The Unexpected

Wow. So much for a Federer-Nadal final... what was hoped for by many and anticipated to be another classic matchup between the world's 1 & 2 players has been nullified by two extremely talented upstarts: Novak Djokovic and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

In the first semi, Tsonga absolutely crushed Nadal, but the weird thing was that Nadal did not play poorly. He had less than 10 errors in three sets, but was simply overpowered by Tsonga's baseline blitzes and delicately stupendous back-handed drop-volleys. Nadal has always been vulnerable on hard courts to flat ball hitters with tons of power, but Tsonga's performance was ridiculous in the way he combined power and touch. Nadal had no chance, especially once it was clear that his patented and potent backhand passing shots down the line were just being drop-volleyed for winners every time.

The second semi somehow upstaged the first, a feat deemed nigh impossible after Tsonga's triumph, but any time the dominant figure in the game and suggested best of all time loses, it's the story of the tournament. Roger's illness before the Open, which prevented him from playing any warm-up tournaments, proved ultimately fatal to his chances in Melbourne, as his normal quickness and athleticism seemed to be lacking just enough for him to be vulnerable. Of course, only the Serbians were able to expose this vulnerability, with Djokovic proving more adept than Tipsarevic at taking down # 1. Novak learned from his loss to Federer in the U.S. Open final, and realized he would have to be able to capitalize on his few chances. He did. And he won in straight sets. Amazing.

So now we have an interesting matchup with Djokovic and Tsonga in the final, where, one would think Novak is the prohibited favorite, but I'm done betting against the Frenchman. Will be fun to watch.