At first I thought, why in the world would Venus fly all the way over from Dubai to Acapulco to participate in a small red claycourt tournament, when we are in the midst of the winter/spring hardcourt season. Worse yet, she has her particular banes Carla Suarez Navarro and Flavia Pennetta as potential opponents in the semifinal and final.

Then it occured to me, that Venus loves to travel and is simply taking advantage of her status as professional tennis player to see the sights. She's gone to smaller tournaments in Warsaw and Istanbul over the years, in addition to her head-scratching fall asian tournament swing back in 2007.

Further proof that Venus is just out there having fun is the fact she's blogging from Acapulco
(http://www.sonyericssonwtatour.com/1/newsroom/stories/?ContentID=3024)

It's great to see Venus seemingly enjoying life during the latter stages of her career. I have quiet hopes that she can complete a career grand slam and have at least 10 slams in her war chest like her sister.

I agree, Venus seems to like diverse venues. I'm not sure Navarro is a bane yet for Venus, since they've only played once and Pennetta, while 3-2, lost their last outing. I bet Venus is chomping at the bit to prove neither of them are a bane.

I too want Venus to get a FO and an AO before she wraps up. I also wish she'd get more weeks in at the #1 ranking, it just seems SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO wrong that Venus has spent fewer weeks at #1 than players like Amélie (as much as I love her!), Tracy Austin, Clijsters (as much as I love her!), JJ, Capriati, Sharpie, Ivanovic, and Sanchez-Vicario. In fact, of all the players that have ever held the #1 ranking, Venus has the second least total weeks at #1 at just 11...it just ain't right!!

I'm assuming this thread encompasses all the WTA/ATP tournaments for the week, the biggest is (or was, rather) the men's tournament in Dubai. I say "was" because the World #1 Nadal, Dubai's best player Federer, and defending champion Roddick are all MIA. For all their whopping prize money ($2,233,000 for a 500 Series?!), at least Dubai still has #3 & #4 Djokovic and Murray. Once I saw the draw, I was hoping for a Djokovic/Cilic rematch, and the two gents have fortunately lived up to their seedings. Unfortunately, TC is only showing the semis and final, so the only way to watch the ND/MC QF is via the ATP online pay-per-view.

Federer, it seems, was only partly MIA - since he showed up at the Players Party in Dubai right before the tournament started. He had a photo op with Murray. Since Federer's PR stuff is all carefully arranged, I wonder what was up with that?

You can also watch it here for free....

http://redbullsports.blogspot.com/

Djokovic, who played sloppy in the early rounds, is on fire at the start of the match against Cilic. He's up 4-1, and it's 19 points to 5. Djokey can't miss.

goodguy, thanks for the link! I wasn't about to sign up for that ATP online thing just to watch one match. It looks like Novak's found his form, and he'll need it in the semi against Gilles. The other semi features two players looking to come back to form after disappointing 2008 seasons, Ferrer and Gasquet. Fortunately, both semis are on TC.

Another 3-set win for Venus in Acapulco. I hope this is giving her a lot of good practice on clay. Is there a record for total 3-set matches won in a single tournament? Perhaps Vee can break that.

the tough thing about watching matches over the Internet is that you can't fast-forward. For most of the 1st set, Novak was playing so badly I couldn't bear to watch. I don't mind watching my fave player lose if he's playing well (would have loved to see the Marseille semi against Tsonga, for example), or even just decently, but when he literally can't keep a forehand in the court, time to surf for pirated porn read up on American Idol. Gilles was playing his usually solid stuff in the first, but Novak's play was just fugly. I checked back in about halfway through the 2nd, when Gilles had a bit of a letdown, which allowed Novak to pull it out. Gilles played a sloppy game to give the break back in the 3rd, and then made a couple of mental errors in that last game to lose a match that Novak was aching to give away. Good players find a way to win even when they're playing poorly, and for somehow pulling out a win, Novak should be proud of himself. Gilles, on the other hand, has gotta be hating on himself right now for giving away a match that was all but gift-wrapped with a pretty red bow on top.

I don't know if Novak ever watches his matches back on tape, but he'll cringe if he sees his forehand in that 1st set. I was never a huge fan of Novak's forehand (as Martina N says, it's "too busy") even with the old racket, but now I flat-out hate it. It's like he's so afraid of the ball flying on him that he comes over it way too much, resulting in a Roddickesque forehand, short with excessive topspin. In that 1st set, he was even falling back with his footwork, as if driving forward with his legs would shoot the forehand long. Novak refuses to answer any questions about the racket switch, claiming he's tired of talking about it. I just want to know why the hell he made the switch in the first place because at the Ozzie Open, he was already "tired of talking about it" after the 1st question. If it was just money, then he's a bleepin' IDIOT.

Now that I have all the venting out of my system, gotta say, it's pretty amazing that Novak, a power baseliner, managed to win a match without a forehand, although he did start to hit it effectively in the latter stages of the 3rd. Novak's serve, which is decent but far from a big weapon, really saved his hide today. On the other side of the net, it's downright shocking that Gilles Simon, such a strong player mentally, managed to blow that match. Well, it's on to the final, where Novak faces either Ferrer or Gasquet, neither of whom are exactly what you'd call Fort Knox in the mental strength department.

Apparently it was the first time Venus has had to play three three-set matches in a row since Wimbledon 2003. But for a couple of years now, her pattern is to pick up an easy first set, screw up on the second, then close out the third; or worse, prior to her mini-renaissance of form around last year's Wimbledon - since which she's defeated numerous Top 10 players, not least of which includes her sister, on a more consistent basis - her pattern was to win the first set and then screw up the last two, like she did with CSN actually and numerous times against Je-lame-a.

Anyhow, I hope Szavay picks up some confidence from this, although I'm convinced she and Chakvetadze contaminated each other somehow in last year's Paris indoors final (a fairly uninspiring display that was, incidentally). For the second set and the beginning of the third, she was back to the pinpoint serving, laser-like backhand, and opportunistic forehand which saw her break into the Top 20 seemingly years ago. But then the remainder of the third showed why she has slumped so much - literally every stroke abandons her without warning.

Just a TV alert - they are broadcasting Acapulco in the US on ESPN Deportes....not sure if it's just the ATP or if they will be showing Venus v Flavia Part 6. Flavia leads the series, so clearly she beats V in the Female GOAT discussion.

I will be watching Mardy v Chardy on Tennis Channel. I'm predicting 3 tie-break sets.

Don't be silly. All of their matches were in '07 and '08, long after Venus's prime...so, therefore, none of them count.

Hehehe, I set you up for that one. I'm just relieved I'm not in one of those debates with you again. It's exhausting and way too much for work for goodguy11-0-quit!

But I do think you're crazy that you think Sampras's era was more competitive. We'll have to agree to disagree on that one as I dont see either one of us changing our mind there....or maybe anything.

More importantly, Venus v Flavia is on ESPN Deportes if you have it. O/Or....

Mas importamente, Venus a Flavia este en la estacion ESPN Deportes si Ud lo tiene.

Um, mas o menos....mi espanol es muy malo.

You're right, it's getting exhausting, so I'll make my argument easier:

Nuh-uh!!



Anyway, it's actually a sign of normalcy when JC and I are having statistical brawls, although the scale of disagreement can vary... just like it's normal when you and I agree on, well, mostly nothing (except for Monica). It's actually usually just two agreements per year with you that seems about right, and only two disagreements per year with TwoHander and voicemale that are the normal trend for me.

Terp and TwoHander going at it non-stop is par for the course now that I think of it, but I think it's because WWCD isn't around anymore for Terp to irritate.

Damn! Venus bitch-slapped her faster than I could find a live-feed for it! We can all rest easy now knowing that Fingering-Flavia no longer has a winning record vs Venus. Phew!

wow..Venus played amazingly. She won fairly easy. Her serve was on...and the forehand was just drilling through the court. If she keeps this up she really has a shot at the French.

I guess Venus can check off the Penetta bane as solved.

I honestly figured Venus was taking it easy this week and wasn't too concerned about winning. But clearly, she wanted to beat her rival and beat her convincingly on red clay. Venus is starting to return to her pre-2003 form, winning titles everywhere and on every surface.

I'm now cautiously optimistic about her chances at the French and really really hope that the Aussie Open loss was just a fluke. By the way, she won 90% first serve and 44% second serve on her worst surface against a quality clay court opponent.

Keep it up V!

If only they kept stats on all of our head-to-head debates. Something special is going on with Venus. Not only was her quality of play high, but I have never seen her so relaxed in a post-match (or any) interview. I wonder if/hope she is in a happy place in her life. Over the past few years, I have really enjoyed how Venus has spoken her mind and often on behalf on the women's tour.

One of the (perhaps stupid) reasons I had never gotten behind Venus like I have with Serena is V always seemed so uncomfortable talking....and not just shy, but like she was always measuring her words or something. Like Graf and Edberg and Navratilova, sometimes it takes me a while to come around on a player for whatever reason. I'm finally warming up to Venus....not that anyone cares. Sorry for babbling - just a wild and crazy Saturday night for me.

On another random note, are Venus and Serena looking more alike? I used to think they looked so different, and now I really see the family resmblance.

Oh yeah.....YAYYYYYY MARDY!!!!! If he cant turn his piss-poor finals record around against Korolev, he never will. Top 20 again and rising.....um, well until his Indian Wells '08 Finalist points fall off. Whatever!

I agree Venus appears to be in a happy place. Check out her blog on the WTA website. She's talking about how much she likes to sleep (she'll even wake up 15 minutes before her match is scheduled), how she texts Serena to say she's too lazy to get out of bed, how she kept having to wake up a few nights ago because she couldn't remember where her cell phone was ... it's pretty cute stuff.

She definitely has grown up over the years. I was impressed by her comments at last week's Dubai tourney whe she praised her vanquished opponent (Virginie Razzano) as having a better week than she did.

yay thanks for the tip, air. the blog was entertaining, and i think i will be stealing her 'losing the battle of the bed' phrase.

A very good final between Novak and David F. A lot of service breaks, but mostly because the receiver was playing well, not that the server flubbed. I was amazed that Novak's forehand, which he literally couldn't keep in court against Gilles in the semi, was blasting deep and into the corners all match long against David. Whatever David's problems were such that his ranking dropped from #4 at the end of August down to #14 today, he seems to be back to his old self. He was running like hell, getting back a lot of balls that would have been winners against most ATPers. I've seen a fair number of David's matches in the past yet didn't realize until just now how much he loves pace. The harder Novak hit the ball, the better David played. The "old" Novak seemed to be back also. I pray that the evil Novak imposter who was on court against Gilles Simon is locked away in solitary confinement somewhere, forever.

The commentator mentioned something about David's "off-court problems in 2008." I know his ranking dropped quite a bit, but a quick Internet search failed to yield any news of what those problems were. Anyone know?

Acapulco is to Flavia what Wimbledon is to Venus. So...Flavia was beaten in her own backyard. After struggling so much earlier in the week, Venus really closed beautifully in her semi and final. Thats now 4 out of the last 5 tournaments won for Venus. Australian Open was ashame but we haven't seen Venus winning titles like this for awhile now. I think that her chances at the French Open are the best this year than they have been in the past several but Acapulco is a lower tier tournament and she didn't even face anyone who will be a real contender for the French Open. There are a number of players who can beat her at the French. She still isn't a natural mover on clay and she slides after hitting the ball which will make a real clay court specialist run her ragged and keep her out of position.

So now she's got this thing Monday at MSG with Serena as they play against Ana and Jelena in that BJK Cup thing. After that, she can rest up for Miami.