Who would have thought that I’d start my tennis day by watching Marat Safin beat the No. 11 player in the world, then walk into work to find out that Justine Henin had quit tennis. For good.

To read my Justine-retirement post, go to ESPN.com. For a few thoughts on Safin, stay here.

Over the course of his innumerable disasters in recent years, I’ve called Safin “irrelevant” and privately wished he would hang it up. He looked miserable in his work, a guy trapped on tour and unable to think of anything else to do. He seemed to want to play well, but all the losses had beaten him down to the point where there was nothing worth doing beyond going through the motions.

Safin has been fined for tanking in the past, and there’s no doubt he’s thrown a few matches away over the years. But what’s been frustrating to me, effort-wise, is his unwillingness to add anything to his game or try anything different once he gets behind. He began his career with a breakthrough backhand that allowed him to fend off opponents’ inside-out forehands. But in the decade since his debut, dozens of other players have developed the same backhand. Content to rally passively and rely on his clean ball-striking, he’s never taken the next step to stay ahead.

Today was different. Maybe it’s the clay that helps Safin’s 28-year-old body catch up to the ball, or the memory of great Hamburg matches from the past. Remember the fifth-set tiebreaker he lost to Gustavo Kuerten in the final one year? It was a glorious match, but also typical of a Safin loss—take it as far as possible, make it as painful as possible, then lose. It often seems that he determines whether he's going to win or lose a match before it even begins. Almost from the first game, you can see in his face and demeanor if he's going to win that third-set tiebreaker or not.

I had a good feeling about Safin's game from the start today. He’s lost a step, especially on his returns, but he was hitting cleanly and keeping his anger, which he’s famous for flashing at the most inopportune moments—like 30-30 in the first game—under control. When he's in this mode, you can see how much the game has lost without him. To my mind, only Pete Sampras has ever owned a serve that’s such a pleasure to watch. It was true again this morning.

What has kept Safin going through the years of zombie-like frustration and blind, pointless rage? Why would he stoop to qualifying for this event? I’d say it’s at least partly an obligation to his immense talent. He hardly seems like a born competitor or a guy with much of a killer instinct—he’s almost too gentlemanly in his relations with his opponents on court. Safin, like Andre Agassi, was coached from a young age by a driven parent (in his case, his mother), and it’s produced a similar love-hate relationship with the sport. He’s good at it, and there’s no getting away from that fact. It’s pretty much 180 degrees from the Henin approach—she'd put everything into the game, and enough was clearly enough for her. Safin's identity, in its morose and defeatist way, is too tied to the game for him to say that.

At least for today, that was a good thing. As the big Russian lumbered and slid around the Hamburg clay, his sense of obligation began to look something like determination. Which is a whole lot more fun to watch.

How do you beat a better player? More specifically, how do beat someone who plays very much the way you do, but who is faster, more consistent, just as motivated, and who fully expects to win? The simple answer is, you need to ride a high wire from start to finish. You must get off to a good start, do a few things your opponent isn’t expecting, and hope that the ensuing boost in confidence will lead you to start making shots you normally wouldn’t make. Then, after all that, you need to remain on the high wire until the final point. This last part is the hardest, because the minute you let yourself think you can win, you no longer have nothing to lose, the way you did at the start of the match. It’s one of the trickiest mental adjustments to make in sports. It's also a shock, because before one of these matches, someone may have said to you, "Well, you've got nothing to lose." But that's only true as long you're losing.

Stanislas Wawrinka couldn’t make the adjustment on Sunday in Rome. The newest member of the Top 10 did many things right against Novak Djokovic in the final of the Italian Open, and he took his thick, workmanlike game as far as it would go. Wawrinka’s serve has always struck me as stiff and powered by an awkward knee bend, but he used it wisely, knocking a flat one up the middle and then following it with a long, slow, bending kicker to the ad court that gave him time to get to the net and pinned Djokovic in the corner. He sent his forehand, which is a touch too long in the backswing to be a truly reliable weapon, up the line and took away Djokovic’s favorite point-opening play, his down the line backhand. Finally, Wawrinka’s one-handed backhand—which ends with a sweeping follow-through that is slightly Federesque, in an infinitely less elegant and more utilitarian way—proved to be versatile and deceptive enough to push Djokovic off the center hash mark and force him to hit on the run.

By the start of the first set, everything was clicking for Wawrinka. Serving at 1-2, he moved Djokovic wide with his forehand and drew an error for 30-0, then followed it up with a brilliant piece of defense. With Djokovic rushing the net, the Swiss took the pace off the ball and dropped a slice at his feet; Djokovic had to volley up, and Wawrinka was there for the forehand pass down the line.

Wawrinka must have scared himself a little with those shots, because he would only win four more games. The change came in the middle of the second set, when the rallies tightened up and each point became a toe-to-toe tug of war for control. With Wawrinka serving at 2-3, Djokovic finally established his superiority from the ground—his two-handed backhand, more dependable than his opponent’s one-hander, was the difference. When Wawrinka sailed a forehand long and wide to be broken, you could feel reality set in on both sides. Djokovic pounded his chest; Wawrinka hung his head—he’d fallen off the high wire.

That’s not quite fair, though; Djokovic did his part to give him a push. This wasn’t the Serb’s finest match, but after his less-than-gallant performance against Federer in Monte Carlo, it was a redemptive one. He began with what looked like an excess of something, either confidence of anxiety, I’m not sure which. He hit two drop shots in the first game, and then casually popped in another from behind the baseline in the second game. While he won two of those points, this was an uncharacteristically eccentric beginning for Djokovic, who is typically dialed in from the first ball. Wawrinka used the opportunity and took the early offensive.

As I said earlier in the week, Djokovic walks a razor’s edge of frustration in many of his matches—it’s what drives him, for better and for worse. (I've been speaking in Roman metaphors lately, so I'll compare Djokovic to the ruthlessly pragmatic and treacherous Cassius from Julius Caesar: Caesar notes his "lean and hungry look"—something I'm sure Federer and Nadal have noted in Djokovic of late.) But frustration is not an easy emotion to ride or even control: The Serb's impatience can boil over and lead him to throw a set away in anger, as it did against Andreev in Rome. Then again, it can also help him overcome a guy who is playing his best and seemingly rolling to victory, as it did against Wawrinka. From the second set on, Djokovic was a study in controlled impatience. He’d shed any anxiety or overconfidence; instead of drop shots from behind the baseline, he forged forward and won points at the net. Djokovic's tactics become more focused as well. Serving for the second set at 5-3, but down 0-15, he sliced his second serve up the middle rather than hitting the customary kick out wide. Surprised, Wawrinka floated his return long and lost four straight points for the set.

It was an admirably gritty and relatively quirk-free performance from Djokovic (though he did continue to pop in the odd, and usually ineffective, drop shot). That’s always been the word that comes to mind when I watch Djokovic. To me, his game is admirable in its comprehensiveness, rather than aesthetically appealing, like Federer’s or Nadal’s or Murray’s or Henin’s or even Davydenko’s.

But in the Rome final I located something in Djokovic’s game, a piece of technique, a moment repeated over and over, that was enjoyable to watch for its own sake. Whenever Wawrinka left a ball hanging in midcourt, Djokovic moved around it with startling quickness to set up for a forehand. So quick, in fact, that he had a moment to freeze, statue-like and perfectly balanced in an open stance, before rotating his shoulders through. Ruthlessly pragmatic and poetic at once, if this isn’t how the shot is taught in the textbook, the textbook needs a rewrite.

This week TENNIS.com will be featuring one of our blog regulars, Asad Raza, who is in Rome for the men's Italian Open. He'll be writing back and forth with me here a couple times; reporting on the home page; and blogging over at Pete's as well.

Hi Steve,

In tennis, when a great opportunity is missed, be it an unexpectedly favorable draw, a good look at a passing shot, or a well-planned dropshot that floats just wide, Italians tend to exclaim, "ché peccato!"--"what a pity!"  That would appear to to be the phrase here in Rome, where there has been ample opportunity to use it.

The Internazionale BNL d'Italia went from unexpected to unexpectedly disappointing today.  Spectators only saw ten full games, as Andy Roddick and Radek Stepanek both retired from their semifinal matches, Roddick with back spasms and Stepanek with stomach problems.  For Roddick, the injury put a sudden end to his best run on European clay since 2002.  The Roman fans had definitely gotten behind him, and there was palpable sadness in the arena after he conceded the match.  Ché peccato.

Stepanek had become, if not a villain, an irritant to the crowd, who (correctly) held him responsible for ridding the tournament of its top seed--but now that he'd done it,the feeling seemed to be, couldn't he have at least stuck around to trouble the next guy?  As the always cosmopolitan Bud Collins exclaimed from seat behind me, "Doppio disastro!"  ("Double disaster!")

Yesterday (quarterfinal day), however, was a much better day of tennis.  For me, however, it started with mild, Italianate frustration: I was delayed on the way to the Foro Italico by another doppio disastro: a transit strike that got started late and ran into the afternoon.  Ah, Italia.  The late strike kept me waiting at the Pyramide station for an hour (I could have walked, but I was well aware that the instant I chose to walk away, the station would immediately re-open).  Anyway, by the time I reached the arena, James Blake was in his third-set tailspin.

On came Stepanek and Federer. As you mentioned, Stepanek is a pleasure to see live, when you can appreciate the subtlety of his rhythm-upsetting, junkballing, net-rushing tactics.  In fact, I think it may be time to admit Stepanek into the ranks of lovably unique players like Miloslav Mecir, Karol Kucera, and Fabrice Santoro.  On this particular day, in addition to his full repetoire of slices, middle approach shots, and surprisingly firm volleys, he had two things going for him: firstly, his first serve consistently kept Federer at bay, especially in the first set.  Secondly, he had a convincing look of hunger and belief--emotions that the sport of tennis reveals to be fully readable on human faces.  Actually, you might count this as one thing: confident self-belief and having a good day with one's first serve are strongly correlated.

For Federer's part, I thought he became somewhat passive, seeming to conclude that Stepanek would crumble at some point or another if he (Federer) only lurked ominously for long enough.  It was as though he wanted the threat of his game rather than his game itself to beat Stepanek.  Less risky, for sure, but in a strange way it seemed to put more pressure on him to remain consistent, while awaiting Stepanek's breakdown.  It didn't happen, as Stepanek played a brilliant set of tennis, even thrusting an index finger in the air after one inspired dropshot.  If Radek's showboating got on Federer's nerves, he didn't show it.  I sort of wish he would show it: get down in the trenches and fight these opponents.  I suppose it's not in his personality.

In the process of waiting for Stepanek to come down to earth, it was Federer's own game that came unhinged--particularly his topspin backhand, several shanks of which caused him to be broken early in the second set.  (Heresy alert: who am I to advise Federer, but sometimes I wonder if the shanks might be partly the result of his "classic," ultra-small racquet head.)  In the second set tiebreaker, Federer won a long, superb point, in which he forced Stepanek back from the net with a good lob and weathered a full deejay set of spins and velocities from the Czech mixmaster.  My instincts told me Federer would cruise from there, but perhaps his confidence has been affected by the events of 2008.  A couple of errors and three huge Stepanek serves, two down 5-2 and one at match point, and it was over.

Afterwards, I wondered if Roger has noticed how effective a patient but unpredictable attack such as Stepanek's could be, and whether he'd thought about doing more of it himself, so I posed the question to him.  He began by irritably telling me that perhaps all of a sudden he'd start coming in on both serves on clay, but he doubted it.  Then he softened, considering the idea before rejecting it: "But of course when a guy serves well, you know, and backs it up with a good volley behind, you he's tough to play...  But I don't think that's the way to win the French Open, to be honest." 

Fair enough.  But the interesting thing is that Stepanek didn't come in on first and second serves, or even on every first serve.  And he did come in unexpectedly, several times, in Federer's serve.  These are some of the reasons that he won the match despite being not close to in Federer's league from the ground and only winning 82 points to Federer's 88.  I'd describe Stepanek's tactics as attacking, but patient attacking, not a desperate mission.  In the end, it's more about an aggressive mentality as it is about coming to net on every point--and it was Stepanek, not Federer, who had that mentality yesterday.

Later that night, Andy Roddick used a somewhat similar approach against Tommy Robredo.  I noticed that Andy came in on Robredo's serve on big points, and it seemed to swing the pendulum in his favor.  Traditional clay-courters are not used to being rushed--chip and charge, and you change the dynamic of the match.  Roddick also showed the patient side of the patient attack: I noticed he seems to have added a very intelligent high forehand, which he uses to "reset" points in which he is in positional trouble, and to upset the rhythm of points that are becoming too clay-metronomic. 

Roddick's backhand is often criticized (notably by Matt Cronin a couple of years back), but on clay he can stay out of major trouble by looping it deep.  Clay is somewhat more forgiving of his volley technique, as well, giving him more time to get closer to the net and swipe or bunt shots away.  Roddick's patience in rallies, and his evolving sense of when to attack, is not a programmatic thing ("Hit crosscourt, then down the line, then come in.  Rinse and repeat.")--it's more like a developing feel.  I mentioned to him that selectively attacking was working well and should give him new confidence on clay , to which he responded, "Yeah, I probably feel better going into the French this year than any time recently.  You know, I don't know, I just played well and I was -- I wasn't forcing my shots...  I had a good mix going, so we'll see if I can keep that up."   A good mix, indeed. 

And one more thing about that match: Roddick's backhand and Robredo's entire game are often considered to be without heft.  This may be true compared to, say Almagro's backhand or Gonzalez's forehand, and as I watched the start of the Robredo-Roddick match from the press room TV, the ball seemed a bit leisurely.  But then I got to my seat and remembered: would that I or anyone I've ever played tennis with have such "lack of heft."  These guys are pros, and trust me, they hit the ball real hard.

Finally, to finish this discussion of patient attacking, I want to return to Federer's ambivalence on the topic: remember that, in arguably his best clay match ever, the Rome final in 2006, he showed excellent, selective judgment in coming to net, won 64 of 84 points when he did, and lost serve only three times in five sets.  After that match, he said, "For me just to hit and move backwards again, that's not the way I learned the game.  My way of thinking is to come to the net and finish it at the net.  [Nadal] hardly passed me today, which was a good feeling.  So I have to keep that up."  Perhaps it's a pity he didn't try it yesterday.

I've really enjoyed doing this, Steve.  Thanks for sharing your space with me!

ciao,

Asad

This week TENNIS.com is featuring one of our blog regulars, Asad Raza, who is in Rome for the men's Italian Open. He'll be writing back and forth with me here a couple times; reporting on the home page; and blogging over at Pete's as well.

Asad,

We’ve caught you on TV a couple times this week, during the Rafa loss and the Roddick win. From that angle, you look like you've got a Jeff Goldblum kind of thing going. But studious and attentive to all details, of course. Call me perverse, but there are few things I savor more than watching a tennis match by myself in a half-empty press section in some far-off city, knowing I’m going to be writing it later. There’s nothing quite like that to focus the observational mind. Have you enjoyed the Roman crowds? They’re more playful than the French, and slouchier.

It’s been an unexpected tournament, as I’m sure you’ll agree. Nadal and Federer down, Roddick up. Has this made it more exciting around the grounds, or is there an air of disappointment or anti-climax? I think the clay season needed this. It’s a breath of fresh air in spring for the first time in three years. We’ll get plenty of Rog and Rafa in the next few weeks, but what are the chances we’ll see the Dirt Worm performed again? Watching on TV, I didn’t get the feeling the crowd was all that thrilled to see Stepanek do his dance. It doesn’t matter, he played much more proactively throughout and deserved to win. Federer spent a lot of time hanging back and waiting for him to create something in the rallies. I wonder if a reverse pressure got to him after Rafa lost and the draw was his.

It was a fun match to watch, perhaps because of the conditions. You’ve been talking about the varieties of clay, and I’m sure there are many gradations. One other variable is the weather; clay matches seem to be affected by sun and heat more than others. Nadal vs. Ferrero was clearly played in “heavy conditions,” and it slowed everything and everyone down. I’ve always thought of Nadal as a great heat and sun player—he seems to feed on it, and perhaps a faster clay court suits him.

Today the stadium was hit by that golden afternoon sun that I associate with tennis in Rome. If the ball was flying faster, Stepanek used it to his advantage. I’m still amazed that he was the one who found a way through both tiebreakers just when it could have gone the other way. I’ve written before that he’s much better to watch live than on TV. You can see his variety, his craftiness, his ability to slow points down and use every part of the court, including the center of it. He also plays at a nice, natural rhythm—not deliberate like Nadal and Djokovic, or semi-frenetic like Roddick. I loved his down-the-middle, chip and charge plays today; it doesn’t get any more old school than that, and they worked. What did you think of seeing Stepanek live this time?

As for the rest, I’ve only been watching in bits and pieces. Here are a few of my couch potato observations:

—Djokovic has a solid game for clay, but I wonder if he has the mental patience. When he started to go south in the second set against Andreev, he was testy and incredulous, and pretty much packed in a couple games. I think he has to guard against impatience against lower-ranked players; the clay greats have always been mentally steady through the ups and downs of a three-hour slog. He did come back to win in the the third, which shows again his overall confidence. But he tends to expend a lot of energy proving what he knew all along—that he was going to win.

—Nadal’s performance reminded me of the one he put on last year in the semis in Rome against Davydenko. He had just come off two unreal blow-outs, against Youzhny and Djokovic, and I expected him to stay at that level all the way through the French Open. Well, that’s not how it works for anyone. Every day is a new one, and subject to a hundred variables, including the weather—your confidence can literally be blown away in the wind or suffocated in humidity. Nadal hit short against Davydenko and had trouble generating power, though he pulled it out in the end.

This year, he came into Rome after another high-flying performance, against Ferrer in Barcelona—for much of that match, he was at his very best. But right from the start against Ferrero, you could see Nadal didn’t have it, especially on the forehand side. I believe he was injured, but I think Bodo had a good point when he said that his recent negativity about the schedule may have caught up with him. Nadal almost seemed to be trying—subconsciously, perhaps—to prove that he was right to complain. Or it may have given him a reason in his mind for an off day. He was right, of course—there was very little chance he was going to run the table this time. And you were right: A Nadal presser is always a lesson in coming to terms, honestly, with what you just did on the court.

—Blake: I like watching him more on clay than other surfaces, because he has to hit a few balls before pulling the trigger. He and Monfils played the most entertaining match of the 2006 French Open, with lots of touch and long, athletic rallies. Watching him today, I kept seeing Blake as a batter on a baseball field. His returns are swings from the plate, as if he’s timing the ball for a line drive. As for Wawrinka, the guy’s game doesn’t do it for me. His brand of bruiser-ball is impressive in its way, but still bruising.

Who do you have in the semis, Asad? I’ll take Stepanek and Roddick. Would that be an anti-climax? I don’t think so. We'd have another chance at spotting the (perhaps rightfully) elusive Dirt Worm.

Enjoy the weekend,
Steve

This week TENNIS.com will be featuring one of our blog regulars, Asad Raza, who is in Rome for the men's Italian Open. He'll be writing back and forth with me here a couple times; reporting on the home page; and blogging over at Pete's as well.

Hey Steve,

I've just returned from a nighttime ramble to the Campo dei Fiore, where I digested the day's events, and some ice cream. Walking home from there, a friend pointed down a dark alleyway guarded by an ancient iron portcullis, whispering, "they say that's where Caesar got stabbed." Funny, eh?

As we all know, the unthinkable just happened: Rafael Nadal lost in the first round of a major clay-court tournament. I've been marveling to myself at just how different the event already feels--any sense of prevailing normality has been lost. Of course, the assumption that one player will win every single clay-court tournament is a strange form of prevailing normality, but that's what Nadal succeeded in constructing over the last four years.

In the press conference, Rafa himself seemed both exceedingly unhappy and already putting the loss behind him--he visibly progressed from despondence to complaint (about his injury) to anger (at the schedule) to acceptance during the press conference. He must have half-expected this outcome, given that he wasn't even sure he would play today, but despite his obvious dismay he got over it quickly, and signed autographs and posed for pictures immediately after the presser. Perhaps it's this kind of quick processing that makes him so impervious to letdowns.

The result today was definitely not caused by a letdown. Rather, it was a combination of the injury, which Nadal said made him unable to generate power from his legs, and the play of Brutus... uh, I mean Ferrero. As the match wore on, the former number one (as Neil Harman mentioned in those press seats, it's strange to think that he has accomplished something Rafa hasn't, and may not) definitely caught the scent of blood.

I headed to the media center while they were on serve in the first, and rushed back after JCF took the first set. I beheld a much more aggressive player, dictating in the rallies and even grunting much louder than before. If nothing else, it shows you that players on the tour do not show the top dogs exaggerated deference. The minute Rafa's level slips, the guys are waiting to tear him down. It would take a churlish fan not to feel some vicarious enjoyment on Ferrero's behalf, after his unfortunate history--you could see Nadal was certainly happy for him afterwards, albeit in a complicated sort of way. For one moment, as Ferrero knelt on the service line absorbing the moment, all was redeemed.

Back on the piazzas of Rome tonight, I caught at least three Italians talking excitedly about the match. No other encounter, of course, could match its newsworthy shock--at this point, David Nalbandian turning in an inspired, focused performance would be more of a surprise, right? Andy Murray losing on clay has turned out to be drearily predictable. Novak Djokovic tuned your man Steve Darcis, who hits a heavy ball but doesn't have the maturity yet to deal with as focused and relentless an attack as Novak's. By the end, Djoko was toying with Darcis, teeing off on first and second serve returns and hitting plenty of dropshots. Afterward, I was quite impressed with the seriousness with which Djokovic took questions--he clearly understands that he has people to win over when it comes to his injury issues.

I asked Djokovic, and had a conversation with another easy victor, Nikolay Davydenko, about the Roman clay, but that's grist for later. Davydenko's match today reconfirmed that when he's rolling from the baseline, he has only equals, no superiors. Poor Mario Ancic found the see-saw of rallies tilting away from him very quickly, and he was reduced to desperate lunges that only set up Davydenko kill shots. Steve, have you ever noticed now smooth Davydenko is when putting away midcourt balls? He flicks them away expertly.

As for the Foro Italico itself, "pleasantly low-key and rough around the edges," as you said, is exactly right. I agree with you that the sunken side-court area is the best place to while away one's time, but the entire place is a relaxed and wonderful place to see matches, and practice sessions (note to Federer-obsessives: Rodge was practicing shallow, crosscourt backhands with a vengeance today). Also, the Foro is just across the Tiber from a tram to the Piazza Flamminia, making it very accessible to the center of town (each night, I've taken the tram and then a long, stunning walk through the center to Ostiense, where I'm staying). Oh, and by the way, the ushers remain twentysomething dancers, you'll be pleased to know.

Near the side courts are two uninspiring "avenues" lined with booths, banners, and fast food. These are similar to Indian Wells or the food court area of Flushing Meadows, places where you can't go three feet without encountering a corporate promotion or piped music. The assumption seems to be that you'd die of boredom if forced to walk a twenty feet without some kind of artificial, plasticated stimulation.

Yet you only have to walk a bit to run into some teens sitting on a pile of old marble blocks moldering next to a highway gas station. Could they be leftover from Mussolini's day? And did he take them from some prior project, perhaps a Counter-Reformation cathedral or even an Augustan ruin? It's quite possible here. In Rome, history is like a wonderful mold infestation: try in vain to keep it out.

A presto,
Asad

Addendum in reply to Ed McGrogan (warning: this will bore you if you don't like eating): Ed, it turns out Rome is an unpretentious and traditional food city, which means you get delicious standards at very good prices. All the things you hear Romans eat--thin pizzas, offal, fried artichokes, anchovies--they're all all over the place here, unlike, say, Manhattan clam chowder in NYC. Some superb things I've eaten: zucchini flowers stuffed with anchovies, salt cod with some heartbreakingly good tomatoes, and bucatini (thick pasta) with gunaciale (pig's cheek)--the pork here is really good, salty and porky and full of nice, differently textured bits and pieces. But earlier tonight came the best morsel: a friend of a friend dropped by, having just returned from Sicily with some food from his mother: sardines, caught yesterday, then stuffed with raisins and bay leaf and cooked with bread crumbs and olive oil. Mamma Mia!! That's the kind of thing that happens here.