Le Sod has the lot

Written by: Staff on 14th November 2010

Le Sod has the lot

Robin Soderling (SWE) |

Robin Soderling has finally won a title in Paris. It may not be quite the title he hoped for – he has lost twice in the last round at Roland Garros, after all – but he did not mind. The reinvented Swede had never reached a Masters final before but on Sunday afternoon he beat Gael Monfils 6-1, 7-6 to claim 1,000 ranking points and $616,000 and the BNP Paribas Masters trophy. And he was gobsmacked.

“I tried to not show any emotions on court, because at the tiebreak I just wanted to be very focused on every point even though I was up 6‑1 having a good chance to win it,” Soderling said, with typical Swedish sangfroid. “I try not to show anything. Then when I won that last point, I just felt so happy and I felt so relieved. I really wanted to win this match so much. I don’t know. I didn’t know what I did. I was just happy.”

Actually, what he did was lie down, flat on his back on the court, a la Rafa Nadal. Then again, when you have just played your heart out, won your first Masters title and, to top it all, moved up to No.4 in the world, you, too, might want a bit of a breather.

Beating Monfils in front of his home crowd is not easy task. The flamboyant Frenchman brings with him a stadium full of supporters who cheer his every move – “Allez Le Monf!” – and in front of such a crowd, he loves to put on a good show. Not only that, but he had more than proved his worth this past week by beating Fernando Verdasco, Andy Murray and then Roger Federer (saving five match points in the process) to get to the final. Le Monf was on fire at the Palais Omnisports but Soderling had thoughtfully brought along a couple of extinguishers and a bucket of sand.

Soderling started his career by being tipped for greatness by Bjorn Borg. Admittedly, Borg tends to tip anyone for greatness if asked to do so (his double-handed backhand is a good deal sounder than his punditry) but, nonetheless, it is still an awful burden for a young Swedish hopeful to be lumbered with. As Le Sod took the occasional big scalp, he showed that he was capable of doing the business but he could never put together a consistent run of results.

That all changed when the man from Tibro (it is the furniture capital of Sweden) asked Magnus Norman to become his coach in November, 2008. Good old Magnus could never be described as a wild man of tennis but he was solid, dependable and, at one point the second best player in the world. It was not an obvious marriage but it has worked wonders over the past couple of years.

Norman took all the component parts of Soderling’s game and, carefully and methodically, created a player capable of beating anyone. A little like assembling an IKEA kitchen, it took time, it took patience but, as Norman knew from the start, all the bits were there in front of him; all he had to do was put them together in the right order. History does not record whether an Allen key was required, but the end product is the Bercy champion and a bloke who fancies his chances at the ATP Finals in London.

“This is great,” Le Sod said. “I think I played very good last week, and this week, too, on a surface that’s pretty similar to what it’s going to be in London. I played a lot of good players this week. It gives me a lot of confidence. I think playing in any Masters, when you play the top players of the world, every match can be a Grand Slam final.

“I think you need to believe in yourself, and I think that can make a big change. I’m feeling really good right now, and I’m going to have one or two days of rest and prepare for London.”

When it comes down to the nuts and bolts, Soderling’s revamped career does not hinge around a new shot or a new strategy (hey, he’s working with Monotonous Magnus – what did you expect?) but, rather, it is based on a simple philosophy: play your best when you can and just beat the other so-and-so when you can’t. It is not the sexiest game plan in the world, but it is one that has won matches for all the greats in the past.

“I always knew that when I played my best tennis I could beat everybody,” the new champion said. “But it was just a matter of doing it match after match, not only one or two matches here and there. That’s what I improved the most.

“Now I really feel like I can beat a lot of good players, even though I don’t play my best tennis. I don’t think I’m a much better player now when I play my best compared to when I played my best a couple years ago. But when I’m not at my best, I’m much better now, I think.”

As for Monfils, he is off to Guadeloupe. He has the Davis Cup final coming up at the beginning of December but, before that, he has a little vacation planned.

Never the most conventional of players, he does not see any reason to hunker down and start working towards the big match with Serbia in Belgrade. After a long season, he needs a little R&R, even if that involves travelling through several time zones and running his socks off against the kids in his father’s home country. He is going to have some fun for a few days and no one can stop him.

“They are going to be my holidays,” Le Monf said of his days away. “I’ll play soccer, that’s for sure. It’s thanks to soccer that I started doing sports. I was raised by my father with that. Basketball also is a part of my life, and I will do that.

“And I will play tennis there, because I love playing with the children. I like spending time on the courts with them. The children from my father’s club all play. It’s not going to be practice, of course.

“So I will be tired, but it will be a good tiredness, so to speak, because I will have found a new energy; I would have seen different faces. I hope I will be able to make those kids happy if I spend time with them and play with them and talk to them, and my family will be happy.

“It’s more happiness. Well, why do people read? Why can’t I play basketball? What’s the difference?”

The difference is that you don’t end up cream crackered, as they say in my country (it’s cockney rhyming slang: cream crackered means knackered. And knackered means tired. We are a very odd race, we Brits, but we invented English so we have bragging rights). But Le Monf is a law unto himself. The only shame is that he will not be in London for the ATP Finals (sponsored by Barclays, in case you should be wondering) – he would go down a storm at the O2 Arena if only, like Le Sod, he could harness his talent and turn it into a winning formula.

And finally, as we sign off from Paris-Bercy, the big news is that the lovely Max Mirnyi, a long-time friend of 10sballs.com, has claimed his place at the ATP Finals. He and Mahesh Bhupathi knew that they were London-bound after they won the semi finals on Saturday but, chock-full of confidence and aiming to end the season with a flourish, the pair won the Paris Masters title by beating Mark Knowles and Andy Ram 7-5, 7-5. It was their first title together since 2004.

“Any win gives you confidence and we’re happy that we’re in London,” Mirnyi said. “A week ago we were still battling for the spot. Now that we’re in there we’re healthy, we’re ready to go, we’re going to enjoy it: play hard and see what happens.”

Topics: Andy Murray, Bnp Paribas, Bnp Paribas Masters, Fernando Verdasco, Gael, Greatness, Handed Backhand, Home Crowd, Masters Title, Match Points, Palais Omnisports, Punditry, Rafa, Robin Soderling, Roger Federer, Roland Garros, Sangfroid, Sod, Swede, Tiebreak