Gulbis to have one of his streaks
In 2014, Ernests Gulbis reached the Roland Garros semi-finals and looked to be finally reaching his potential, climbing to world no.10. Things quickly took a turn for the worse, however, for the Latvian as injury struck him and a slump, which has lasted a year now and seen him fall to world No. 87, took its toll.
This week, Gulbis has qualified for the Montreal Open and will face friend and training partner Dominic Thiem, who beat him in the US Open Second round last year, and is currently in form winning two clay titles (Umag, Gstaad) in the last week.
This match might be a good chance for Gulbis to get one of his streaks going. The Latvian has had some match practice on hard courts in qualifying, and his opponent will be making a transition from clay to hard courts, not too tricky in this age of court surface similarity, but difficult when you have won 10 matches in 13 days like Thiem has just done.
Another Gulbis streak would be good for the game. His big hitting, and eccentric looking game (that forehand) can be quite a spectacle and his off court quotes keep us entertained. A return to form would also spice up the US Open, making Gulbis a dark floater yet to fulfil his potential and just waiting for the momentum to propel him into doing so.
Federer vs Nadal at the U.S Open.
That this has not happened yet, in a rivalry that has spanned 11 seasons and 33 Matches, is one of the game’s mysteries. Except it is not much of a mystery really. By the time Nadal had got to grips with the speed of the US Open surface and made his serve a weapon to be reckoned with in 2010, Federer’s peak on hard courts was done.
Right now, both men are past their peaks, but the match would still come at an interesting time. Few men have played the way Federer the world no. 2 has at age 34 while Nadal is trying to put back together a game that has taunted and broken down Federer’s in the finals of all the game’s other big stages (Nadal leads 7-2 in slam finals).
There are arguments, though, that the lack of US Open finals makes that head to head a little lopsided, and had Nadal made the finals of the 2005-2009 events he was the second seed at, that head to head might be more equal, and who knows what those final wins might have meant to Federer’s confidence and how they would have affected their other matches.
Mind you, there were theories that the Nadal game would never match up to Federer at Wimbledon or in Melbourne, but it did, and if Nadal had beaten Federer at Flushing Meadows then the case his dominant head to head over him was courtesy of the many clay matches he beat him in and not a superior mental toughness would be lost.
We will never really know the answers to those speculations, but if the contest was to finally happen this US Open, our speculations would at least be a little more educated about what might have been.
One of the old young guns to break through
Not long ago the ATP were pushing Dimitrov, Nishikori and Raonic as the young guns of the tour, but since injury, chokes and slumps have taken their toll, they have quickly been replaced by the new young guns of Coric, Kyrgios and Kokkinakis.
No longer the young guns aged 25, 24 and 23¸ they are still a little too young to be old hat, and in a game that has seen the likes of Murray, Cilic and Wawrinka win their first slams aged 26 and 29 they still have some breathing space before the fickle critics and authorities completely throw them to the side.
Whether one of them will break through this US Open and win a slam is questionable. Raonic is just back from injury, Dimitrov is adjusting to life without Rasheed, and Nishikori has the pressure of following up and building upon last year’s finalist appearance. However, they could still make a breakthrough with some success at the ATP 1000 events in Montréal or Cincinnati. The trio have just two ATP 1000 finals between them (Nishikori, Madrid 2014, Raonic, Paris-Bercy 2014), a startling fact considering their talent and the buzz around them.
One of the real young guns to get a major scalp.
Kyrgios, Coric, Zverev, Rublev, Chung and Kokkinakis have all made their mark this season, but have yet to score a win of the magnitude of the 17 year old Chang over Lendl at the ’89 French Open, the kind of win that would really shake up the tennis establishment.
Kyrgios over Nadal at Wimbledon ’14 was not really a major scalp as the rot had already begun to set in for Nadal (beaten by Ferrer and Amalgro on clay that season).
A major scalp would be a defeat of Djokovic, Federer, or Murray at any stage of this year’s open and Wawrinka, Nishikori, Cilic or Berdych from the quarters onwards. A win like that would propel any of these young guns into the spot light and give hope to the other youngsters that there is room for Youngblood at the top of the veteran’s club that is the current ATP tour.
Isner to make a deep run at the U.S Open
Isner’s resume is very bright when it comes to the US Open Series with three Atlanta titles, Washington finals appearances (when it was the US Open Series) and a win over Djokovic at the 2013 Cincinnati Open.
Those runs seem to have left him spent though when it comes to his home Major The US Open. Though Isner has a respectable 17-8 record there and made the 2011 quarter- finals, he has underachieved considering his formidable record on home soil outside of Flushing Meadows. (Indian Wells ’12 final/ Semi-final ‘13, Miami Semi-final ’15, Cincinnati final ’12.
If Isner is going to make another New York run into the second week then he needs to avoid, or beat, Philipp Kohlschreiber who has defeated Isner in his last three US Open, and each time in the third round.
Isner’s other NY losses have come, apart from a first round loss in 2007 to 122nd ranked Beck (Isner was ranked 125) to top 20 opponents of the calibre of Murray, Youzhny, Verdasco, and Federer. Those are pretty tough draws and if he could get a luckier one Isner could give the home crowd something to cheer about in the second week of the Open, and who knows how far that support could take him.
Commentary by Christian Deverille.
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