Surviving amidst Parisian glamour
The Grand-Slam venue Roland-Garros in Paris has laid an inviting carpet to the world in its presentation of the French-Open 2015. Nothing has been spared to take the event into the global mega league attraction. As for the players, the hurdle of getting past the first challenges, that is to get past the first two rounds became much more than a test of skillful Tennis and adapting to settle on clay courts.
In the midst of the glamour of Parisian scale, the ‘grind’ the women and men had to face to survive the early rounds will go down on record as the toughest challenge French-Open has ever placed on players. It has been nothing less than ‘survival struggles’. One would have never guessed that the differences in the playing standard in the elite 20 and the tail ender’s in the draw of 128 will be marginal on clay courts. In the first two rounds surviving top twenty rankers got a shake they would remember for a long time and in the process some big names had to go home.
First samples
In the women’s singles the sample of what is to come in Roland Garros began when France’s Alize Cornet faced a player whom she had never beaten – Italy’s Roberta Vinci. Vinci clinched the first set but that did not hamper Cornet’s spirit in front of the home crowd. She became fiery, loud and bold.
Both brought out the best of skills in the second set and it left the older of the two Vinci completely drained of energy. This match brought out every aspect of the clay court game accompanied with the ‘Latino temperament’ of France and Italy to heighten the entertainment.
Cornet played the match of her life. A few weeks ago in Madrid, Cornet beat the world’s number two Romanian Simona Halep in a similar performance.
In the match between Serena Williams and Czech Republic’s Andrea Hlavackova the first three games gave every sign of the match becoming a roller coaster win for Serena. So much so Hlavackova celebrated winning the first game when she was down 0-3 as if she had won the Paris title. Over the next few games Hlavackova came in terms with the sizzling pace of Serena Williams and came close even to break Serena’s service game a good few times.
The match went to Serena at 6-2, 6-3 but the second set lasted nearly four times the time of the first. The match went well past the one hour mark when Serena shook hands after winning. Lot of the winners of Hlavackova left Serena standing. Players in this class of Tennis adapt to challenges very fast. This is what Hlavackova did raising her reaction levels to keep up with the fierce pace of Serena Williams.
Causalities of shock defeats
The Czech Republic’s Petra Kvitova was given a real fright by the Croatian born New Zealander Marina Erakovic. The match went to three sets and Kvitova could have easily lost the match. The real shock was when 54th ranked France’s Kiki Mladenovic beat Canadian Eugenie Bouchard ranked 6 in the world. Other shock defeat was 3rd seeded Simona Halep losing to Crotian Mirjana Lucic Baroni ranked 70 in the world. Lucic Baroni is 33 years old and played French-Open for the first time in 1999. Baroni beating Halep is a repeat of her win against Halep in US-Open 2104. This year, Halep changed her team and that is giving her a bumpy ride although she is still ranked 3 in the world.
The men’s draw shook when 37th ranked USA’s Jack Sock beat prominent Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov ranked 11. Somehow, Dimitrov did not look impressive on clay although it is his home surface in Bulgaria. As for Sock he made sure star spangled flag fluttered into the second round.
Today’s popular Clay game
When it comes to handling pace, the better women players are playing somewhat a similar game like the men. All the players in the third round have a good first serve which often comes out as an ace. The second serve seems to be the weakness or better said not very strong in all. Often the second serve gets returned by the opponent as a down-the-line winner. Alize Cornet, Maria Sharapova and Serena Williams among women and most of the top in men have this ability and use it liberally.
Once the rally passes the service/return situation, players try to open the court to hit the sharp cross court winner from the centre area of the baseline. Such rallies tactically take a lot of skill, good reaction and imagination to be done repeatedly. I did not see the serve and volley being played by any of the players like the last man to master the game with net play which was Sweden’s Stefan Edberg. Often players rush to the net from the baseline once they notice that the opponent is scrambling to reach the ball at the far end of the baseline. The conventional ‘following the approach shot to net’ is not a frequently used method in today’s net-play. Apparently this gives an easy ‘target’ to opponents to pass. Anyway, to play at net on clay, one has to be an extraordinary volleyer and move and position very tactically. Right now, there are signs of this coming back.
Outright winners from the baseline have been providing the successful players with good many points. Many players have this in the form of backhand down-the-line, forehand down-the-line and the deceptive inside-out-forehand. The short cross court where the ball goes out of the court over the side line, is used only when players are wide out of the sides of the court. Serena Williams uses this angle from the middle of the baseline with tremendous spin in her forehand. This shot of hers is almost never returned by the opponent.
White hats of Paris
For Sri Lankan players, this is the event from which they could learn a lot. When the match begins glamour of fashion, fascination of racquets and all others will not find an effective place. It will be the strength of personality, skills and endurance to stand up again and again under daunting conditions and challenge that will win any match. One is bound to feel very lonely doing this. There is a ‘game’ to be played which will not have the entertaining carnival elements of practice sessions. Only the ‘lone warriors’ will ever survive here.
The competitive nature is so high that the matches will get tougher in the second week. The seasoned campaigners, clay court specialists and the emerging talent will have to book a berth in the finals on Sunday to be famous for life. Those surviving the first week are all armed to the teeth to fight for the prize. White hats of French-Open will fill the famous courts in the second week and Paris will not fail to impress the world with the glamour of its national championships.
George Paldano, former international player; Accredited Coach of Germany, National coach, Davis Cup and Federation Cup Coach; ITF and USPTR; –
gptennis.ceylon@gmail.com-