The two men who once dominated tennis were blasted to the sidelines at Cincinnati this afternoon, forcing Rafa Nadal and Roger Federer to go into the U.S. Open, which begins in 10 days, with perhaps their worst-ever preparation for the final Grand Slam of the year.
Nadal has played only four matches since Wimbledon, losing two. Federer has played just six, including a Davis Cup match against Portugal and, in their final tuneups Friday, neither was anywhere in the neighborhood of scintillating.
Nadal: Out 6-3, 6-4 to Mardy Fish, who now must be taken seriously as a challenger at the Open.
Federer: Down 6-2, 7-6 (3) to Tomas Berdych, and looking very sloppy and at times disinterested.
Were they rusty following the long, hard half-season that led to Wimbledon? No doubt. But you would expect both to have come to Montreal and then Cincinnati with serious practice time and ready to use matches to get back their groove.
Federer at one point these last two weeks seemed to be playing quite well. But he clearly wasn’t ready to play the opening set against Berdych and, though he served better in the second set, his ground strokes looked nothing more than ordinary and he was whacked badly in the tiebreak, despite Berdych’s sore right shoulder, which required heat ointment and massage on changeovers. Tellingly, Federer never had a break point opportunity in this match.
Nadal? He never got it right in his four matches at Montreal and Cincy. He gutted out a third-rounder against Fernando Verdasco on Thursday, but you knew from the dicey performance he put on that he was going to be in trouble with Fish.
Mardy has faced only six break points in three matches at Cincinnati and has yet to be busted, and that, of course, includes Nadal, whose return of serve looks like perhaps his most pressing problem going into the Open.
Nadal came to Cincy leading the ATP in points won returning second serves (58%) and was fourth in points won returning first serves (35%). Against Fish, he converted 38 percent on second serves, just 18 percent of his first serve returns.
Yes, yes. Fish is one of the top servers in tennis. Still, that’s a pretty sizable drop-off for Nadal from his average.
Let’s go back to preparation for the Open. For the last few years, both Nadal and Federer have opted for long layoffs following Wimbledon, needing some physical and mental recovery time and playing only two tournaments (the 1000s at Canada and Cincinnati) before New York.
For Federer, he played nine matches leading up to the U.S. Open in 2010, eight in 2009, seven in 2008 (but that included the Olympics), 10 in 2007, eight in 2006. He played only six matches in 2005, but he was six years younger then and in the middle of a 30-1 run going into the U.S. Open, which he also won. He obviously didn’t need any more matches that year.
But he’s 29 now, his game on the backside of the mountain and his body and stroking in need of more day-to-day attention to stay sharp. That’s exactly what he hasn’t gotten this summer and that makes him even more questionable to win at New York — not that he could be considered over Novak Djokovic, Nadal and maybe Andy Murray and Fish.
Federer is still a top-5 player. The rankings say so. But there haven’t been many winner’s circles lately. He hasn’t won any of his last six majors, scoring his only runner-up at this year’s French Open. And with his loss at Cincinnati, he has now not won any of his last eight ATP 1000s nor 14 of his last 15 ATP 1000s — his only title coming at the 2010 Cincinnati tournament.
Nadal looks even shakier at this point with only four prep matches. Last year he had seven. He had seven in 2009, 15 in 2008, 10 in 2007, seven in 2006 and 17 in 2005.
Whatever sharpness these two are going to bring to New York is going to have to be honed on the practice courts now, and as hard as you train that’s never quite the same as feeling the pressure of a match.
What does it all mean? Probably a more competitive and interesting U.S. Open in the first five rounds. Once we get to the final four I think you can expect Djokovic to be there and maybe Fish and Murray, depending on how the draw plays out.
But Federer and Nadal? As great as they are, this hasn’t been a good summer. They’re going to have to scramble more than ever to reach the finish line in New York.