Future Tennis Stars

Roger Federer had a much harder time than most people thought he would. Personally I thought he looked really sluggish in the first couple of sets and was among those who thought Tipsarevic would pull the upset. Still, this is a great match and an amazing win for Federer. Like many have said, it’s rare when Federer gets into a tough situation and has to fight his way out like he did at Wimbledon against Nadal. It was a gut check for him against Tipsarevic and he came though.

Everyone thought that Fabrice Santoro would give Roger Federer a hard time. If this is how Federer meets tough competition without playing a warmup event, the rest of the field will be in a tough, but very familiar situation.

Federer so completely dominated Santoro, it wasn’t even funny expect to Santoro. When Federer missed an easy overhead, Santoro ran around in circles as if he won the match. As Federer was about to win the match, Santoro pleaded for mercy, looking at the scoreboard. Federer paused, then served out the match taking the last 10 games in yet another awe-inspiring 6-1, 6-2, 6-0 romp.

So why is this such a big deal? Santoro is the oldest player in the draw and Federer is an all-time great, shouldn’t this have been expected? Sure, Federer was supposed to beat Santoro but again, this is Fabrice Santoro. Regardless of his age and the fact he’s now played in 62 Grand Slams, he can still give the best players fits and isn’t prone to upsetting the odd top 1o player every now and then. Not to mention that Federer didn’t play any warm up events, hasn’t played in a tournament since the Masters Cup and no one knew if this may be the first time he doesn’t win a Slam outside of Paris in God knows how long. Still, Federer shows that he is perfection personified and that no matter what we may think, he’s not ready to go downhill yet.

Roger Federer and Justine Henin were named the ITF Champions for 2007. Seriously, they put out a press release for that? I guess they had to but it’s not like anyone was within spitting distance of them.

“Every year brings new challenges, and I am proud that I have been able to raise the level of my game when needed,” said Federer, who won three Grand Slam titles this year and reached the final at the French Open.

“This has definitely been the best season of my career,” said Henin, who was 63-4 with 10 titles in 2007 after skipping the Australian Open for personal reasons related to splitting up with her husband. “It has been a very challenging year overall, but I have stayed positive and proved that nothing is impossible if you work hard.”

Read the entire article at ESPN.com

The first match between Roger Federer and Pete Sampras wasn’t close. The second match lived up to the hype.

Federer battled Sampras and won again, this time in a 90 minute, 7-6 (8-6), 7-6 (7-5) thriller. Sampras had his rocket serve and laser like forehands down the line on full display on Thursday preventing another Federer steamroll.

“I was impressed with Pete tonight,” Federer told reporters. “He played some unbelievable shots, but then again he is capable of doing that. He had an incredible serve which was so difficult to read tonight.”

The last of the three matches between the two will take place on Saturday in Macau.

Two days ago, David Ferrer beat Rafael Nadal. Today, he gave Nadal a gift. Nadal beat third ranked Novak Djokovic 6-4, 6-4 to keep Djokovic winless in round robin play in his first trip to the Masters Cup. Still, Nadal needed a Ferrer win to keep Richard Gasquet from having a chance to move into the semifinals. Ferrer did just that and beat Gasquet 6-1, 6-1 in a rout.

Andy Roddick already made the semifinals and will face Roger Federer on Friday. If Federer wins, he will be the last semifinalist no matter if Davydenko wins as Federer has an edge in sets won.

Roger Federer drew Andy Roddick, Fernando Gonzalez and Nikolay Davydenko in the Red Group when the Masters Cup draw was selected on Wednesday.

The Gold Group, which opens play on Sunday, includes Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, David Ferrer and Richard Gasquet.

Federer is of course the favourite to win his fourth Masters Cup title. Nadal isn’t in top form and Federer’s draw is similar to that of the US Open when he beat Roddick and Davydenko en route to the title.

Djokovic is also a threat and a rematch of the US Open finals is most likely what we will get in just over a week.