Archives for March 2012

if Isner plays like he did against Federer, he could make a top 10 run.

By Matt Cronin

FROM THE BNP PARIBAS OPEN AT INDIAN WELLS – Up until the mid part of last year, when one injury after another took Andy Roddick out of serious contention, he was still nine years into the run as a standout player, and was THE MAN in US tennis. But then in 2011 Mardy Fish surpassed him in the rankings and in quality of play. Just last month, John Isner un-hunched his shoulders and stunned Roger Federer in Davis Cup.

Isner is now ranked No. 11, well ahead of Roddick

King (above), McHale and Hampton were impressive

By Matt Cronin

FROM THE BNP PARIBAS OPEN AT INDIAN WELLS – The beat has quickened for young US women and week-by-week they continue to show that as a group, they are not just a flash in the pan. Of course, some are progressing at a faster rate than others and most of them have gone though ups and down, but on the first Friday at Indian Wells, there were looking pretty impressive. Jaime Hampton scored her first two straight WTA main draws wins ever, besting Polona Hercog and then pounding former No. 1 Jelena Jankovic 6-4, 6-3 in the second round.

The 22-year-old is not the tallest player on tour and maybe not the strongest. but she has a solid build, is pretty fast and mixes up her attack adeptly. She isn

Caro has to take some losses in trying to improve.

By Matt Cronin

INDIAN WELLS – Defending champion Caroline Wozniacki enters the BNP Paribas Open with 1000 points to defend and few folks believing that she can pull herself up by her ponytail and win the tournament.

Last year, when she came to the California desert, she was in much better mental shape, having won Dubai, even though she had gagged her Aussie Open semi to Li Na.

But this time around, she is playing third fiddle, behind higher-ranked Slam champs Victoria Azarenka and Petra Kvitova, and even possibly behind Aga Radwanska, who sits at No. 5 behind her no. 4, but whom has had a much better stretch than she has since last August, winning four Premier outdoor hard courts tournaments.

The Dane is determined, which is one of her best qualities, but she also has to be realistic about her chances of meeting her goals, which is to win the next three majors and the Olympics, or just one of those four titles.

The fact is that her game is still undeveloped and she is not cracking her forehand enough on important points, not delivering enough hard and varied serves, and not pushing herself inside the court against opponents who are capable of hitting through her. There are not many of those, but there certainly are more than there were last year, as witnessed by her loss to Julia Gorges in Dubai.

So now, her task to is open herself up to the possibility of change, try some new things in practice and take those elements on court in matches and risk suffering losses.

Because as it stands today, if she doesn

By Dan Weil

Special to Tennisreporters.net

Through the wonders of tennis journalism I was able to participate in a clinic run by Ivan Lendl last month at the ATP tournament in Delray Beach, FL, where Lendl played in the senior event.

The biggest risk for me was probably at the beginning of the clinic. In the first one of these that I did, Jim Courier gave an easy feed to my forehand, and my arm was so tight that the ball barely made it to the net