Nerves, wind and at last Serena

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — They battled nerves, wind and the oh-so-brilliant lady across the net. They went from day into night, from advantage to disadvantage. They produced one of the longest and most tense U.S. Open women’s tennis championship matches ever.
  
In the end, as expected — and for the enthralled, hollering capacity crowd at Arthur Ashe Stadium, as hoped — it was Serena Williams, surviving both herself and the irrepressible Victoria Azarenka, winning 7-5, 6-7 (6), 6-1.
  
This was one of the best, if not once of the classics. This was a 2-hour 45-minute struggle both against a south wind that swirled viciously around the 24,000-seat bowl and great shots from the opponent.
   
Williams, No. 1 in the rankings and the seedings, seemed more flummoxed by the weather than Azarenka, who is one notch down in both categories, as tennis skirts flapped and serves took flight.
   
But at last, the veteran, the American, Serena, who will be 32 in two weeks, took the American title for a second straight year and a fifth time overall, and joyfully bounced about the court in triumph.
   
Serena seemed well on her way to the championship, her 17th Grand Slam, with a 4-1 lead and up two breaks in the second set. But suddenly her big serves started coming back at her on terrific returns by Azarenka, who was dashing from corner to corner and ripping balls in every unreturnable direction.
     
“Yeah, I think I got a little uptight, which probably wasn't the best thing at that moment,” confided Williams.
    
She also pointed out that her problems were caused in part by Azarenka.
    
“Vika is such a great fighter,” Williams said, using the nickname by which everyone calls the 24-year-old from Belarus.
   
“That’s why she was able to win multiple Grand Slams,” she added, in a bit of exaggeration, Azarenka having taken the Australian Open twice — including this January but no other majors.
   
For Serena, it was her second Slam of 2013, after a win in the French Open. Two days earlier, John McEnroe, commenting for television, called Williams the greatest women’s player ever, and surely this match did nothing to change his viewpoint. Or anyone else’s.
   
Indeed, although she had not lost a set until the final, the reality is that the farther one advances in a tournament the tougher it becomes. And especially in women’s tennis, beyond the top half-dozen players, there aren’t many who are in the class of Serena or Vika.
  
“Well, there's one word,” said Azarenka afterward. “She's a champion, and she knows how to repeat that. She knows what it takes to get there. I know that feeling, too. And when two people who want that feeling so bad meet, it's like a clash. That's what happens out there, those battles.
         
“And in the important moments is who is more brave, who is more consistent, or who takes more risk. And with somebody like Serena, you got to take risk. You can never play safe, because she will do that. She did that today really well.”
  
Just the edge. Serena had it, then Serena lost it, or more accurately Azarenka, who beat Williams a month ago at Cincinnati in three sets, wrenched it away. But not for long.
 
“I started to try to — I wasn't playing very smart tennis then,” Serena said of the second set, “so I just had to relax and not do that again. This was never over until match point.”
    
Technically, yes, although once she regained control by breaking serve in the fourth game of the third set, the result was inevitable.
   
“Vika, you played unbelievable,” said Serena, who at times can be self-centered. “It was an honor to play against you.”  
   
The disappointment welled up in Azarenka when the chance for an upset, very real at the start of the third set, disappeared.
    
“It is a tough loss,” said Azarenka, doing her best to hold back her emotions, “but to be in final against best player, I showed heart.”
    
Then, in front of the microphone that carried her words over the public address system. Azarenka began to cry, trying to hide her tears behind an available towel.
  
“I think it was raising, you know, from the first point the tension, the battle, the determination, it was raising really, you know, kind of like boiling the water or something.
 
“She (Serena) really made it happen. In that particular moment she was tougher today. She was more consistent, and, you know, she deserved to win. I wish I could do something better today. You know, I felt like I had opportunities in the first set, as well. But, I mean, it's okay. It goes that way. I did everything I could."
   
Serena did everything she needed, as usually has been the case the past year. Since a first-round loss in the 2012 French Open. Williams is 98-5 with 14 tournament wins. This year, she is 67-4.
   
“I felt almost disappointed with my year, to be honest,” explained Williams when asked if she needed the win to a validate her domination.
    
“I felt like, yeah, I won the French Open, but I wasn't happy with my performances in the other two slams, and, you know, not even making it to the quarterfinals of one. So I definitely feel a lot better with at least a second Grand Slam under my belt this year."
   
Especially the way the wind blew and Azarenka played.

Djokovic wins match that was matchless

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — Four hours and nine minutes — of agony and beauty, of courage and dexterity, of power and grace, of ballet with a racquet and a ball, of chances blown and greatness displayed, of a U.S. Open match that was matchless.
   
Saturday, when America’s game brought out the pompoms and the tailgaters, when someone tweeted that the television viewership for college football was much greater than it was for tennis, and that’s understandable. We love our alma maters. We love our violent sport.
   
But Saturday was also for a presentation of athletic skill in a game not always appreciated in the United States until put on display as it was when, for 4 hours and 9 minutes, Novak Djokovic and Stanislas Wawrinka served and volleyed against each other until they were near exhaustion.
   
Djokovic, No. 1 in the men’s rankings, No. 1 in the seedings, ended up the winner, but barely, 2-6, 7-6 (4), 3-6, 6-3, 6-4. For a fourth straight year, he’s in the final. For a third year of the last four, he’s in the final after being down two sets to one in the semifinal.
 
“These matches are what we live for,” said Djokovic.
   
What sport lives for. Drama, tension, comebacks, survival.
  
A game, the third in the fifth set that lasted 21 minutes, that included Wawrinka holding off five break points to win, that had the capacity crowd of 24,000 at Arthur Ashe Stadium screaming, that had the brilliant, lithe Djokovic even more determined.
  
"I was thinking, I guess everyone was thinking, that whoever wins this game is going to win the match," Djokovic said. "I thought to myself, I guess I have to fight against those odds."
  
He fought. He persevered, as No. 1 should over No. 9, which is where the 28-year-old Wawrinka of Switzerland is ranked. Maybe because Wawrinka incurred a strained groin tumbling in the fourth set on a cement court that seemed too slippery. Maybe because at age 26, and having won the Open and five other Grand Slam tournaments, Djokovic, of Serbia, is a better player, if marginally.
  
Wawrinka, who in his years had never been as far in any of the four majors as this spot in the semis, is a battler.
   
“I gave everything I had,” he said to the crowd, words affirming actions. “I was fighting to the end. It was an amazing experience.”
      
It was an experience so appreciated that the fans gave Wawrinka, in a shirt as red as his nation’s flag, a deafening round of applause and cheers, drowning out his remarks.
     
Djokovic, who won the Australian Open and lost Wimbledon, will be in his third Slam final of the year, although to his viewpoint somewhat apologetically.
  
“It’s obvious Stan played more aggressive, better tennis overall,” said the man known as Nole, accent on the e.
  
“I was just trying to hang in there. It was not an easy match for both of us. We had to run. I kept trying to find my rhythm. Give credit to him. I was fortunate to play my best tennis when I had to.”
 
Which in any sport is what champions do.
  
“He’s not No. 1 for nothing,” said Wawrinka, who also lost to Djokovic in five sets at the Australian Open in January.
 
“Unfortunately today,” said Wawrinka, “I was a little bit struggling physically. I think that is completely different match than the match we play in the Australian Open. In the Australian Open I had to play my best game to stay with him. Today, I had the feeling when I was still healthy I had the match in control. I was playing better than him, doing much more things than him.”
   
Djokovic said as much. Yet, the best ones, the winners, in whatever sport, manage to make it through when things go wrong and then produce the big shot or the big hit or the big basket when needed. Nobody plays well all the time. It’s how you finish when you’re not playing well.
   
The last two years plus, Djokovic has been finishing admirably and successfully, and each step makes the subsequent steps easier, although Djokovic did say he was nervous simply because of the situation, a semifinal in a Grand Slam against an opponent who had just knocked out the defending champion
  
“Maybe I have a physical edge over him,” Djokovic suggested, “and this kind of match, on a big stage, that experience is going to give me confidence.
  
“I was frustrated with my own mistakes. I had break-point chances and couldn’t take advantage (he converted only 4 of 19). But I managed to stay tough and play well when I needed to, and that definitely encourages me for the final.”
   
That, no surprise, will be against Rafael Nadal, who beat Richard Gasquet in the other semi, which followed.
  
When someone wondered if Djokovic would scout that match, he laughed. “I’m going to grab some popcorn,” he responded, “and watch it on TV.”
  
After 4 hours and 9 minutes, he was allowed.

McEnroe calls Serena “greatest of all time”

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — The tournament isn’t over yet for Serena Williams, or certainly, the woman she’ll again face in the finals of the U.S. Open. The way everyone’s talking, it might as well be.
  
Not that Serena is going to win, because even favorites — and certainly she’s the favorite — lose every now and then.
   
But Serena’s real competition is not the player across the net but the history of the game.
  
The lady Williams is to play in the Sunday final, the one nicknamed Vika, Victoria Azarenka of Belarus, declared without reservation that Serena is the “greatest of all time.”
   
Strong words, which could be interpreted as a setup, but Vika isn’t one to be disingenuous.
   
Besides, the idea is shared by one of tennis’ greats, John McEnroe, who Friday, after Serena routed Li Na, 6-0, 6-3, in one semifinal, said, “I know she doesn’t have the amount of wins of Chris (Evert) or Martina (Navratilova) or Steffi (Graf), but I already think she’s the greatest.”
   
So far for Williams, this Open has been less about success than about verification. The question in any of her six matches hasn’t been whether Serena would win but how easily she would win. Again on a warm, breezy afternoon in Queens, we learned.
   
The afternoon began with Azarenka, the 24-year-old from Belarus, who’s got a wonderful forehand and a no-less impressive sense of humor. Seeded No. 2 — behind Williams, naturally — Azarenka defeated Flavia Pennetta of Italy, 6-4, 6-2.
   
That gave her time first to watch Williams, 31, extend her streak of consecutive game wins to 24, as Serena won the first seven games of the match, and contemplate what might be done to reverse last year’s final. In 2012, Vika, then the top seed, lost to Williams in three sets.
  
Serena has pitched shutouts in five of the 12 sets she played this Open, meaning 6-0 wins in those sets, and not only hasn’t lost a set but has lost only 16 points. The record for a full tournament for fewest points allowed is 19 by Navratilova in 1983.
  
The question is how to get the 31-year-old Williams out of the comfort zone she now occupies, and Azarenka had a ready answer. “You’ve got to fight,” she began. “You’ve got to run. You’ve got to grind, and you’ve got to bite with your teeth for whatever opportunity you have.”
  
That’s a figure of speech, of course, Azarenka not planning to emulate Mike Tyson with her bicuspids.
  
Azarenka has beaten Williams two out of the last three times they met, including a couple of weeks back in Cincinnati, but overall Serena has won 12 of 15 matches between the two. And with Williams overall 66-4 this year, it would be redundant to point out she’s on a roll.
  
Li Na is now 1-9 against Williams after Friday, and she appeared shellshocked for quite a while, finally regaining a bit of respectability.
 
“In the end, finally,” Li said, “I can play tennis.”
  
Not as well as Serena, who with the French Open among her eight tournament titles this year, has won 16 Grand Slams, including four U.S. Opens.
    
The 24,000-seat Arthur Ashe Stadium was maybe only two-thirds full on a languid Friday. Those in the stands had come to see, and to support, Williams, the only American still playing for the tennis championship of America.
  
“It’s great to hear, ‘Go Serena, Go Serena,’” said Williams in a post-match TV interview also carried on the public address system. That brought a few chants of “Go Serena.”
   
“It’s really a pleasure to be here. Older voices, young voices.”
   
Williams, after the first-set blitz, in 30 minutes, surprisingly was down 2 games to 1 and, with Li serving, 40-0 in the fourth game. But Serena rallied, broke serve and regained what little control that had been lost.
 
“It was tough at the end,” said Williams. “Li Na is such a great player. I got a little nervous, but I was able to close it out.”
  
Then after a break, she and older sister Venus played doubles.
  
Azarenka simply went out for dinner.
  
“It’s important to have self-belief and confidence in what you do and just be aware of what’s going on, what’s coming at you,” Azarenka explained about her strategy for Williams.
  
What’s coming at Vika will be some of Serena’s 115-mph serves.
  
“It’s always a new story,” said Azarenka, alluding to last year’s loss to Serena in the final. “I don’t think it’s even going to be close to the same as it was last year.”
   
When you’re about to face the player you’ve labeled the greatest of all time, that’s an interesting observation.

Murray’s loss upsetting to a journalist

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — Timing is everything, isn’t it? We pose the question to Simon Barnes, the excellent sports columnist from the Times of London who crossed the Atlantic solely to bring to his readers the progress of Andy Murray as he tried for a second straight U.S. Open tennis championship.
   
Murray, the Scot, not only took the Open a year ago but this summer became the first Brit in 77 years to win Wimbledon, a feat that earned front-page headlines in every publication from John O’Groats (as far north as one can go and still be on the British mainland) to Land’s End (as far south).
  
Barnes arrived in New York just in time for Murray on Thursday to play in the quarterfinals, which against the other guy from Switzerland — Stanislas Wawrinka, not Roger Federer, who was long gone — figured to be a Murray victory.
   
It was not, however. Wawrinka, with great ground strokes and big serves, upset Murray, 6-4, 6-3, 6-2. He also upset Barnes, whose sole purpose was to write about his countryman.
  
“It never fails,” said Barnes. “I’ve never seen him win a match, except at Wimbledon.” Those are not to be dismissed, certainly, and Barnes did have the exhilaration of describing Murray’s historic triumph in July.
   
Still, now and then, Barnes would like his paper to be rewarded for sending him to the four corners of the globe. Twice he went all the way from London to Australia, a journey of nearly 24 hours, to watch and cover Murray, who inconveniently lost the two matches Barnes attended.
  
But as bad as Barnes feels, Murray, 26, must feel worse. Murray was a semifinalist in 2011 and, of course, a champion in 2012, winning a Slam for the first time. He was ranked and seeded third and had won his previous 11 matches here at Flushing Meadows.
 
“I would have liked to have played a little bit better,”  said Murray, “but, you know, I had a good run the last couple of years. It’s a shame I had to play a bad match today.”
   
And that Wawrinka, 28 and making it to the semifinals of a Grand Slam event for the first time in his career, had to play an excellent one.
  
“I thought he played great,” affirmed Murray. “He hit big shots. He passed extremely well. He hit a lot of lines on big points. He served well. That was it. He played a great match.”
   
A match that elevated Wawrinka into the semifinals.
     
“To beat him in three sets,” Wawrinka said in an understatement, “is quite good for me.”
   
Because in pressure situations, Wawrinka has been known to come apart like a cheap watch — not one made in Switzerland, however.
  

“Normally,” Wawrinka conceded, “I can be a little nervous and I can lose a few games because of that, but today I was just focused on my game. It was windy, was not easy conditions, but my plan was to push him to be aggressive, because I know Andy can be a little bit too defensive. I like it when he’s far back from the baseline, and today I did it well.”
   
Murray made no excuses, but he reached the summit of the mountain with victory at Wimbledon, where no British male had won singles since 1936. Surely everything else is Peoria. Even Flushing Meadows, where last year he knocked off Novak Djokovic in the final.
   
It’s hard for an American, a Spaniard, a Swiss to comprehend what winning Wimbledon means to a Brit, and to Britain, even if he’s a Scot, not an Englishman. Lawn tennis developed in Britain, where the Wimbledon tournament is as much a part of the nation as Buckingham Palace.
   
Over there it’s known simply as “The Championships.”
    
That would make Murray The Champion.
    
“It’s not about focus,” he said, responding to a question about competition after Wimbledon. “You know when you work so hard for something for a lot of years, it’s going to take some time to really fire yourself up and get yourself training 110 percent.
   
“I think it’s kind of natural after what happened at Wimbledon.”
   
Murray, one of the game’s big four for several years, was properly philosophical, and had the right to be, when asked about the last 12 months as he broke through with two major titles.
 
“I mean,” he said, “it’s been challenging both ways for different reasons. Physically, I played some extremely tough matches in that period. Mentally, it was very challenging for me to play — Wimbledon, the last few games at Wimbledon may not seem like much to you guys, but to me it was extremely challenging.
    
“I’ve played my best tennis in the Slams the past two, three years. I mean, I lose today in straight sets. I would have liked to have gone further. But I can’t complain. If someone told me before the U.S. Open last year I would have been here as defending champion, having won Wimbledon and Olympic gold, I could have taken that 100 percent.”
    
So could Simon Barnes, if he had not chased Andy Murray across the sea for the story.

Nadal perfection creates a mismatch

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — Perfection has a face and a wicked topspin forehand. It speaks English with a Spanish accent. It runs down lobs and runs opponents off the court at Arthur Ashe Stadium.
  
Rafael Nadal is playing tennis with such passion, verve and brilliance that opponents are having trouble even winning points off him, much less games. Sets? Sorry. Matches? Get serious.
   
What the experts thought might be a mismatch Wednesday night in a U.S. Open quarterfinal indeed was just that, with Nadal taking the opening eight games and then crushing fellow Spaniard Tommy Robredo, 6-0, 6-2, 6-2.
   
“We could have been watching (Roger) Federer against Nadal,” John McEnroe moaned on national television. “I kept telling people not to miss it.”
   
But it was Federer, only a shadow of his former self, who missed it, beaten in straight sets Monday night by Robredo. And when that happened, the suspicion was that Nadal, who had won 19 straight matches on hard courts and nine tournaments since March, would make it another win.
   
What we didn’t suspect was that Robredo, 19th in the world, would be embarrassed. And he was.
   
“Do something,” McEnroe pleaded. “Change your tactics. Hit some inside-out forehands.”
  
It was like asking Rush Limbaugh to vote Democratic, like asking a New York restaurant to serve a steak for less than $35. It was impossible.
  
“Not much to say,” remarked a subdued Robredo. “I don’t know the way he felt, but obviously I felt that he was going pretty good out there. At the beginning it was a little different for me. I started a little bit tight, and he was up very quick. Then it was nothing else to do. He was too good.”
      
Robredo, now 0-7 against Nadal — he was 0-10 against Federer, but Roger is 32 and Rafa a relentless 27 — won the first point of the match. That was his highlight.
  
Nadal broke him, and in a half-hour it was 6-0, and Nadal had surrendered only five points in the entire set.
 
Talk about a deer in headlights. Robredo was a man who could barely get the ball over the net. The 24,000 fans or so filling Ashe cheered when he managed to return one of Nadal’s shots.
   
McEnroe, a champion of the 1980s, one of the top players in history, and as on target with his observations as he was with his graceful backhands, was awed by Nadal’s moves.
   
“I don’t know how he even got the ball, much less got it over the net,” said McEnroe when Nadal, as is typical of his game, raced after a ball that logic decreed he wouldn’t reach.
   
As if logic has a chance against Nadal, who after a 2012 of knee troubles is churning through 2013 without tape and without a worry.
  
“I am very happy,” Nadal told Brad Gilbert in a post-match TV interview broadcast on the public address system.
   
“I think I played my best match this year in the U.S. Open.”
    
His next match, in the semis, is against the Frenchman Richard Gasquet, who after winning the first two sets and losing the next two managed to get past yet another Spaniard, David Ferrer.
     
“Last time I beat him,” Gasquet joked about Nadal, “I think I was 13.”
     
Nadal, with a remarkable lack of arrogance, laughed about the comment. “I think it was 6-4 in the third set of a tournament when I was 14,” he added.
   
That was before Nadal developed a serve that blows people off the court. He always had the forehand — “Nobody comes close to his topspin,” insisted McEnroe, who was a master of that shot himself — and the intensity.
   
Knowing full well what the answer would be, Gilbert, the Bay Area guy who once was No. 8 in the world and then coached Andre Agassi to No. 1, asked Nadal whether he would relax after the rout.
  
“I think I’m going to play a little bit (Thursday),” Nadal said. “I like to play every day. I enjoy practice.”
   
Nadal has 12 Grand Slam wins all-time, tied for third with Roy Emerson behind Federer’s 17 and Pete Sampras’ 14. For someone who developed his game on clay (he’s won the French Open eight times), Rafa has learned the trick of playing on hard courts: charge everything possible and hit into corners.
  
“Not every day is the same,” said Nadal. “I don’t have the same feeling. I feel today I played much closer to the way I want to play, more aggressive with my backhand. With the forehand, I was able to change directions.
  
“In first set, I did all the things that you expect to do good in the first set … Is fantastic win.”
   
That’s one way of describing it. A perfect way for a perfect match.

New York's back-page sporting glory

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — The contention is that tabloid newspapers make a great sports town. Sure, it is necessary to have teams, and New York has an abundance, many not very good, as well as three tabloids, the outrageous Post, the “hey, look at us” Daily News and the more restrained Newsday.

Front page news is either shocking or racy — or is that redundant? — with sex and gore where Syria might be in other dailies, such as the Times.

But here it’s the back page, the glory of a tabloid, that a fan reads first.

Papers are failing, we’re told, because either (a) kids have stopped reading or (b) the only thing they do read are the tiny words on their cell phones.

Beneath the surface, there may be chaos in the journalism biz, but in New York, contrary to situations in the hinterlands, it’s still the good old days, competition, scandals, entertainment.

Not that any of those can be separated.

They figured out the formula to stay in business here in Gotham City, according to an editor from the Daily News, as told to the author Frank Deford: “Boobs, Cops and the Yankees.”

He didn’t exactly say boobs, but he did say specifically what tempts the glorious readership, bless them.

Now, at the start of September, one might substitute the Jets or the New York Giants for the Yankees — as did both the News and Post — but at it’s heart and spleen New York is a baseball town, the place where the Babe hit homers and Gehrig became the “luckiest man on the face of the earth.”

Indeed, Newsday, noting a Yankee victory on Monday after a long rain delay, on Tuesday had the headline, “PERFECT STORM.” The other two tabs continued pounding on the Jets.

“CUTTING OUT,” said the Daily News about (if reports are to be believed) soon-to-be-former coach Rex Ryan, who on cut-down day traveled to see his son at Clemson.

The Post headline was “EXIT SAN MAN,” alluding both to the expected departure of QB Mark Sanchez and in wordplay to Yankee closer Mariano Rivera, known as “Sandman.”

The U.S. tennis championships go on night and day at Flushing Meadows, about 10 miles from Manhattan. More than 700,000 people attend the two-week tournament, and while an upset, such as Roger Federer’s defeat Monday, gets attention (“FED EX’D OUT” was a small headline in the Post), it’s tough to crack the big two, baseball and football, or if you choose, football and baseball.

Maybe when the Open reaches the semis, the editors will become more interested. Right now, it’s mostly favorite beating underdog (Federer excepted), dog-bites-man items — in other words, news that isn’t news.

Tuesday, Novak Djokovic, No. 1 in the world (and in the Open seeds, of course), needed only 1 hour, 19 minutes to club Marcel Granollers of Spain in a fourth-round match, 6-3, 6-0, 6-0.

A veteran pro tennis player who two sets out of three can’t win a single game? “Well, when you play against No. 1 in the world,” said Granollers, “is difficult match, no?” Yes.

Djokovic won the first 25 points on his serve. “I was trying my best,” said Granollers, “and I didn’t play my best tennis today. But I think he play very good.”

What doesn’t play well, figuratively, in New York is a mismatch. The people want something for their money. It’s permissible to underachieve in Peoria or St. Paul, but this is the big time. There’s a reason why musicals or dramas open in Baltimore or Philly before they hit Broadway. If they hit Broadway.

Sanchez, from USC, hit Broadway, hit New York, with a bang. He was the next great thing, the kid who would lead the Jets to the Super Bowl. Now, at the start of his fifth season he’s — no, not chopped liver because at the Stage Deli chopped liver is a famed dish — but practically unwanted.

That’s New York. You’re either, as the lyrics go, “king of the hill, top of the heap,” or you’re a fraud. There’s no in-between.

Sanchez was getting ripped for his misplays over the last two years, and then last week he was injured in the closing moments of a preseason game when sent back on the field. A dumb move by the head coach, the perceptive critics in the media insisted.

That brings on rookie Geno Smith to start until Sanchez is ready. And maybe after he is ready. “IN ROOKIE THEY TRUST — SORT OF” is the headline that covers the top of pages 46 and 47 in the Post.

According to Steve Serby’s column, “The Grim Reaper stands over Sanchez now as conspiracy theories gain new life about the inevitable death of his Jets career ... ”

What do you mean it’s only sports? In a city of tabloids, sports is the stuff that matters. Don’t you love it?

Federer loses battle to time and Robredo

By Art Spander

NEW YORK — It isn’t as painful as the decline of others, of Joe Namath stumbling behind the line of scrimmage, of Willie Mays waving at fastballs he used to rip. No, Roger Federer still can make the shots he once made but, unlike the past, not when he needs to make them.
  
Roger is losing the battle to that most relentless of all individuals, Father Time, and so maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that he lost a match to Tommy Robredo, a man to whom he never had lost before.

Federer was 10-0 against Robredo. Now, after Robredo’s 7-6 (3), 6-3, 6-4 win in the fourth round of the U.S. Open the record is 10-1. And Federer’s 2013 record in the four Grand Slams is a look into a grim future. Only a semifinal, a quarterfinal, a third-round and a second-round. The demons have settled.
    
John McEnroe wasn’t surprised.
   
“You start to question yourself,” McEnroe, who’s been there, said on television. “He’s feeling that.”
   
Federer’s feeling the frustration of growing old, because in tennis, 32, which he reached a month ago, is old. The skills have diminished. The doubts have increased.
  
From the very first game, when Federer’s serve was broken — two or three years ago, to make that statement would have a virtual impossibility — to the bitter end, the match belonged to Robredo, a Spaniard who couldn’t win the big one. Until Monday might.
  
Until a Labor Day beset by rain, schedule changes and what some would consider an upset. And some would not.
   
They were supposed to play in daylight at the 24,000-seat Arthur Ashe Stadium, the jewel of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. But by the time the downpour eased and the courts were dried, the match had been shifted to nighttime at the adjacent, smaller Louis Armstrong Stadium.
  
“I was prepared,” said Federer, seeking no excuses. “I’ve been practicing on Armstrong. I’ve waited for so many matches in my career. I was even happy about Armstrong. I thought it was going to a great atmosphere, that I could take advantage of, the fact people were really going to get behind me.”
  
They were behind Federer. In tennis, as in golf, the favorites get the cheers. Fans want familiarity, a Pete Sampras or an Andre Agassi, an Arnold Palmer or a Tiger Woods. They come to support Federer, not Tommy Robredo, although he did get an appreciative roar from the crowd after the final point.
  
“Unfortunately,” said Federer, “I didn’t show the game they could really get into and get excited about.”
   
The game Federer had from 2003 through 2012, when he won a record 17 Grand Slams, including five U.S. Opens. The game he never will have again.
   
It’s no sin to grow old. We all do. But an athlete’s aging is more visible. He drops passes. He strikes out. Or in Federer’s situation, he sprays balls beyond the lines he used to pinpoint down the lines, shots that made us gasp, shots that now make us sigh.
   
“I struggled throughout,” conceded Federer, “which is not very satisfying. I mean, Tommy did a good job to keep the ball in play and make it difficult for me today. I missed so many opportunities. Rhythm was off. When those things happen, clearly, it’s always going to be difficult.”
  
This year, 2013, those things happened more often than not. At Wimbledon, in the second round, he was beaten by Sergiy Stakhovsky, from the Ukraine, ranked 116th in the world. At least Robredo is a respectable 19th.
  
“Confidence does all these things,” admitted Federer, who surely has lost more than a minimal amount of his — or as McEnroe put it, you start to question yourself.
  
“Confidence takes care of all the things you usually don’t think about.”
  
Deep down, Federer understands what he is, and what he was. The remarkable moves he once performed, taking a shot and with aggressive topspin placing it where it the other guy couldn’t reach it, are no longer in the repertoire.
   
Federer hit some fine ones on Monday. He didn’t hit enough of them.
   
“I kind of self-destructed, which is very disappointing, especially on a quick court," he said. “Your serve helps you out. You’re going to make the difference somewhere. I just couldn’t do it.”
   
Robredo, at last, could.
  
“If you play Roger,” said Robredo, 31, whose elation countered Federer’s disappointment, “we all know the way he plays, how easy he can do everything, no? The difference today was break-point conversions. (For Federer only 2 of 16 chances).
  
“But when I was with a chance, I was getting it, no? Sometimes it happens. And today I was the lucky one.”
    
Luck had nothing to do with it. Age — Roger Federer’s age — had a great deal to do with it.

Serena a winner over the “heir apparent”

By Art Spander  

NEW YORK — Oh, the the things that took place after Sloane Stephens, the designated “heir apparent” to Serena Williams, beat a semi-injured Williams in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open in January.

Stephens, 19 at the time — she’s now 20 — once had a poster of Serena in her room but allowed, in one of those moments when elation blurs logic, “I think I’ll put a poster of myself now.”
    
Then a month or so later, Stephens bemoaned the fallout, saying Serena unfollowed her on Twitter and that in truth Serena had in “the first 16 years of my life never said one word to me.”
  
What Serena said to Sloane Sunday, after their fourth-round match in the U.S, Open ended with Williams, having won the final five games and verifying her status with a 6-4, 6-1 victory, was “Good job.”
   
What Stephens said was, “I mean, obviously, she’s No. 1 in the world for a reason.” Obviously.

Serena will be 32 at the end of September, ancient for an athlete in a sport where there always seems to be another teenage phenom coming along. From Serbia or Spain or Russia.
  
Which is why so much — too much? — was made of Serena and Sloane, two women who, if not actually the rivals some journalists choose to call them, at least both are Americans.
   
You know, mom, apple pie and forehands. Also, alluding to that match eight months ago, revenge.
    
There was a misplaced assumption that, perhaps because they both are African-American, Serena had become Stephens’ mentor, as well as her bosom buddy. But tennis players, as golfers, do not become friendly with the people they are trying to pummel until retirement.
   
Arnie and Jack were competitors. Pete and Andre were competitors. Serena and Sloane are competitors.
 
“I think it was a high-quality match,” said Williams, and it was until it wasn’t.
  
Stephens isn’t in Serena’s class yet. She hung in for a while, which is what happens so often, but Williams won the big points in the first set and then won most of the points. Stephens was beaten mentally as well as physically.
  
“The second set got away from me a little bit,” confirmed Stephens. “I thought she did a lot of things well.”
   
Women’s tennis is dominated by very few, mainly Serena, Victoria Azarenka and Agnieszka Radwanska, and Radwanska has never won a Grand Slam tournament. Stephens is 15th in the rankings. “But I have a chance to break the top 10 at the end of the year,” she said.

She didn’t have much of a chance against Serena, even though it was 4-4 in the first set. The crowd, which didn’t quite fill 23,000-seat Arthur Ashe Stadium, seemed to favor Williams if marginally at the start. What it wanted most was a close match, and for about 45 minutes that’s what it got. Then, wham.

“I think she had some bomb first serves,” Stephens said of Williams, who broke her in the fourth game of the second set. “I lose serve. That kind of threw me off. I think having Serena serve up 3-1 is not ideal. When you give her that opportunity, to take that step forward, she definitely takes it.”
   
Williams has won the Open four times and, with the win over Stephens, advanced to the quarters 11 times in 14 appearances. Overall, of course, she has 16 Grand Slam titles, the most recent at the French Open in the beginning of June.
  
“I just tried to do what I wanted to do,” said Williams. If that was confusing, her game was not. She pounded serves, chased down balls on the lines and never reduced the pressure.
  
“Maybe one day when she’s not playing,” said a hopeful Stephens when asked about being on the same side of the draw as Serena, “people maybe would say, ‘I wish I wasn’t on the same side as Sloane.’
  
“Things happen in their time. It’s an honor to play on the court with one of the greatest tennis players of all time.”
  
That player was relentless.
  
“I’ve been at this a long time,” answered Serena about a possible letdown in her next match, against Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain. “So for me, in my career, there are no letdowns.
   
“I don’t go out there thinking about being a star. I just want to play tennis, and I want to do really good at it. It’s not about the stage for me. It’s just about getting the ball in.”
  
She got it in against Sloane Stephens as much as needed.

Newsday (N.Y.): Andy Murray becomes first Brit to win Wimbledon since 1936

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — He raised his fist, dropped to the grass, which for so long had been his enemy, and didn't know whether to laugh or cry. The country from which Andy Murray lifted the curse had no such decision.

It unleashed a collective shout of celebration. After 77 years, the Wimbledon men's championship belonged to Britain, where it was created.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Marion Bartoli wins Wimbledon women's crown

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON England — It was a mismatch more than a match, a women's final that given all that happened during a strange, bewildering Wimbledon turned out be perfectly imperfect and painfully one-sided.

Marion Bartoli is a champion with a past here, having returned to the All England finals six years after a one-sided defeat, and on a warm Saturday afternoon inflicted her own one-sided defeat on an overwhelmed Sabine Lisicki, 6-1, 6-4. In reverse order those were the same scores Venus Williams defeated Bartoli in the 2007 final.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray reach Wimbledon final

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — A virtually endless day of tennis outdoors and eventually indoors ended with history, controversy and the top two men's seeds of Wimbledon 2013 making it to the final.

The longest semifinal in the 127 years of the All England Championships, 4 hours, 43 minutes, was the match that enabled No. 1-ranked Novak Djokovic to get past Juan Martin del Potro, 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (2), 6-7 (6), 6-3 Friday.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Marion Bartoli, Sabine Lisicki advance to Wimbledon women's final

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — Marion Bartoli caught up with her past. Agnieszka Radwanska was caught up by the future. So the most unpredictable Wimbledon of recent times will offer a women's final matching a 15th seed against a 23rd seed.

Bartoli, 28, of France, the 15th seed, needed only 62 minutes on a blue-sky day to defeat Kirsten Flipkens of Belgium, 6-1, 6-2, in the first semifinal on Centre Court yesterday.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Andy Murray rallies to beat Fernando Verdasco and reach Wimbledon semifinals

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — Juan Martin del Potro literally picked himself off the turf. Andy Murray, did it symbolically. Toss in Novak Djokovic's relentless pursuit of perfection and the first male from Poland ever to make Wimbledon's semifinals and you have a dramatic afternoon of a spill, some chills and in the end for the home nation, thrills.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Sloane Stephens, last American, out of Wimbledon

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — This the type of Wimbledon it's been: There will be tennis players from Poland in both the men's and women's semifinals but there will be none from the United States.

The final American remaining this year was beaten on a Tuesday of rain and gloom, Sloane Stephens falling 6-4, 7-5 to Marion Bartoli in a bizarre match of eight consecutive service breaks in the second set.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Serena Williams stunned by Sabine Lisicki at Wimbledon

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — The winner, the stunning winner, was in tears. The loser in a state of acceptance.

"It's not a shock," Serena Williams insisted after she, and all of tennis, indeed were shocked Monday by Sabine Lisicki's 6-2, 1-6, 6-4 victory.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Serena, Novak still around as Wimbledon begins second week

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — There's a guy who once hit himself on the head so hard with a racket he drew blood. There's a young Englishwoman who's being treated as the Queen.

And, of course, there are top seeds, who despite so much chaos the first week of Wimbledon 2013, remain as perfect as they are supposed to be.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

Newsday (N.Y.): Serena Williams dominates for 34th consecutive match victory

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — For Serena Williams, it was a long day into night, but the only journey involved was from one tennis court to another.

Along with the figurative trip to Wimbledon's fourth round.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.

A century low for U.S. men at Wimbledon

By Art Spander

WIMBLEDON, England — The ad is one you’d never see in America. “My sweat terminates here,” the lady is saying as she holds up a plastic bottle of Sure. They don’t dress things up in Britain, don’t use euphemisms.

In the United States, we “perspire.” Here, they sweat.

What we don’t do in the U.S. is play tennis on a high level anymore. Other than Serena Williams.

She’s the best women’s player around, maybe ever, but that’s one of those unwinnable debates, and Thursday, Williams beat both the rain and in the second round of 2013 Wimbledon somebody named Caroline Garcia, 6-3, 6-2.

Another U.S. lady also made it through, Madison Keys, who at 18, and with a smile as sweet as her backhand, might be the future for the American women, if it isn’t Sloane Stephens.

The American men’s game seemingly has no future. It definitely doesn’t have a present or, at the 127th All England Lawn Tennis Championships, a presence.

When, as expected, Novak Djokovic swept past a 30-year-old journeyman from Georgia, Bobby Reynolds, 7-6, 6-3, 6-1, Thursday early evening under the closed roof of Centre Court, it meant that for the first time since 1912, no U.S. male had made it to the third round at Wimbledon.

“I just happened to play after everyone else,” said Reynolds, as if he felt he were the reason for the failure. “We have some young talent in the pipeline . . . Sports are becoming a worldwide thing, and everybody is so good now.”

Other than the American men, but you can’t have everything.   

What Serena had, after her 33rd straight match victory, was an apparent challenge from Andy Murray, the Scot who’s second in the rankings bellow Djokovic.

“He’s challenged me?” asked Serena. Two weeks ago she won the French Open. Now she’s aiming for a second straight Wimbledon and sixth overall.

When told, indeed, Williams continued, “Is he sure? That would be fun. I doubt I’d win a point.”

The question is whether Murray, runner-up last year to Djokovic, can become the first British man in 77 years to win Wimbledon.

The optimistic thinking is that, with all the train wrecks in his bracket so far — Rafael Nadal losing in the first round, Roger Federer in the second — Murray’s pathway to the final is much smoother than it would have been.

The defeat of Federer on Wednesday by the Ukrainian Sergiy Stakhovsky was considered so momentous the Daily Telegraph, a serious broadsheet, ran a photo of Federer across the entire top half of the front page. Not the front sports page but the front page, above the painful news of welfare cuts.

Stakhovsky’s most notable achievement until now, if you want to describe it that way, came in the first round of the French Open at the end of May. Angered about a call by the umpire on a ball that did or didn’t hit the backline, Stakhovsky ran to his equipment bag alongside the court, grabbed an iPhone and took a picture of a mark in the clay surface.

The decision remained unchanged, and the stunt cost Stakhovsky a $2,000 fine, but the video of him and the official pointing and focusing went viral. It seemed to be his 15 minutes of fame. Until he knocked Roger out of Wimbledon. And down the rankings.

When the new ones are released on July 8, Federer will be fifth, his lowest placing since June 2003, 10 years ago. A month and a half from his 32nd birthday, Federer must confront our doubts and perhaps his own.

“You don’t panic at this point,” Federer said defensively. For the first time in 37 Grand Slam tournaments he didn’t make it to the quarterfinals — a blow, even if an inevitable one because of his years.

“Just go back to work,” said Federer, “and come back stronger really.”

Wishful thinking, one would surmise, but that’s what so much of sport is about.

Serena Williams contends she doesn’t do much thinking about win streaks and such but only how best to face an opponent, the next being Kimiko Date-Krumm, the remarkable 42-year-old.

“I’ve never played her,” said Williams, who is 11 years younger. “I have so much respect for her. I think she’s so inspiring to be playing such high-level tennis at her age. And she’s a real danger on grass. It’s for sure not going to be easy, but I’ll be ready.”

Serena’s not going to sweat it. Or as we would say in the states, perspire it.

Los Angeles Times: Roger Federer, Maria Sharapova suffer upset losses at Wimbledon

By Art Spander
For the Los Angeles Times

LONDON — The little world of tennis spun out of control Wednesday. Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova took figurative tumbles at Wimbledon far earlier than anyone believed, and others took actual tumbles on lawns apparently too slick for the purpose.

Federer, who advanced to the quarterfinals in his previous 36 Grand Slam tournaments, was knocked out of Wimbledon this time in the second round. And by a 27-year-old Ukrainian ranked 116th, Sergiy Stakhovsky, 6-7 (5), 7-6 (5), 7-5, 7-6 (5).

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013, Los Angeles Times

Newsday (N.Y.): Roger Federer, Maria Sharapova upset at Wimbledon

By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

WIMBLEDON, England — For 9 1/2 years, 36 consecutive events, Roger Federer had never failed to reach the quarterfinals in any Grand Slam tennis tournament. But this Wimbledon he couldn't get past the second round.

A 27-year-old from the Ukraine, Sergiy Stakhovsky, 116th in the world rankings, defeated Federer, 6-7 (5), 7-6 (5), 7-5, 7-6 (5), a stunning conclusion to a long Wednesday afternoon of upsets, upset competitors and withdrawals.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2013 Newsday. All rights reserved.