The Scary Round Four

Stanisla Wawrinka - a name unheard of, until yesterday night has become the talk of the tennis world today. And this has sparked me to write a post.

Yesterday, at the Australian Open 2013 Men's Singles Round 4, he gave Novak Djokovic a run for everything - money, title, fame, name and most importantly - the game. While I sat through the five hour battle that Novak fought, to defend his campaign to the quarter finals; I realized what havoc Stan had created.

Novak lost the first set 1-6 in rapid 25 minutes. No one expected this from a world number one. He was down on the second set as well but then managed to win it 7-5 in about an hour. The third set was reasonably comfortable when Novak won at 6-4 spending only 45 mins. While everyone believed that Novak had to get the fourth set, he lost it at 6-7. He did put up a very good fight because Stan got it only after 68 mins. The fifth and final set lasted a nasty 104 mins. In the end Novak survived.

Was Novak overconfident? He probably was in the beginning. He would have never expected a 15th seed player to shock him out of his wits in the first set. Stan served 16 aces against Novak's 7; but it was not just about the aces. Novak struggled to keep up with the serves in general.

Stan kept Novak on his feet all through the 5 sets. Stan was literally dictating the game. You would expect it to be the other way around, but that hardly happened. I still remember a few points where Stan moved a few feet to swing the ball and Novak was running like a dog all over the baseline to make the return. Moreover, Stan's backhand's became a nightmare for Novak.

Towards the end of the ordeal, Novak managed to pull himself up a bit more than Stan, which gave Novak a slight advantage and a ticket to the quarter finals.

What helped Novak all through was his fitness. He could not bring his A-game because Stan quashed it right from the start. Years and years of playing competitive tennis, esp the 5 setters, gave Novak the edge he needed to last that long. Stan developed a minor hamstring injury during the game which definitely made him slow in the last 2-3 sets. Despite that, Stan took the 4th set. But his injury started playing up. The last set was a clear indicator when Stan moved less and relied on serves and backhands. Nevertheless, Novak was nowhere close to making an advantage of this.

At the end of the day, it was Stan's mistakes that made Novak win. And clearly, those mistakes were not forced on him by Novak. If Stan was even 10% more fit than what he was in the 5th set, Novak would have had to re-schedule his return ticket.