New appointment on OA Sport YouTube channel with TennisMania Special Madrid Openin which Guido MonacoEurosport journalist, touched on numerous topics of Saturday in Madrid: Nadal, Sinner, the Italians and so on.
Great focus on the Nadal-Challenge controversy: “The way I understand it, with the Challenge on earth you have to explicitly say the word Challenge. Or so Fergus Murphy said. He really seemed like the usual referee looking for a quibble, even if according to the rules he could be right. In general, I have seen the referees pay more attention, after the Monte Carlo events, to refereeing and not just acting as accountants, also to clarify things for next year. If on earth the image and the sign do not match, there could be some discussion. Nadal was very angry, ‘siempre lo mismo’ he said. Murphy is very rigorous, he is not intimidated. Here, however, it is not a question of favoritism, but of having a margin of mental elasticity or common sense. In any case, everything remained within limits. More common sense would be enough on the part of the referees in tournaments like this, unless the sign does not correspond to the image and then there would be problems. I hope that in the months remaining until the introduction of the new rule they will sort things out. As far as I know, there will be no Falco in Rome and Paris, so the line judges and referees will need to do their job. I liked Tsitsipas when he said ‘I referee’. We will have to be very careful and when there are doubtful balls ask immediately to avoid leaving us with games, as happened to Sinner in Monte Carlo“.
But the harshest criticisms are related to those who lost from the Mallorcan side: “I am stunned by de Minaur’s performance. I knew Nadal could express this level, with ups and downs, not enough to win these tournaments. However, the Australian made him play from a standstill throughout the match. I understand someone who isn’t used to it, but I wouldn’t have expected such a performance from him. Better for Nadal… he was able to turn forehand because the other shot close to him all match. True, the atmosphere was different than in Barcelona. But the same would have happened yesterday if de Minaur had managed the first set better at the end. Yesterday we played indoors, so Nadal’s forehand bounced a little more and caused more problems for de Minaur, who felt the burden of playing against him a lot. Which is not a shame, but from a trained and strong player with similar experience a few days ago, so he was the most calibrated of all to play against him, I expected more. Now Nadal will play with Cachin, who gave a very long interview on an Argentine site about what happens and the reasons for such a long crisis (15 defeats in a row). Now he has won two in a row, he (re)beaten Tiafoe in Madrid. Then there is the winner of Monteiro-Lehecka and this version of Nadal also almost makes you want to reach the quarter-finals, which would be something incredible even if it needs to be verified day after day how Rafa’s body reacts“.
The Sinner-Sonego argument is inevitable: “Sinner started so well and Sonego so badly that the match slipped away. Sonego attempted a reaction in the second set, but lost a game at 40-15 that could have brought it to 2-2 and essentially it was a massacre. My prediction combined Sinner’s statements with the fact that Sonego, after seeing him play perhaps the best match of the year with Gasquet, with a change of coach and new stimuli and energy, I thought could be annoying. What happens when a player who, when he plays with Berrettini, after Stuttgart when he was totally disheartened, and with Sinner sees in them two big points of reference, two lighthouses? He suffers them. There is a mental discussion. Fabio Colangelo confirmed to me that they tried, him in particular, before the match to make him understand that he could win this match, and probably that balance between believing it and exaggerating or feeling too much pressure made him give a counter-performance. If you go onto the pitch calmly, maybe you play your match and leave the pitch with your head held high. However, if you think you can beat him, or they try to convince you that you can beat that player better than you, mechanisms can be triggered that block you. This happened in Sonego yesterday. He took a higher lay than he would have taken in different conditions because he tried to enter the field mentally with the idea of doing the feat. Anyone who has played tennis knows this mechanism quite well. When Sonego entered the field with that mood and took 6-0 it was like taking a journey that you never get back from. Furthermore, the fast conditions that helped Sinner completed the job. Lorenzo is probably too good, because Sinner said ‘I was better than him at putting friendship aside’. And even that final embrace from Sonego smacks of a player who, despite being very present competitively, one of the greatest fighters on the circuit, lacks the malice or the conviction to win the match against certain opponents. That said, Sinner is definitely stronger than Sonego and nothing strange happened yesterday“.
Returning to the discussion related to Nadal: “I’m afraid that by winning 1-2 more games, the thought will enter his cursed head that he can really score another great feat. I fear, and I am convinced, that his body will not allow it. He said that he is training at 100% of 40%, in other words he is training semi-injured. This was a few days ago. Then the situation is evolving, maybe he wakes up feeling a little better. I liked the last statements in which he seemed to have become aware of the fact that they were the last releases and he wanted to enjoy them. Now I’m afraid that such an athlete, beating the 11th in the world, will think he has underestimated himself. I don’t think so, he’s very objective“.
A mention also to Sinner’s main rival (in terms of age): “Alcaraz is happy in Madrid, he has played several tournaments here. There are also these considerations to make. Even a South American plays well at altitude, which is why they do well here. Then it is an atypical tournament. Sinner can adapt very well, if we want better than in Rome. If he hadn’t acted like the Incredible Hulk in the gym these days, I’d say he would also be capable of winning Madrid and Rome“. And who can beat Jannik right now except the top 4? “Ruud, Shelton, Hurkacz, Fritz, Zverev, Rune. I wouldn’t underestimate Struff“.
Clearly a passage on other Italians is inevitable: “I am amazed by Cobolli’s fighting ability, personality, coolness and competitive spirit on a tennis court. Qualities that he has always had, but now he has entered a new dimension and has a chutzpah, a belief in his own abilities that have improved. This year at a certain point Jarry hit Alcaraz with balls, worth 20. He beat him in two totally different conditions, Australia and here. When you put it on the fight level you don’t come out much with this one. Tennis-wise he still has his limits, but he seems like one of those players who lend themselves to tennis, like Gattuso. A mangy man, who also continues to improve at tennis, doesn’t shoot slowly. He doesn’t move spectacularly, but he hits well. His father told me that many times he doesn’t like to win easily, and they had to scold him. He lights up in the climate of struggle. He says ‘sometimes I prefer to have fans cheering against me, when I go 3-3 in the third it’s the greatest pleasure for me’. It’s not a very small quality. Arnaldi played his usual bim bum bam game and for a set and a little bit of a second he managed as Medvedev wanted. Then he lost a somewhat foolish game and there the inertia changed and the Russian won 6-4 in the third. We got great signals from the two of them and from Darderi“.
There remains one question coming from Denmark: “Rune has not yet returned, or become, what he will sooner or later become. He’s still a bit messed up amidst his conflicts with the team, his mother, himself, the referee, his opponents and the public. However, he remains a competitive player, physically very strong, tennis-complete, who must find a balance to be able to compete stably with the leaders. It’s just a matter of time. I don’t see him having the mental order and mental condition to win big tournaments with continuity any time soon. I hope there are no doubts about his potential“.
General considerations with focus on Musetti: “We are commenting on a very international and competitive sport, where the stories, difficulties and potential are valid for our players, but also for those of every other country, we always start from this point of view, otherwise we talk about great nonsense that does not take opponents into account and difficulties, as if the Italians, anointed by the Lord, had to necessarily finish among the top 10-20. Musetti plays wonderful tennis, he is a special player, with different kinds of difficulties that he is trying to manage and improve. We will see along the way at the end of his career how much he was able to improve or how much his limitations led him to have a career of a certain type. If we focus only on those 5-6-7-8 Italian players we don’t lose sight of the fact that, for example, losing against Seyboth Wild is not a tragedy. He was a very strong junior, so in Brazil perhaps they have similar conversations compared to ours with Musetti. This is the world and this is tennis. The provincial vision leads to provincial discussions“.
Final comment on the big 4 and the moments in which Sinner found himself at risk: “The ranking says that the top 4, in the last year, have dug a very deep furrow between themselves and the others. However, tennis is made up of moments of form, changes in surface and so on. It would be insulting to those behind to say they have no chance. The last tournaments were won by Tsitsipas and Ruud and there were also the winners. Let’s take Sinner’s moment: the match with Griekspoor in Miami could have gone one way or the other. With Rune in Monte Carlo in third he could have lost it and with Tsitsipas he lost it. In Australia he had a good margin, apart from the final with Medvedev in which he was under a train. Those players are dangerous. Come break Hurkacz and Shelton in Madrid… thinking that Sinner can win from here to eternity without even unexpected defeats is science fiction“.
