Welllllll this the last part of my Sony Ericsson Open coverage, the big tournament on the mens and ladies tour, so this post will cover the mens and ladies finals.
Starting with the ladies final which was between Maria Sharapova and Agnieszka Radwanska who fought it out on the centre stadium for the right for the title trophy. And the match itself was a pretty tight affair, which was almost like a game of cat and mouse, or Tom and Jerry even! In the first set it was pretty taut stuff as the players held serve until 6-5, where on Sharapova's serve she gifted the break to Radwanska on an unforced error. In the second set it was tight again until 5-4, with Sharapova serving to level up 5-5, when Sharapova yet again proved to be her worst enemy as she hit a final unforced error (her 45th!) to hand the match and championship to Radwanska, with the Pole winning her first Miami title in 7-5, 6-4.
The scoreline for this one was pretty tight but it was yet again for the fourth time, the same result as before. But to be fair Sharapova did give a good account of herself, way better than she did in Indian Wells. But Maria as usual failed in one main regard and that was in keeping her unforced error count down, she has improved her serve incredibly, but if she keeps making the errors then it doesn't count for much in the end. You could also see the look on Sharapova's face when she lost, as she rolled her eyes and looked like she was saying "Not again!!!". Radwanska on the other hand did incredibly well and used her game to mix things up, and while she lacks the power that Sharapova has, she has the ability to create points and use the court to her advantage. Radwanska's consistency over the last 6 months or so has been alarmingly good, and at this rate she could even raise higher in the rankings, as she is now the world no.4, but she could push it even further, maybe even to the No.2 spot. Also Agnieszka has only been beaten by one player this year, and that's Victoria Azarenka, but she has the same number of wins under her shorts (belt!), 26. So big well done to Agnieszka, who keeps going on the rise, and you never know, just maybe we could be looking another slam champion in the making here. And that's a great thing about Radwanksa and even Wozniacki as they are both counterpunchers, they bring something a little different to the proceedings, rather than just the aggressive bit hitters who just blast the ball down the court from the baseline, they also try to out-think each other and push each other into making the error, which is different from just hitting the ball as hard as you can.
Now onto the men's final which was a much anticipated match up between Andy Murray and the World No.1 Novak Djokovic. This promised to be quite a match, but unfortunately it didn't quite live up to expectations, as from the start Andy didn't look very comfortable out on court, he also looked pretty rusty in comparison to Djoko who was match sharp. In the first set Djokovic dominated right from the start and was able to break Andy twice, and served it out 6-1. In the 2nd however it proved to be a tighter contest, but Andy had to fight hard to hold onto his service games, while Djokovic breezed through his, until 5-6, on Djokovic's serve, which came under threat for the first time. However Djoko managed to survive all the break points on his serve and pushed it to a tiebreak, which he came out on top on, and won his 3rd title in Miami, in 6-1, 7-6(4).
This wasn't a bad final overall even though it was by no means a classic, but to be fair I guess with two walkovers and having only played 3 matches up until then, Andy's game wasn't as sharp as he would like it to have been. However Andy just failed to get his serve going, and he dumped his first serve too often into the net, and his return game ultimately let him down. The conditions on court of course probably didn't help matters much as it was very hot and humid, and you could see both players were feeling it quite a bit and in the 1st set it was pretty flat. However the 2nd set did provide some terrific rallies from both players, and some of the real highlights were from Andy who hit some great winners, particularly a superb drop shot during the breaker at 2-2. And despite the scoreline the match itself was no pushover for Djokovic, as they were out on court for nearly 2 hours and 20 minutes, and plenty of matches with that scoreline have lasted much shorter.
But Djokovic definitely proved he was the World No.1 in this match and this tournament, where he didn't even drop a single set throughout. And what's more alarming for the other players on tour it looks like he's worked on his main weakness, which has been tiebreaks, as he didn't lose a single tiebreak in this tournament either. So that could mean even bigger trouble for the other players on tour if they can't even take a set off Djoko in a tiebreak. Gulp! But Djokovic definitely deserves full credit for his performance throughout the tournament, as he returned and served brilliantly and it helps keep him safely at the top spot once more, and with another 1000 points onto his ranking, no one will knock him off the top spot anytime soon.
As for Andy Murray, well to be fair, he did well to fight back in the 2nd set, but he will need to make sure he improves his performance for future finals. But despite the loss, he has reached another final, and that's already three this year, despite losing two, its still a good start in comparison to last year where at this time he failed to even win a set never mind a title. But here's hoping in time it will to come Andy, but for now he might as well go back to the training camp with Lendl and work on what's loose. For me and everyone else, it is the serve that hurts him most, and Greg Rusedski said the right thing about it, which is quite often he changes the direction of his ball toss and he keeps trying to thump it too hard on the first serve, if slow down the speed of the serve to get it in, he would have better chances of increasing his percentage. But it really remains Andy's Achilles heel, and despite it all, his serve is terrific when it goes in, its a tough one to stop, but he needs to find that consistency, and that's where he has always struggled since the beginning.
And while he has made two finals this year against two of the top 3 players in the world, he has struggled to bring out his best tennis in either of those finals, and that is definitely something Andy needs to work on. But there are more chances ahead, and here's hoping that he can take some of them, or at least one of them! He is also still talking of hoping to reach the No.1 spot by the end of the year, but from here its a mighty big ask, as Novak Djokovic might just have something to say about it, especially as Andy has yet to even win a grand slam, so the sound of pigs fluttering up springs to mind at that one, I have to unfortunately say. One thing however that is impressive for Andy that he is now for the first time in quite a while got 8000 points to his ranking, which puts him just over a thousand points underneath Federer, so all he needs to do is keep plugging away, try to reach a few more finals or even try to win a Masters title and it will put him ahead of Federer. But I think as Andy rightly has said that he will try his best to peak at the French Open, and I hope he does, even if he gives himself a decent shot of getting to the final, but its still a mammoth ask to get past Rafa or Djokovic in the final. But with Lendl on his side, you never know, he put in a great performance in Melbourne, and that is something he can hopefully build on for the French Open.
But anyway that's the hard court season come to an end for now, and in a week or so it will be time for the red dirt, or clay. And this will most likely see the return of Rafa to his winning ways, or will it???? Because let's face it, if he faces Djokovic in another clay court final, be it a Masters, he could lose once again. But last year was last year, and it will be very interesting to see where Rafa will be at with his game on clay this time, and we will also see if he can somewhere down the line snap his losing streak to Djokovic. And if there is a place where he should and I would love to see him do it, then that place would be Roland Garros.
But that's another story, for now I shall leave it there and say goodbye to the Sony Ericsson Open which has been a terrific tournament this year, especially on the ladies side of the net, some great matches, and the Miami crowd are really receptive, far more so than the heavily sedated atmos at Indian Wells. So next up will be the start of the clay season, and on the WTA it kicks off with the Family Circle Cup from Charleston in the US, except this is green clay (yuck!). And there are quite a few big names playing there such as the Williams sisters, Sam Stosur, Marion Bartoli, Sabine Lisicki and Jelena Jankovic, so it promises to be pretty good!
Oh and also Great Britain's next Davis Cup tie at the Braehead Arena is on this coming week, which is Easter week of course, and I will be going myself, with my cousin, my uncle and my dad to see it (yep its become a family thing!). And unfortunately once again Andy Murray will not be playing the tie, so it will leave Great Britain with a big big task ahead of them in getting past their next opponents, Belgium. The Belgium team have two very good singles players who are within the Top 100, Xavier Malisse and Oliver Rochus, and Malisse is also a great doubles player, so team GB have their work cut out in both the singles and doubles departments. And if I'm being honest I really don't see Great Britain winning this time, no matter how much home advantage they might have, I just don't think it will be quite enough. However having said that I really didn't expect them to win last time, and yet they pulled a great win out of the bag, and provided a terrific and very close tie, so just maybe you never know, they might just be able to pull it off again. I sincerely hope they do and I will be there on Easter Sunday to cheer them on, or groan in dispair when they lose, either way I'm prepared for the either scenario, and I've seen just about enough tennis not to be too surprised, well nearly!
Right that's finally it for now!
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