OK its been a while since my last tennis post, and the season is still very much on the go just now, although some of the top seeds have been out of action, especially Andy Murray, who won't be playing again until Indian Wells at the beginning of March, and Novak Djokovic is out of action until Dubai at the end of the month. Federer however is back on the scene this week in Rotterdam where he hopes to defend his title at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament.
But the main subject of this post is of course on Rafa's return to the tour, as after an 8 month hiatus, due to an ongoing knee injury, the Spaniard finally made his long awaited return to the courts. Last week Rafa played at the VTR Open in Chile, which is an outdoor clay court tournament, and as Rafa is the king of the red dirt he would be top favourite to win it. And Rafa throughout the tournament played some really good tennis, and he reached the final in both singles and doubles at the event. However in the singles final, Rafa came up against an inspired opponent in Horacio Zeballos of Argentina, who came from a set down to pull of a big upset victory and win his first ATP tour title, with a dramatic 6-7, 7-6, 6-4 win.
This result alone clearly shows that Rafa is only at the start of his comeback trail, and to even reach the final of the tournament in Chile is fine effort given the time that Rafa has been out of the game, as well as in the doubles there too where he also lost in the final with his doubles partner Juan Monaco. However it does raise a big concern of just how well can he recover and improve as the year goes on? Rafa said after his matches last week that his knee is still painful, and it will still take time for the pain reside, and this could have a big impact on him in the grand slams. And its in the majors where we might see Rafa struggle the most, as naturally the grand slams are the most physically demanding events in the sport, and this is where his knee and his movement will really be put to the test.
And I think from that point of view that its going to be tough for Rafa to get back in and try and dominate and compete at the top of the game like he did just at the beginning of last year and at the French Open. Whether or not however he can still go on and defend his title at the French open this year remains to be seen, as we will just have to say where Rafa's fitness is by then. And the other big question is how will Rafa's game stack up against the other big three in the sport? Particularly as Novak Djokovic over the last two years has gotten Rafa's number (their last three clay court meetings notwithstanding) and now Andy Murray is going from strength to strength, he will look to become the World No.2 and compete with Djokovic for the top spot.
Rafa has also recently complained in the press about how he felt the ATP don't take good enough care of the players, as overall they have too many hard court tournaments on the season calendar, and of all the surfaces, hard court is the most physically taxing. And this is another problematic area for Rafa, as right now he is playing on clay, his best surface, which will allow him to slowly ease his way back into playing on the court. But when he hits the American hard court swing, that's when the real test could begin for Rafa, as the hard surface could take its toll on his joints, and then we will see where he goes from there. And it wouldn't surprise me that if that's the case then Rafa might withdraw from some of the hard court events to conserve his energies for the clay court season, which I'm sure will be more in his priorities just now.
But this is all speculation, and as it stands for now its great to finally have Rafa back on the tour, and even though he's got a long way to go before he can get back to anywhere near his best, to just have him back is great for the sport. And there is a fair possibility that Rafa might not even recover his best form again, but you never know. Until then we can all watch in fascination as to how Rafa will get on throughout 2013.
So that's it for now. More to follow later.
