The almost-comeback, and Lucky Plaza is creepy.
written: 8:03 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 22, 2009

1. (Regions Morgan Keegan Championships, Memphis - semi-final) Roddick def. Hewitt 2-6, 7-6, 6-4

Once again, I found myself pulling for the underdog despite going into a match rooting for the top seed. I wanted Andy to win when I set the timer for this match last night; halfway into the first set, I wanted Lleyton to win.

The thing is, I love Andy, but Lleyton needed this win more. The commentators kept going off about how Lleyton hasn't won a match against a top 10 player since May last year, and he's also just returned to the tour after a hip surgery. After Lleyton won the first set and pushed the second to a tie-break, I couldn't help but start fantasising about how awesome it'd be for him to win the semi against Andy, then the final against Radek Stepanek - which would've marked his first title since 2007.

The thing is, also, I'm a huge sucker for a nice underdog comeback story. Lleyton Hewitt would've fit that role to a T: former World #1, two-time Grand Slam champion (US Open 2001 and Wimbledon 2002), his career derailed by, among other things, his marriage, his arrogance, his family, injuries. He's talented; he wouldn't have been able to win the first set against Andy so convincingly otherwise. He's much, MUCH more compelling to watch than Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray combined, even more compelling than Andy Roddick himself. If he'd won the match, it would've brought him one step closer to winning the title, which would've been a small, but significant, stride forward in breaking the top 20.

I hope he finishes in the top 20 at least by the end of the year. I had a crush on him in secondary school solely because I thought he was cute so watching him play, properly for the first time, was a bit nostalgic for me. Like I've said before, I much prefer the older players like Roddick, Hewitt, Nalbandian, Safin, and obviously, Roger, to the younger ones. I get excited when a fantastic match-up like Andy Roddick/Lleyton Hewitt comes my way - and boy, it was one hell of an awesome match, one of the best, if not the best, I've watched since the Australian Open.

Lleyton played absolutely amazing in the first set. Absolutely amazing. He played from all corners of the court, aggressively attacking at the net, hitting winners from the baseline, and breaking Andy twice to win it. Unfortunately Andy stepped up his game in the final two sets and Lleyton's dropped a bit, though I'd definitely say it was more a matter of Andy stepping up than Lleyton dropping. Still, the second set was REALLY close until the tie-break which Andy absolutely dominated. Before the tie-break, I honestly thought Lleyton would win as he was the better player, albeit only marginally. I just couldn't see how Andy could break him. Andy had, what, six break points that set, and converted none. Andy was up 0-40 at one point but Lleyton easily held after some FANTASTIC play that did not involve saving his break points with cheap aces.

It was also pretty even in the third until the seventh game where Andy finally broke Lleyton. And just like that, one badly-played service game, and Lleyton lost. The bright side is, he saved two match points in the process, but the downside is, Andy eventually won at love.

Great for Andy though. I'm definitely pulling for him over Radek Stepanek (though I'll be asleep when they play at 5 a.m. Singapore time - brilliant), more so because Andy recently lost a final to Stepanek (in San Jose. Last week, I believe). I admire Stepanek's volley skills but god, I can't stand that man. His on-court antics are obnoxious. He actually pulled down his pants in one of his matches when he received a bad lines call against him, and rightly got a code violation warning for that. He's really ugly and I can't imagine anyone wanting to look at his ass so that was REALLY irritating.

Anyway, go Andy! I love him. There's actually not much I like about his game except his serve, and I think a huge reason why I like him is because he's from Roger's generation, and he's been really consistent over the years in which Roger single-handedly wrecked his career in the sense of keeping him from winning Slams and keeping him from the #1 spot. I think it says a lot about him, how he's managed to finish in the top 10 every year since he became #1 and how he consistently tries to improve despite consistently losing to the same person and consistently getting criticised for not winning another Slam. I think his spirit is great. He may be an arrogant prick which is also a small part of why I like him. He's like the Bad Boy to Roger's Goody-Two-Shoes and I've always had a thing for the Bad Boy anyway.

Lastly, another small reason I like Andy: he puffs out his cheeks whenever he gets ready to hit the ball and it's so cute, like this:



Oh, and of course, most importantly, his serves are out of this world amazing. It's unfortunately not amazing to the extent of owning Roger (Roger has out-aced Andy on many, many occasions, the most recent being the Australian Open semi-final this year) but everytime he slams a 220km/h serve down the T, my jaw drops and it takes me a good 10 seconds to retrieve it from the floor. His service motion is ugly for sure, but you can't deny its efficacy - its lethal, deadly efficacy. He served three straight aces against Lleyton!

*

2. I can't believe some people

I find it amazing that some people have accused Roger of lying about his back and using it as an excuse to hide his "broken heart" after losing the Australian Open final. What the fuck. Seriously - WHAT THE FUCK. That's the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard. If he bounced back from losing Wimbledon to win the US Open, there's no way in hell he'd still be crying over the Australian Open. NO WAY IN HELL. Wimbledon is his favourite tournament; that loss would've been his sixth straight victory. Sure, the AO would've been his 13th Slam, but it was also the first Slam of the year. He has three other chances this year to get 13, two other ones to be realistic (i.e. taking the French out of contention), and he just said that he plans to play until he's 35 - which means he has many, MANY chances left.

Skipping Dubai and Davis Cup because he's still hurting over the Australian Open final? If I'm already over it, it means he's been over it since, like, last year. Like he's said before, he wouldn't even step on the court if he doesn't feel like he's fit enough to play because "Roger Federer never retires" (this quote is really one of my favourite Roger quotes, if not my favourite), and he's learned his lesson from the later half of the 08 season when he played Madrid and Paris even though he wasn't sure at first if he should. He wants to be fit, even if it means sacrificing the Davis Cup once more, which he's never won before, which he's consistently said is one of his goals to attain before he retires.

I honestly can't believe the drivel that gets posted on the Internet that tries to pass itself off as "journalism" sometimes. Rafael Nadal cites his knee as a reason to pull out of the Davis Cup final last year, pull out of Shanghai, pull out of Dubai, and everyone's all understanding and accommodating. In one of the few times in his career that Roger pulls out of a couple of tournaments, and everyone's jumping down his throat and accusing him of lying, of still being hung up over a loss that happened nearly a month ago, of being unpatriotic, of not wanting to take a political stand against the Dubai/Israel controversy...

These people have way too much time on their hands.

On a brighter note, I miss Roger so much and I can't wait for Indian Wells. It's apparently 58 degrees C in Indian Wells though, with the humidity level at 47 degrees C?! Seriously? That's like not even conceivable to me. Singapore is hot enough.

*

3. Tennis in the rain

I dragged my parents to KR today to play tennis despite how it started raining rather heavily seconds before we left the house. It was drizzling a little when we reached KR, but five minutes later, the rain got heavier. And heavier. And heavier still. It got to a point where the three balls I took out to sacrifice were soaked with water, and one awesome backhand I hit saw water spraying from the ball, straight into my face. It was awfully disgusting.

I'm actually quite surprised that my dad can play a little. Before this he kept bragging about how his tennis totally pwns mine and how he can totally play and how the only thing he can't do is an overhead (Wikipedia calls it overhand) serve. I always laughed it all off as he has a tendency to exaggerate - and this is putting it mildly - but after today, I humbly admit defeat.

The thing is, my dad is pretty athletic despite his height and I've inherited zero of those genes. Even my mom is somewhat sporty; she used to be on the track and field team in secondary school, though I can't remember if she ran long-distance or short-distance. My mom said this morning, before we played, that I had no sporty cells in me which I refuted in protest - but maybe it's true.

Maybe, just maybe, it's actually not true, and the truth is that I am maybe 45% sporty; it's just that I've been way too lazy and sports-allergic over the years to let it manifest. I still play tennis really badly, but I think my forehand is improving bit by bit. Playing with the new racquet also helped a little; it felt a lot more comfortable and I only panicked 6 out of 10 times when I tried hitting a forehand.

Playing on a really wet court was quite terrible though. A few times the ball bounced a lot lower than I anticipated due to all the water it soaked up, and once it bounced away from me when I ran up to receive it because of the wetness of the court.

The weather has been really antagonistic towards me the past two days. It better see some improvement over the next few days or I'm gonna be seriously pissed.

On another, but kind of related, note, my left knee has been hurting lately. I used to have some cartilage problem, starting from secondary school, which I used as an excuse in JC2 to stop going for PE but because I've done nothing sporty apart from swimming in like, five years, the knees have been fine. Until now. The left knee has always been weaker than the right and it's hurting again, and apparently my dad gave my brother a knee guard which he never used but of course he didn't dig it out for me before he went back to Tekong because it would have TOTALLY taken SO much out of him and therefore killed him.

Whatever.

*

4. Misc and last words

OMG SHIT I CAN'T BELIEVE I WROTE 'IMPULSION' IN THE LAST ENTRY.

Lastly, I was going to mention this but it slipped my mind. I went to Lucky Plaza on Friday - and it was my first time venturing into Lucky Plaza all by myself. It was really scary. REALLY. SCARY. I was genuinely afraid, albeit mildly, for my bodily integrity. There were not one, but two times when I walked past some random electronics/handphone/whatever shop on the basement level and had the ah beng shopkeepers calling out to me who continued to stare at me even though I ignored them and showed no sign of even wanting to acknowledge them.

Would anyone call such attention flattering? I mean, seriously. Would anyone? I was really grossed out and even a little bit apprehensive, on the defensive. Maybe I'm just weird.

Suffice it to say though, I'm never going to Lucky Plaza all by myself again. I only went there to check out this store that sells tennis equipment which Baoyue told me about; I thought I could buy my stuff cheaper there but it was the exact same price as the stores so it was quite a waste of time. Oh well. I did see a nice autographed poster of Roger thugh, so that was good.

I need to study. Sigh.

before sunrise // before sunset


Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010