Episode #6: Can we come out from behind the sofa/couch?
What happened? Well ok maybe we’re being a teeny bit sensationalist, of course by now we know what happened. The rock solid favourite for the title exited stage left from the first Slam of the year.
While some of us (not looking in any particular direction) might have been watching Andy Murray’s progress, all the action was going down on Rod Laver as Roger Federer’s Australian Open campaign ended up as dead as a racquet-swatted bug on the court.
If Simone Bolelli played lights out tennis to take his first set off Federer in the previous round, we could be forgiven for exaggeratedly rolling our eyes when he lost the first set to Andreas Seppi. He teased us with a hope that he would pull off another mini-blip-but-it’s-all-ok-now comeback as he surged ahead in the second set tie-break, but the next time we glanced at the scores, it was 2-0 to the Italian.
That’s ok though because the come-back started as Seppi’s level inevitably dropped and Federer picked up a set. And this is important, because best of five sets are a whole different beast, and anything is possible. Well it was… until the fourth set tiebreak when Seppi struck a winner to snap a 10 match losing streak against the Swiss 6-4, 7-6(5), 4-6, 7-6(5).
We’d have used a more colourful phrase like “turned out the lights” but this was Federer’s first day match.
“How many times have I played night session, day session, night session, day session or day session, night session? Who cares. I think he did well. I struggled today and he took advantage of it really. I wish I believed maybe if we played at night I would have been more comfortable, but at this point who cares, right? I mean, like I’m on the plane and he’s not.”
Meanwhile Andy Murray, Maria Sharapova and Rafael Nadal all progressed with relatively little drama, which meant we could come from behind the furniture (mainly because it’s pretty uncomfortable down there).
Nadal seemed to have little lingering effects from the mystery bug that half crippled him, and Murray has yet to drop a set, although let’s be fair, his concentration has taken a little wander now and again and he can’t do that when he plays Grigor Dimitrov in the next round, although both their draws have opened up nicely with Federer heading for the airport.
So time to plump up the cushions for tomorrow with Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams doing battle for the round of 16.
Topics: Andreas Seppi, Andy Murray, Australian Open, global chick, Melbourne, Novak Djokovic, Rafa, Roger Federer, Serena Williams, Tennis
GLOBAL CHICK REPORTS IN ON HER DUTIES @ THE #AusOpen THE “HAPPY SLAM” JUST BECAME THE “SAD SLAM” FOR @rogerfederer- http://t.co/HZ2W9RISaf
RT @10sBalls_com: GLOBAL CHICK REPORTS IN ON HER DUTIES @ THE #AusOpen THE “HAPPY SLAM” JUST BECAME THE “SAD SLAM” FOR @rogerfederer- http:…