 prize money offered to the first round loser at this year’s Wimbledon, Stakhovsky poetically struck back. He said that the top-10 players already benefit from exclusive sponsor contracts and added that “the rest of the top 100 guys don’t have the lifestyle of superstars. They have the life of humans.” He also said in an interview with a Ukrainian sports writer back in 2012 that he came out in the red from his trip to the Indian Wells and the Miami Masters Series tournaments, even though he made the second round in the first tournament and made around $20,000 in prize money from the two tournaments combined. Once again, he contrasted the top players and the rest of the guys: “Federer, Nadal, Djokovic, Murray – that’s simply another world. We simply don’t exist in comparison with them.” For Stakhovsky, the image that the general public has about tennis players “making big money” was nothing more than an “illusion”. Stakhovsky’s comments clearly show what this current prize money increase in the Slams, and especially at Wimbledon, mean to the lower-ranked players.

Yet, it seems that the historical significance of this increase will only be understood in the future, when one takes a retroactive look back at the sport. Many will agree that, for a few years and running, men’s tennis has been going through a period of success in popularity, first one of this magnitude since its golden age during the years of the Borg – McEnroe – Connors rivalries and others surrounding them. It would be very tempting for the leading figures of the sport to sit back and collect the fruits of this kind of productive period. However, this current period led by Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Federer, and Andy Murray is likely to reach its conclusion in the next few years, if not in less time. From that perspective, the effort of the ATP Player’s Council having the vision to safeguard the future of the sport, and to diminish the chances of a potentially-somber period, by protecting the interests of the larger pool of lower-ranked players before all else, is to be applauded.

There is one extra factor that most people forget, one that did not escape Darren Cahill, the ESPN analyst, ex-professional player and a successful coach on the tour. He insisted on TV during the second week of broadcasting that the top 4 superstar players on the tour, Nadal, Federer, Djokovic, and Murray, have all played significant roles in the success of the negotiations by either using their influence within the ATP Council (such as Federer, and Nadal until 2012), or clearly voicing their support for the increase from the outside in the case of Djokovic and Murray. In other words, the top 4 put aside their own interests and cared for the progress of the sport by supporting an increase in prize money that favors the lower-ranked players more than themselves – Jimmy Connors who consistently demanded more for himself and the top few while he was at the top of the game, and who at times claimed to never even having heard of some of the players outside the top 30, comes to mind.

Exactly one century ago, the New Zealander Anthony Wilding won his fourth Wimbledon title in a row. What only a few people know about “Captain Wilding” is that during the two years prior to his title in 1913, he was a loud voice taking a position on two sensitive issues that did not necessarily benefit him, but were bound to make the sport better. The first one involved the removal of the Challenge round system that was in place back in those days. For those who may not know it, back in the days, the players participated in a draw called the “All Comers”, and the winner of the draw would then play a one-match Challenge round against the previous year’s title holder, the winner crowned as the Wimbledon champion. Wilding won Wimbledon for the first time in 1910, earning his title through the All Comers draw and winning the Challenge match against the 1909 title-holder Arthur Gore. In 1911, he sat and watched as all other players battled through the All Comers draw. The British player Herbert Roper-Barrett won the All Comers draw after a fierce 5-set battle against his compatriot Charles Dixon, coming back from two sets and 3/4 down in the third set. When the 38-year-old Roper-Barrett had to play the Challenge match against Wilding the next day, with the temperature reaching 31 degrees in the shade, and the match extended to a fifth set, an exhausted Roper-Barrett could no longer play and retired at the end of the fourth set. Wilding then began a loud campaign in favor of eliminating the Challenge system and giving every player an equal chance at winning the title by going through full draw, even though he was the one clearly benefiting from the existing system! The second one concerned a concept that was foreign back then, but one that has become second-nature today: the seeding system. Wilding, also writing articles for tennis publications in his home country and abroad (a common practice for players back then to add an extra source of income), continuously raised the issue of placing the best players in the draw to avoid early round match-ups between them, thus raising the level of play as the tournament progressed and diminishing the chances of a quick final rounds where one player outmatched the other.

His first wish came true in 1922, 4 Wimbledons after he played his last final in 1914 (the tournament was not held during the World War I years), and the second one came to fruition in 1927, when the “crocodile” René Lacoste and “Big” Bill Tilden were seeded one and two respectively, along with six other players. Unfortunately, Wilding never had a chance to see the positive results of either campaign that he pioneered in their beginnings. On the advice of the Duke of Westminster, and discussions with the then First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, Wilding joined the Naval Brigade branch of the British Forces later in 1914, and he was killed during a battle in France, in May of 1915, less than a year after playing his last Wimbledon final.

A century goes by, the technology advances, new rackets come and go, courts get renewed, facilities improve, rules change, and tennis progresses. During the 100 years, many champions lifted trophies. But not all of them were necessarily pioneers of the game. In this state of continuous flux, there are still some “constants”. One of those constants is the on-and-off appearance of personages who go beyond their “champion” status to pave the way for the progress of men’s tennis. It seems that few champions such as Wilding, and the top 4 players a century later, manifest that character by putting the interest of others and the sport ahead of their own. And for players such as Stakhovsky and Kubot, and a few hundred others, this “constant” definitely serves its purpose.

The US vs. Serbia Davis Cup Tie Aftermath: A Closer Look with Jim Moortgat

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It’s done. The unthinkable happened. No, I don’t mean that it’s unthinkable that Serbia led by the world’s number one player Novak Djokovic would defeat U.S.A led by number 20 Sam Querrey and number 23 John Isner in Davis Cup, but that the world’s number one ranked doubles team Bob and Mike Bryan twins would lose on Saturday to a doubles tandem composed of Nenad Zimonjic, and some guy named Ilija Bozoljac (many pundits nicknamed him “Bozo”) who is ranked number 1150 in the ATP doubles rankings, and a mere 335 in singles! But anyone who has watched the matches over the weekend and who has read about it is aware of the headline tidbits. So, let’s go beyond the doubles upset or the retrospective obvious.

I caught up with Jim Moortgat, an old friend who currently runs a tennis academy in Boise, Idaho where the tie took place. He resides in Boise, thus he attended the Davis Cup weekend and was in charge of the ball kids. Jim is a well-known figure amongst tennis coaches and circles at the national level. Since the late 1970s, Jim has been involved in tennis as a competitor for a few years, and since then as a coach at many levels, including a successful career as a college coach, and a 5-year stint with the USTA Player Development Program. Tennis is an essential component of his life, and coaching is his passion. I asked him to reflect on what happened during the weekend, and below is what he had to say.

Jim what was the most striking memory of this Davis Cup tie for you?

JM: What struck me most actually happened before the weekend, and it has to do with Novak Djokovic. But before I get to that, let me add this: we live in a soft culture in the USA, and when you add the tennis arena into it, it becomes even a softer culture. There are no other sports where the player “drives the bus” so to speak. Everything revolves around what the player wants, the player tells the coach what he wants to work on, the coach is the player’s employee in a sense, and the coach can’t “bench” the player for bad play as is the case in many sports. American professional tennis players subscribe fully to this notion.

Then, you have a player like Novak Djokovic, head and shoulders above the rest of the players involved in the weekend. He is the earliest one to come to Boise to get used to the altitude. In Miami the week before, he stayed in the tournament longer than Isner, and lost in the same round as Querrey. Yet he gets to the site days before any Americans and starts training Monday night. He wants to run EVERY stadium stair here at Boise State stadium. To have access to the stadium, one has to get special clearance, and get the security personnel to open the doors. He actually takes the trouble to arrange all that, just so he can get in his necessary workout. I see this, and I am wondering what the American players are doing on Monday night wherever they are, but they are definitely not in Boise. Novak is out the next morning for practice again. If you want to be like everyone else than do what everyone else is doing. If you want to be #1 in the world, than be an outlier! That is the lesson to learn from Novak’s pre-weekend preparation. His training is very different from the Americans, both outside the top 20. We have a guy like Jim Courier at the helm who used to outwork everybody in his days, and yet there is not one American guy who works as hard as the other top guys.

That brings me to my next question: with all due respect and in all fairness to Jim Courier, how much influence the Davis Cup Captain has in the development of American players? To what end does the buck stop with him for this weekend’s loss?

JM: I am not sure how much of the blame/credit can be placed on the Captain. If there is blame, it certainly does not lie with Courier alone. Courier has the players for less than a week. He could demand that they come a bit earlier, but again, that goes back to what I was saying previously. The players drive the bus. Jay Berger is the head responsible of USTA Player Development program. Technically, he is Courier’s boss. All coaches in the program should demand more from the players, and in my opinion, they simply do not. When Courier was a player, the knock on him was that he did not have “enough talent”, similar to Ivan Lendl when he played. Yet, both of these guys rose to number one and overachieved through sheer determination, will, and pure hard work. Since 1968, this is the first time we have never had a player in the top 20. Perhaps we need to realize that “working hard” is also a talent, perhaps the most essential one. The buck stops with the governing body.

It seemed that the American’s hopes of defeating the Serbs rested on winning the doubles point. It was a massive upset win for the Serbs. What do you make of that?

JM: This relates a bit to the previous question’s comments, but before I get there, let me tell you a quick story. There are very few people that I really look up to with their tennis knowledge and the guy that shared the first-hand knowledge of this story was a friend of mine named Steve Smith from Tampa, Florida. Steve told me that long time ago, when Gabriela Sabatini was number two player in the world, she asked Jack Kramer to evaluate her game. Kramer bluntly told her that her serve was terrible and that she did not know how to play the court. He added that he would not help her because he felt that it would take a year of adjustments to add those aspects to her game. Sabatini replied that she was number two player in the world, so she must be doing something right. Kramer said that rankings had nothing to do with it, either you can or not. The implication was that she could either rest on her ranking based on a comparison to the players below her, or take the extra step.

Now, why do I bring this up? Because there are very few coaches, hardly any, who are willing to do what Kramer did, i.e. demand the best player to do something ‘more’ regardless of how well they do many other things compared to the players below them. They feel like leaving them alone on certain things is the safest way to go. Jim Courier fell into this trap during doubles. His team may well be the world’s best doubles team but on Saturday, the best doubles player on the court was Nenad (Zimonjic), and the second best one was his partner Bozoljac. Why? Because our team made them play well. Mike and Bob kept serving to Bozoljac’s backhand and he was on fire with the returns. In a crucial point in the first set, the Americans served to his backhand he once again hit a scorching backhand return winner. You would think that Jim Courier would notice that, but yet, they kept serving to his backhand and through his returns, Bozoljac’s confidence soared and he started serving and stroking the ball in a zone. Then comes late fifth set, and once again on a crucial point, another serve to the backhand and another return winner. When you are on the bench, even if you coach the number one team in the world, you have to demand more, still strive for perfection. That includes sometimes that the coach demand his team to do something out of their Plan A but one that will make the opponent uncomfortable and take them out of their zone. Courier and the Bryans never did that. As a result, their opponents who, under normal conditions, are not as skilled as the Bryans in doubles, found their perfect rythm and overachieved.

Any last thoughts?

JM: Yes, there is one more area where they overachieved, or we underachieved, depending on one’s perspective. The Serbians wanted it more than us. Their awareness of what a Davis Cup tie means was tremendous. On the bench, they had 18-20 people, always invested emotionally in the match, vocal and enthusiastic, creating extra energy for their players on crucial points. Djokovic was eating inside when the second set tiebreaker began, and he ran to the bench with his food to encourage and cheer his teammates because he knew how primordial that tiebreaker was to the outcome of the tie. The Serbians sure as heck knew who they were playing against and what was needed. In contrast, our bench was subdued for the most part, except on few important games and the extension of the fifth set tiebreaker, and we never had more than 10 people on our bench who were far less vocal than their counterparts. The tie was held at an 11,000+ seat arena. There were around 100 Serbians in the crowd, yet several times in the match, it felt like we were playing an away game. Our approach to Davis Cup paled in comparison to how the Serbs approached it.

Q & A with Pat Cash

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For most tennis fans, Pat Cash, the 1987 Wimbledon winner, member of multiple Australian Davis Cup teams in the 1980s, and former top-5 player, needs no introduction. Before I ever had the pleasure of meeting the legendary Australian tennis star, I wrote an article back in October of 2004 rating his autobiography entitled “Uncovered” (2002) as the best tennis-related autobiography that I have ever read. Since then, other books have been published, notably those by Tim Henman, James Blake and Andre Agassi. Unfortunately, I have only read a chapter of Agassi’s book, and I am hopelessly falling behind on my tennis literature in the last few years. Nevertheless, I would recommend “Uncovered” to any avid tennis fan. Pat also maintains a blog in which he recently finished a fascinating, 5-part-long “Greatest Tennis Player of All Time” series.

I would like to thank Pat for taking the time to do the following Q & A with me:

Question: Pat, it seems that we had a great era in men’s tennis starting with late 70s, through the 80s, into the early part 90s, one in which you played a part as well. Then, men’s tennis staggered through the rest of the 90s and early 00s. Then Federer and Nadal came around and from that point on men’s tennis found the spotlight again. Now it seems we are in the middle of a golden era again. Logic says that it will go into stagnation again once the top 4 go into decline in a few years. Do you believe that is inevitable? Or does it simply depend on the generation of players? What picture do you see five to ten years into the future in this context?

Pat Cash:
Unfortunately as a purist I see men’s tennis going in to a boring stage. There will always be superb athletes and tough competitors of course but the complete and utter lack of foresight from either the ATP or ITF have inadvertently created tennis players with little or no variety in their game. When Federer leaves the tour there will be only a few players on tour with any style of flash about them with any variety. We already have a tennis world dominated by two handed backhands big forehands following up from big serves. Ventures to the net will be to shake hands and that’s about it. When the Grand Slams started slowing down the game in the mid 90’s by introducing slower courts and balls they had little foresight in making decisions on things such as technology advances or decision on court speeds and surfaces. They changed the game that was initially for the better but as we see it now quickly becoming mundane unfortunately. There must be a committee of ex-top tour players who can discuss the game and what may be the correct decisions as far as technology or court surface speeds and if it is a good decision to change or not change things. String technology must be outlawed if we are ever to see a serve and volley player near the top of the game ever again. You must look at what surfaces favour what styles. Clay and any hard court favours the baseline player no matter what speed the court may be (unless it’s an extremely fast old indoor court). Only grass favours the volleyer or attacking player but over the past 15 years the grass courts at Wimbledon have become so hard that a good volley will bounce high just like a hard court and this again favours the baseliner. Don’t get me wrong I love watching Nadal vs. Federer and some of the other battles we have seen over the last 5 or 6 years as they are just incredible but we must reward good attacking shots and net play as well as baseline battles. It is very clear that the court surfaces balls and strings do not do that at all.

Question: Some of the players from your competitive years have gone into coaching and have had considerable success, including coaching some of the top players on the tour. Let’s imagine for a moment that there is one particular young talent who is succeeding extremely well in the juniors and you feel that he is ready to make the jump to the next level. Let’s also say that one day he comes to you for advice on whom to hire as a coach. Assuming that, for one reason or another, you are unable to be his coach at that particular time, whom would you recommend and why? What sets that particular coach apart from others in your opinion?

Pat Cash:
I think the main thing for a coach is to identify what can be improved and how, but sometimes it means some issue shouldn’t be changed. That could mean technically. For instance I would do some work on Federer’s volley technique which has become a weak point in his game and only works well from time to time. What shouldn’t be touched? I wouldn’t touch much else of any of the top players (other than volleys which are now an afterthought in junior coaching hence the poor volleying) as this may require a period of going backwards and ranking loss so therefore you can work on tactics and /or perhaps the physical part of the player. What would you change in David Ferrer’s game? He has just about maximized his ability. His backhand technique limits his power, but to fix that may require several months perhaps a year to get it better, and at 31 this is not something I would do.

So the question really is, what coach can do all of these? I don’t know any. The best thing a coach can do is to get a team around him as I did in 1986. I had a fitness trainer a sports psychologist and a coach all traveling with me. This was unheard of in 1986 but I realized that no one coach could do everything well, so I got experts from different fields to help make me a better player all over. This is common place now with the Centre Court player’s box full of people. Towards the end of my career I used sport biomechanist Brad Langevad, a body movement specialist, who worked to correct some long-standing technique problems but also to help some existing injuries, and then prevent new ones. This was good timing for me as I had many injuries, so I had time to rebuild my serve in order for it to have more power, and it also helped my back. Last year I served equal to my fastest serve ever at 47 years of age. With some practice I can consistently serve harder than I ever did on tour in the 80’s and 90’s, and it’s not about the strings as I can’t use a full racquet with modern polyester strings as they have no feel on the volley.

Question: It has been over a decade now since your excellent autobiographical book “Uncovered” was published. As you well know, I called it the best tennis book that I have ever read in one of my articles before we ever met. The last chapter is entitled “So what comes next?” and you speculate on many things regarding your future career, possible endeavors and your personal life. Do you ever take a look at that chapter now and smile reading what you were thinking 11 years ago and what has transpired since?

Pat Cash:
I can’t remember what I wrote back then. As you know I decided to be very open about my life outside of the sporting arena which, up to that stage, had not been done in a sports book. I’m glad Andre Agassi did the same thing and I know he enjoyed my book. Perhaps it gave him the confidence to be candid as well. I sometimes wonder how I am managing to play tennis at a good level after all the injuries I have had and I surprise myself when I write ‘tennis player’ in the form at passport control when I arrive in to another country. I don’t really see myself as a tennis player any more though I still do too at some level. I’m more of an entertainer now but in the end that’s what all tennis players are to the public. My life is ever evolving and I think I will move away from just tennis at some stage as there are lots to do beyond tennis. As I continue to enjoy many parts of it still, I will continue to coach, commentate and write.

Question: As you know, Brad Drewett is unfortunately stepping down as ATP’s Executive Chairman to deal with his illness. Is there anyone that you would like to see replace him? If not, what qualities are important for the top position of the ATP? Or do people make too much of it, in other words, at the end of the day, does the ATP Executive Chairman have as much authority on issues as the title would suggest?

Pat Cash:
I have known Brad for many years and played Davis Cup with him. He was a very good player winning events on all surfaces. The difference between him and other CEO’s at the ATP is that he was a player and understands what players need, so that brought a different dimension to the tour. He made sure that after 30 years of debate players finally had extra weeks off, though I did laugh to myself when I saw Federer and Djokovic racing all over the world playing exhibition matches over those new free weeks. Some were charity fund raisers which I admire. The point of having a chairman or CEO is that they lead the company in the right direction, I think given time he would realize that men’s tennis needs some hard issues looked at. It’s easy to get bogged down in politics and finance, but if the product is no good there will be a problem in the end, either that or the marketing better be very good, and this is what tennis is doing well. For instance you watch TV or read magazine and you believe the article of food you see is a good product but in reality it’s just a chewy bit of old cardboard that has been marketed well enough to attract attention and people buy into it, in the end its just cardboard but if cardboard is all you ever had, it’s pretty tasty and that’s what the younger generations are eating. Women’s tennis is much the same. The WTA slogan ‘strong is beautiful’ with shots of the players hitting tennis balls dressed up in night club dresses and ball gowns, what the hell is that all about? It doesn’t exactly promote tennis as a high quality sport does it? It did attract attention so perhaps that’s not a bad thing. The problem arises again when the product isn’t great and at the moment much of that attention goes to two of the top players who are the noisiest grunters in the sport putting spectators off in their thousands.

Question: Outside of Bernard Tomic and Marinko Matosevic, there are no top 100 Australian Men in the ATP. Does Australian Tennis need a change in the system, or an overhaul of the system, or is this simply a phase like one that any other country goes through at times? Where do you see the next 10 years in terms of Australian tennis’ future?

Pat Cash:
That’s a long conversation. The basic reality is that tennis in Australia is a small sport compared to many. It’s hard to believe considering the champions we have had over the years but it has struggled for various reasons to capture the interest of children and families to pick it up as a playing sport. Tennis Australia has done a very poor job of promoting tennis at a grass roots level for many years and is still hiding behind the fact that the Australian Open is a big financial success. The open is a big corporate event that brings needed money in to player development. Where and how the money is spend is spent is up for debate and conjecture. Tennis Australia has aimed to take control over all things in tennis and I do not believe that is a healthy situation to have. It needs some diversity and non-Tennis Australia ideas but they are not welcome and that creates tension amongst coaches, families, and the association.

Absurdity Surrounds the 20/25-Second Rule Enforcement

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When the ATP announced in the beginning of the season that it would begin to enforce the rule in regards to the time allowed to players between the points, anyone who recently became a tennis fan probably thought it was bizarre that the governing body of men’s tennis that sets the rules of the game would announce that a rule that has existed for years was going to be applied this year. If it was not applied properly before this year, why was it listed in the rules? To those of us who have been in the game of tennis, or who have followed tennis closely for many years, it was more than bizarre: it was downright absurd, as if how the rule has been ignored for so long was not comical enough in the first place

It seemed inevitable at the time that it would be the first of many absurdities to follow. It’s like having a promising project planned in writing, then never putting it into action for no apparent convincing reason, and finally having to answer to those who see the plan and ask why it was not put into action. In simpler words, when you talk the talk but don’t walk the walk, your talk becomes absurd. The rule itself is initially a good plan, and if the referees walked with it from the beginning, we would have avoided the confusion of today. Unfortunately, ATP is attempting to walk few years behind the talk, and nobody is certain that it can ever catch up.

The referees in the first tournament of the year in Doha were specifically instructed to tell the players during the coin toss before each match that they would apply the 25-second rule for time between points stricter than before. Did they also remind them that they get a second serve if they miss the first one, or that they lose the point if they miss two serves in a row, or that the long alleys on the sides of the court only matter in doubles? No, because the referees fully enforce those rules, and not “halfway”, therefore the players know and accept them. The otherwise reasonable 25-second rule would have same firm reception had it been enforced from the moment the rule-makers first put it in the rules. Since they did not do that, they are stuck in a catch-up game, except that just like in any other situation where one tries to do the right thing too late, absurdities multiply left and right and don’t let you advance straight on your course.

In Doha, Gaël Monfils became one of the early victims of the 25-second rule enforcement, and one could see the astonishment on his face as he was arguing with the referee who was reduced to repeating the same absurd sentence again and again, “it’s the rule”, as if that has always been enough to give the same penalty to the players in the past. Was it not a rule last year, and the years before that Mr. Chair Umpire? While you looked so sure of yourself when you responded to Monfils, did you penalize anybody who went over 25 seconds last year too when it was still “the rule”? Apparently one absurd quote perpetuates another, thus Gaël Monfils argued back: “I’m black so I sweat a lot!” While Lleyton Hewitt, John Isner, and Rafael Nadal may have a few thoughts about Monfils’ quote, I will simply let Monfils decide if black players are the only ones having trouble with the 25-second clock.

Other than Monfils, Feliciano Lopez received a penalty at a set point, and the big-serving Isner received a warning as early as his second serving game in Sydney. Needless to say, some disgruntled players complained and, slowly but surely, the ATP realized that enforcing the rule was not going to be a walk on the park.

The uncertainties before the Australian Open led to more absurdities, beginning with Novak Djokovic’s response last week to the enforcement of the rule: “I cannot have any complaints when I take more than 20 seconds between the points. If the chair umpire comes to me and said, ‘Listen, you should be a little bit more careful about it’. If I do it again, he gives me warning, I can’t complain about it. It’s within the rules and I will respect it.” But Novak, wait a minute! The rule does not say that if you violate it, the umpire should “come to you” (how exactly Novak?) and ask “to be more careful”. It says that you violated the rule and must receive a warning, and not just a friendly ‘pre-warning’, in the same way that the rules say that you will get a foot-fault call if you serve an ace with your feet placed one yard inside the court and not win the point while the referee ‘pre-warns’ you in a friendly way that you will receive a foot-fault call “the next time” you do that. So Novak, do you see better now how totally absurd your last sentence sounds after the previous three halfway-absurd ones?

How about the 20-second rule in the Slams vs. the 25-second rule in all other ATP tournaments? First of all, it’s absurd that there is a substantial difference in the rule from one men’s tournament to another. Is the tennis played on Court 5 of a Slam tournament a different game than the tennis played on Court 2 of a Masters Series tournament? Don’t answer that. Second, who in the right mind can possibly expect the players to be ready in twenty seconds during the fourth or fifth sets of a tough match after a long point? Don’t answer that either. Let’s simply get back to how one absurdity can perpetuate others.

When the ATP tried to flex its muscle with the “new enforcement” of the “old rule” during the smaller tournaments with Monfils, Isner and Lopez, most tennis followers knew that they were hoping to send a firm enough message to the players in order to avoid a potential controversy with a top player in the Australian Open. What they did not expect is the resulting disarray caused by the absurd application of an otherwise-needed adjustment. So, they hastily took some decisions only to find themselves in a position of being forced to explain one absurd decision with another. The ATP Chief Brad Drewett announced that the ATP will hold talks with the players, which seems absurd considering that the decision to enforce the time-between-the-points rule was enforced by the ATP Player’s council just a few weeks ago. Well, we can always hope that the walk will accompany the talk this time around.

Few days ago, the Australian Open tournament referee Wayne McEwen announced that the referees would be more “flexible” during the Australian Open with the 20-second rule and added another absurd statement to the already existing ones: “We don’t want players out there being penalized after playing a fantastic point, but then again we don’t want players deliberately taking too long and that’s what we really look at. We focus on that and tell them to use good common sense, good judgment.” Excuse me Mr. McEwen, but is that not what you have done in the past anyway? For many years, you never strictly enforced the absurd 20-second rule; your umpires used common sense, and in general, they watched for players deliberately taking too long and tried their best to warn them. It would have been less diplomatic but more honest if McEwen simply said: “we will ignore the absurd 20-second rule, as we have done in the past.” In fact, from watching a number of first-round matches, my occasional clocking of some of the time taken between the points shows that the application of the 20-second rule is no different in 2013 than it was in the previous years. For the most part, players stay around the 20 second-mark; they exceed it here and there; and every now and then, exceed it by a lot. And I have yet to see a time violation call against any player.

Let’s face it anyway: McEwen would do anything to avoid the embarrassment of having to defend the 20-second rule if the umpires penalized one of the top players. Penalizing Isner in the second round of the Sydney tournament is a much easier task than doing it at Rod Laver Arena against Djokovic or Murray.

The ATP can talk all it wants with the players, and can make as many absurd announcements as it wishes. There are only a couple of steps to take for anyone with common sense who desires to leave the absurd domain of the 20/25 second rule chaos: initiate a 25-second (or 30-second) rule over all men’s tournaments, and by all means, consistently enforce the rule on every court and every player, without explanations and announcements.

Enjoy the rest of the Australian Open!

Roger Federer’s Multiple Plan A’s

ATP Majors Tactical Analysis No Comments

Yes, we all know about Roger Federer’s 17 Slams, his regaining of the number one ranking, and his equaling of the 286-week record at number one held previously by Pete Sampras. Congratulations to the great Swiss player but in this article, I will neither repeat his astonishing statistics nor reload the “bravo” tributes and comments that newswires have been overloaded with since his moment of victory at Wimbledon. I will simply attempt to point to a certain aspect of Federer as a tennis player that I believe to be non-existent in any other player, and yet seems to mysteriously remain undervalued, if not obscure, to most so-called tennis experts.

Obviously his forehand, his physical shape, the variety of his shots, and his serve, only to mention a few, are all putative qualities of Federer. I would like to go a little further than that in this article. Let’s take into account Federer’s Sunday’s final match against Andy Murray along with his 2009 Wimbledon final match against Andy Roddick. The comparative analysis of these finals posits two relatively overlooked qualities of Federer: his intelligence and awareness on the court.

Let’s rewind the clock back to 3 years ago to that final between Federer and Roddick…

In 2009, in the finals against Roddick, Federer began the match playing aggressively, looking to advance to the net at every opportunity. Roddick was focused from the start and was able to withstand the barrage of attacks from Federer. Roddick took many people by surprise by producing some sizzling passing shots to counter his opponent’s early aggressive tennis. As the set advanced, we witnessed Federer becoming more and more intimidated by Roddick’s accurate passing shots. He began to stay at the baseline and to try to dictate the rally with aggressive ground strokes. On the other hand, Roddick got more confident as the set went on. At 6/5 on Federer’s serve, he hit an “out-of-this-world” forehand crosscourt winner, and then followed it later in that same game with a terrific backhand down-the-line drive on set point to win it 7/5. The Swiss needed to change his tactics before it was too late. Well, he did more than that.

Federer did not simply adjust his game after the first set. He completely changed his tactic and outlook. He took a one hundred and eighty degree turn from his initial plan at the start of the match and went to an exclusively defensive format. He ceased venturing to the net unless forced to do so, thus taking targets away from Roddick. He made each point last longer, giving Roddick plenty of floaters, low-speed slices, in order to force him to hit several great shots to win the points. He placed himself further behind the baseline with the intention of running every ball down, prolonging the time of the rallies and the games, including plenty of off-speed, loopy shots that gave him ample time to come back to the middle of the court if he was ever pushed to the corners.

In short, after the first set, Federer basically took a page out of a classic clay court retrieving game and applied it to the grass of Wimbledon. While it is true that the second set could have gone either way (Roddick did have 4 set points, one of which was an easy forehand volley that he missed!), Federer was able to give himself a chance to level the playing field and have a tangible shot at winning the second set. After he won it in a tiebreaker, the match was not only leveled on the scoreboard but also on the court. Helped by a superb serving performance – he hit his 50th ace to win the epic match at the end of 4 hours of 16 minutes of battle – Federer eventually prevailed over Roddick 16/14 in the fifth set, while playing defensively for the remainder of the match.

Now, let’s fast-forward the clock to Sunday’s 2012 final between Federer and Murray…

Murray began the match with an aggressive approach, and Federer began with an unusual amount of errors (including after he survived the initial break and came back on serve). Federer was not particularly playing defensive, but Murray kept launching so many aggressive shots in succession that all Federer could do was to retrieve balls the best that he could for the first several games of the match. He did eventually break back, but Murray’s early form had him unsettled. The unforced errors still kept coming and he lost the first set 6/4.

To circumvent the problem, Federer did the reverse of what he did in 2009. To counter Murray’s initiative to dictate the points, he began to “out-attack” Murray with an even more aggressive game with the intention to cut the points short. Although he was not the better player in the second set, Federer did what was working best for him: build the points around coming to the net. He came to the net 26 times in the second set (vs. 15 in the first) and won twice more points approaching the new (total: 22) then in the first. Relentlessly staying loyal to his modified plan, Federer began to further embellish it by adding the ‘chip-and-charge’ and progressively coming to the net on second-serve returns in the third set during which he was the better player. Once he won the third set, there was no doubt that he would do more of what he did in the second and third sets. In the fourth set, he came to the net 16 times and won 14!

Overall, in the last three sets, the approaches to the net included slice approach shots, swing volleys, chip-and-charge returns, drop shot that he followed up to the net, wide balls that he knew would put Murray on the run, and last but not the least, several serve-and-volley attempts of which he only lost one point! This time, Federer won the title by changing his game to total offense, in the reverse manner of what he did in 2009, and taking a page out of 70s and 80s grass court tennis, (minus the ‘continuous’ serve-and-volley). It is only fitting that he celebrated the winning point by lifting his arms and immediately falling to his knees at the net after watching yet another passing shot attempt by Murray sail long.

It is an important asset for a top-level tennis player to have the ability to insert variety to his or her game. Although not many do, there are more than a few players who possess the ability to use plenty of variety on their game, including Murray in the finals on Sunday. These few players are already quite distinguished, and in a class of their own. However, it is another thing to be able to combine the intelligence and the on-court awareness, with that variety, in order to modify strategies and produce the result desired. Some of these distinguished players will not do it either because they are still lacking courage to do it, or because they don’t feel comfortable doing it in the course of match, or simply because they the thought does not occur to them. The one that can dare to undertake such adjustment, and actually follow through with it successfully, is the kind of sui generis player who can comfortably claim to have “a Plan A” to fall back to, in case the “other Plan A” already in progress is not functioning well. Plan B is not an option for this type of player. Federer in 2009 against Roddick, as well as on Sunday against Murray, simply switched from one Plan A to another.

I believe Federer’s skill to have more than one Plan A along with the presence of mind to know intrinsically when to shift at will from one to the next is one of the central elements of Federer’s success. While other players strive during their whole careers to improve up weaker defensive (or offensive) parts of their games to match their stronger side, and practice for years their weaker shots to complement their stronger ones, Federer has gone past this stage early in his career. Furthermore, he has not only reached the next stage that I have explained above – the combination of intelligence and variety resulting in multiple Plan A’s – but he has excelled in that area, the one that other players in the game of tennis never even get to experience.

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