Will the Real US Open Contenders Please Stand Up

Anne-Marie Stark With the pressure off a bit, Fed aims for 5 straight.
FROM THE US OPEN - The more understated contenders for the US Open title didn’t do their press rounds on Saturday, but some of the big guns did, right after Arthur Ashe Kid’s Day. Five of the six top male contenders – Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Andy Roddick, and James Blake, made appearances, as did six of the top four women, Serena and Venus Williams, Jelena Jankovic and Dinara Safina.
Of the nine, seven can be seen having top flight chances to win the Us Open, and the other two, Roddick and Blake, haven’t put up the 2008 results to put them on the upper reaches of the chalk board, but both are capable of making deep runs if their draws play out the right way.

Let’s start with the thoughts of Federer, who hasn’t won a Slam in a year, the last one coming in his fourth nearly perfectly played US Open over Djokovic. Now, the thoughts around the grounds are that he’s losing a step with every turn, sort of like American Bernard Lagat did on Sunday in the 5000 at the Olympics.

“I had a tough beginning to the season, so maybe I've been playing a little bit of catch-up all the way through the season,” said Federer, who had mono. “I was lacking practice, and so I think it's just a matter of maybe, winning a lot of matches in a row together, and really feel like this is going to happen here at the US Open if I play good. And then once if I hope to make it to the quarters or semis, I think then I have enough matches and enough confidence to go all the way. I have to take it a little bit more step by step. That's what I usually do anyway in Grand Slams. I've been very consistent even this year in Grand Slams. I'm not really too worried about that. But Rafa has played great, so he deserves the No. 1 position. He's in a way the favorite now all of a sudden, even on hardcourt, because he's' played so, so well. I'm going to concentrate on what I can really control, and that's in my section of the draw.”

Federer has the easiest quarter of any of the top four favorites (a list which also includes Andy Murray) and is the man who held the record for the most consecutive weeks at No. 1 and stood up tall all the way until the start of 2008. But he said he’s a bit relived he doesn’t have to defend the top spot anymore.
“Five years almost I was expected to win every tournament I entered, except maybe towards the end a little bit on the clay,” Federer said. “ Rafa showed he was very, very good on clay. Other than that I was always expected to win, so maybe now it changes a little bit, because obviously there's a shift in the rankings. Rafa will now feel what I had to feel for a very long time. So it will be interesting to see how he handles it, but so far he's been great and he's played so well on all surfaces now. Maybe it's nice to go into a Grand Slam for a change maybe not having No. 1 next to me, and it should be interesting trying to control all the players.”

Nadal is taking much the same attitude that he has all year – control his side of the court, impose his will regardless of the surface and let the results come. If he fails to reach the final here, it will be an extreme disappointment for his fans, most of who want him mentioned in the same breath as Federer. But despite his first Wimbledon title and Olympic gold medal, he’s going to have to win at least a few more fast court majors to be called one of the top 10 players ever.

“ All tournaments is very important,” he said. “Here is the last Grand Slam of the season, so going to be important, very important for everybody. If I play good tournament here, I gonna have chances for continue to be No. 1 for more time. For sure, maybe New York an important city, one of my favorite cities. To be here is a pleasure, and always play, New York is big motivation.”

Djokovic arrives in a slightly obscured fashion, as the Aussie Open champ hasn’t won a big event since Rome. However, he did split hardcourt matches with Nadal during the past five weeks, with the Serbian taking him out at Cincy and the Spaniard overcoming the all courter at the Olympics. Djokovic is on Federer's side of the draw though and that’s a much more attractive place to be. Surprisingly, the usually brave Djokovic tabbed Federer and Nadal as the favorites.

“Them two, first two favorites to win this title,” he said. “I don't think I'm a clear favorite when I'm playing next to these two guys. I've never been, because they're of course first two players of the world. But still next to me there are a lot of players, like Murray who is doing really well last couple of months. We can expect him to play well in this tournament. Davydenko, of course. Roddick. Ferrer. There are players who are really motivated, and they're waiting for their moment. So anything can happen. I do have a lot of expectations, of course, always to go far in the event, towards semifinals at least.”

Roddick is in an odd position this year, as he comes into the tournament as almost no one’s pick to do major damage. That has never been the case since he won the title in 2003. Even in 2006, when he was reeling, he took on Jimmy Connors in July and has immediate positive results, winning Cincy and then reaching the US Open final. This year, he had a good two-month stretch in February and March, but then his body began to break down and he’s been less than impressive since then.

When asked when he expected another Grand Slam from himself this year, Roddick replied, “Well, I'm going to have to start working if that's the case. I certainly hope so. I've actual enjoyed having a practice week that's been healthy. I've kind of been going from not playing and then jumping straight into tournaments, which isn't ideal, but you've got to kind of play the hand you're dealt. So it's been a good week, and, you know, hopefully I'll be there when the final comes around.”

Roddick and Blake have both been working a bit with US Davis Cup captain Patrick McEnroe at the site, a good call on both their parts to get some extra advice. Both men have put up some of their best results in Davis Cup play, partly because McEnroe is such a keen observer of the game.

This almost surely Blake’s last chance to really contend, as he’s a headstrong 28-year-old who doesn’t seem to be willing to make the kind of adjustments to his game that the likes of Andre Agassi did into his 30s. He wants to win as a big hitting athlete and he’s hoping that his upset of Federer at the Olympics will give him increased confidence.

“Every year I do feel like I can come in here and win this tournament,” he said. “I think I really started believing it after the Agassi match in '05 when I was a couple points from being in the semifinals against a good friend of mine, Robby Ginepri, who I played a ton of times and I would have felt comfortable playing out there.

"I think after that tournament I felt like I could win any these. But at that time Roger was still dominating, and at times he was making it look easy. It was tough to really go into a tournament thinking you're anything but a dark horse the way Roger was playing.

"Now I think a lot of guys have started really improving at a great rate, hopefully including myself to the point where we can challenge him. We can hopefully challenge Rafa as well the way he's playing. But this time is the first time I've had that win on my record against a guy like Roger to come in and feel like I can not just say that I believe it, but everyone can know that I have the confidence to be that top player.”
Venus and Serena showed up to promote a new sponsorship with Oreos Double Stuff, which like them when they are working their magic on court, is sweet and full of energy. They both appear to be healthy, which is an excellent sign, but neither sister is a dominant hardcourt player anymore, so it will be all about proving that they are here to stay for the next couple of years. Despite the plethora of injuries on the WTA Tour again, there are a slew of capable kids who don’t fear them.

“I love this tournament and love to have a Grand Slam in New York,” said Serena, a two time titlists who won her last crown in 2002. “It's the last one, so it means that I really, really want to give it my all and my best.”

Venus, the five-time Wimbledon, champ, hasn’t won this crown since she went back to back in 2000 and 2001.

“This is where the big things happened for Serena and I first: me having the final here, her winning the Slam and us winning the doubles the same year,” Venus said. “ So there has been a lot of firsts for us. We wish we were playing the doubles, but next year. I'm all about my results and wish everyone else the best of luck. But I'm really down with me winning this tournament.”

Jankovic doesn’t appear to be confident at all, saying that she’s still recovering from injuries and isn’t in top form. Hopefully, that’s not a built in excuse because she has a fine draw on the bottom half and is more than capable of reaching the final. Someone needs to give her a kick in the pants, or she might never reach that stage at a Slam.

“At the moment, I'm still working very hard, and some of the things don't happen overnight,” she said. “I need time to train. You cannot get your endurance and your strength back in a few days. So I will try to keep working hard and we will see how everything goes.”

I wrote a ton on Safina earlier this month so I won’t bore you again, but suffice to say that she knows she’s been playing consistently better than anyone out there since May.

NOTES FROM ALL OVER
I caught the New Haven’s women’s final between Caroline Wozniacki and Anna Chakvetadze on my Jet Blue flight to NYC on Saturday and was happy to be able to settle in and watch Wozy, who I hadn’t seen play since Wimbledon. My, has the Dane improved, not just off the ground, but also in her court stewardship. That’s why she won the title 3-6, 6-4, 6-1, because she knew that A-Chak still isn’t secure in her anticipatory game and would begin to doubt herself late, which the Russian did. Chakvetadze, who skipped the Olympics in order to get more practice time, was striking the ball nicely for a set and half, but you can still see fear in her eyes and she tired too easily. Interestingly for me, and probably not for many of you, Wozniacki was my No. 11 pick for my top 10 women’s contenders that I wrote for Fox earlier this week. It was a coin flip between the former ITF junior No. 1 and Marion Bartoli, whom she crushed in the quarters. Looks like the coin flipped out on me….Believe it or not, Marin Cilic, who beat Mardy Fish for the New Haven’s men’s crown, was also my No. 11 for Fox and now he looks like a top=8 guy. So strange… Former pro Paul Goldstein and his wife and baby were on my flight, but Goldy was headed to Maine for some R&R and won’t be stopping at the USO this year. We discussed Etienne De Villiers’ resignation for a while, as Goldstein was on the ATP Players’ Council before he retired. Because it wasn't a formal interview, I’m not going to repeat what he said, but I will say that he liked De Villiers approach a whole lot more than I do. Goldstein’s pick to win the men’s is Federer….Some more notes on (as Serena would say) ME: TennisReporters.net will be posting daily from the Open, but I’m buried with other work so there will be some other (more interesting) voices piping in. Inside Tennis’ Richard Osborn will have his days and maybe, just maybe, I’ll ask an extremely interesting player (let’s keep that a mystery for now) to blog. I’ll be writing daily picks for USopen.org, will be on doing color on matches for USOpen radio every night and also be writing for Foxsports.com. As soon as Mr. Cioffi gets back from his junior events in Alabama, he’ll make the site look nicer and put up the proper links…. Thanks to all for your correspondence this summer. I know I’ve been horrible about responding quickly, but I promise to keep trying.

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