Love the Australian Open, always love the Aussie Open. The late nights, the bright courts, the blistering sun that you can almost will yourself to feel on a cold night in New York, the bleary-eyed exhaustion the next day—it’s like a nighttime winter vacation for American tennis fans. Something about the extra effort it takes to watch makes it that much more worthwhile. Anybody can flick on CBS in the middle of a September afternoon and watch the U.S. Open. To keep up with the Australian is to join an exclusive club of obsessives—very classy obsessives, of course. One of my all-time favorite tennis-on-TV experiences was watching Younes El Aynaoui beat Lleyton Hewitt in the fourth round of the 2003 tournament by myself in an utterly dark living room in the wee hours of a weeknight. There’s an exotic quality to seeing tennis live from halfway around the world at that hour.
It has also helped that there have been so many competitive, high-quality matches from Melbourne over the years. Say what you will about Rebound Ace, but it brought out the best in a lot of players and allowed everyone to play his or her game, whatever the style. But the rubber has met the road this year, replaced by a more conventional hard surface called Plexicushion. It’s classified as “medium slow” by its manufacturer, the same company that makes DecoTurf II for the U.S. Open, which they label “medium fast.” The highest-profile event to use Plexicushion was the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, where Andre Agassi beat Sergi Bruguera in the men’s final, and Lindsay Davenport won gold on the women’s side.
The surface doesn’t sound like a radical departure from Rebound Ace, or from the courts used at events like Indian Wells and Key Biscayne. The Aussie Open will not be quite as unique—and I’ll miss that piercing bright green in my living room at night—but I don’t think it will lose its niche as the “fairest Slam.” We’ll see: The courts may play differently in different types of weather, or gain some speed as they wear down over the next two weeks. Either way, I don't think the general pecking order in the men's and women's draws will be upset by the change.
Speaking of which, those draws are out, which means we have the pleasure of perusing them in their pristine state for a couple of days before the sweat begins to flow and the seeds begin to drop and our predictions fly out the window. I’ll start the perusal right here, in the traditional bracket-by-bracket fashion.
The Men
First Quarter
Three-time Aussie champ Roger Federer’s section looks, by his standards, manageable. He’s had a stomach virus but appears to have recovered in time to handle his first-rounder with Diego Hartfield. More interesting is his potential second-round matchup: the winner between Fabrice Santoro and John Isner, which is bizarre just to think about—this is one time I hope ESPN chooses to broadcast an unseeded American.
After that, Fed may get terminal underachievers Verdasco and Berdych, then await the winner of a rematch of last year’s encounter between Blake and Gonzalez in Melbourne. I can only assume Gonzo will be happy to be back in Australia, where he let fly some of the most spectacular tennis by anyone all season. If he gets in that kind of mood again, a Fed-Gonzo quarter will be one for the highlight reel.
First-round match to watch (or read about, anyway): Nicolas Almagro vs. up-and-coming young Croat Marin Cilic
Semifinalist: Federer
Second Quarter
Some impressive names are lined up here: Djokovic, Tursunov, Hewitt, Baghdatis, Nalbandian, Ferrero, and Ferrer (and Spadea, just in case you were wondering where the Vinc-anity was going to go down). Hewitt-Baghdatis and Nalbandian-Ferrero could be hard-fought third-rounders, though Baghdatis might have to get by the 2005 champion, Safin. Nalbandian, naturally, injured himself last week—maybe he thought he had a chance to win.
The second seed in this section is Ferrer. Can he continue his climb into the game’s upper echelon? The surface sounds suited to his safe, scrappy game, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him upset Djokovic in the quarters.
First-round matches to read about: Safin vs. huge-hitting Latvian Ernest Gulbis; Spadea vs. Stepanek in the battle of the late-blooming, crowd-pleasing freak shows.
Semifinalist: Ferrer
Third Quarter
This is shot-maker heaven, with Gasquet, Murray, Youzhny, and Andreev in residence. There’s also a beast to go with the beauty—Karlovic—as well as the ubiquitous Nikolay Davydenko, who has traveled around the world just to answer the same questions one, two, three, 10 more times.
No matter how harried he might be, you have to like Davydenko’s chances of going deep here. He’s been to the quarters three straight times and is coming off his best year at the majors. He’s also in the soft half of the section, protected from the shot-makers who will beat each other up in the heat during the first week.
First round match to read about: Murray vs. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
Guy no one wants to face: Andreev. The man with the wicked forehand has never done much here, which might just mean he’s due.
Semifinalist: Davydenko
Fourth Quarter
This bracket is headed by Rafael Nadal and Andy Roddick, which would be a marquee quarterfinal if there ever was one. For that to happen, Roddick might have to do his duty and send Donald Young home in the second round. But other than that his draw doesn’t look taxing; the next-highest seed is Tommy Robredo, a guy Roddick has always eaten for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Nadal’s side is similarly nondescript: Clement, Simon, Calleri, etc. His old buddy Carlos Moya is hanging around, too, and they just played a barn-burner in Chennai. But I don’t see him staying with Rafa over a three-out-of-five-setter. Which means we should get our marquee matchup. It’s one that favors Nadal on a fairly slow court—witness what he did to him in Indian Wells last year.
Dark horse: Uh, Paul-Henri Mathieu?
Semifinalist: Rafael Nadal
Semifinals: Federer d. Ferrer; Nadal d. Davydenko
Final: Federer d. Nadal
The Women
First Quarter
We start with a bang here: Henin, Sharapova, Davenport, Peer, and Golovin. The top seed comes out swinging against Aiko Nakamura, and she should go unscathed until at least the fourth round, when she plays the always-on-the-verge Tatiana Golovin. The Frenchwoman can play with Henin, and she should have time to use her touch and variety on these courts. That's a match to watch.
The other one, of course, is the second-rounder between Davenport and Sharapova. Now we’ll see what kind of shape Lindsay is in. I doubt it will be good enough to overcome Sharapova, but Davenport has two things going for her: She’s got nothing to lose, and she’s hungry for competition. The winner could get all the way to the quarters. But no further.
Semifinalist: Henin
Second Quarter
More good stuff: Jankovic, Serena, Vaidisova, Schnyder, and Mauresmo. There are four qualifiers in Serena’s vicinity, which should help her get past her customary early rust, and I like her in a fourth-rounder against Vaidisova. On the other side, Jankovic has been injured, but she’s also become consistent enough to count on through the first week of majors, and I don’t see either Mauresmo or Schnyder knocking her off in the fourth round. Which means we should get the histrionics and bullet backhands that will make up a Serena-Jelena soap opera, I mean tennis match.
Semifinalist: Serena Williams
Third Quarter
Venus Williams and Ana Ivanovic bracket this bracket. Venus might be tested by big-hitting Sania Mirza in the third round, and even more by a resurgent Li Na in the fourth. Ivanovic’s road looks smooth from here, but she’s never won a set from Venus and was outclassed by her at the U.S. Open in September.
Semifinalist: Venus Williams
Fourth Quarter
Kuznetsova and Chakvetadze headline this section, and there are some intriguing names in between: Szavay, Radwanska, Safarova, Petrova. I could see Petrova or Szavay knocking off the streaky Kuznetsova, who has never been past the quarters Down Under. But Kuznetsova played well in Sydney this week in reaching the final and giving Henin a run there. She's also a better hitter and mover than anyone around her in the draw and has won big hard-court events in the past. She's coming off a runner-up finish at the U.S. Open, in which she beat Chakvetadze in the semis. It may have been the worst Grand Slam semifinal in history, but a win's a win, right?
Semifinalist: Kuznetsova
Semifinals: Henin d. Serena Williams; Venus Williams d. Kuznetsova
Final: Henin d. Venus Williams
I look back and see I went "chalk" this time, picking the two top seeds to win. Anybody have anything bolder to predict? Something tells me you will.
Set your DVRs for the next two weeks and try to sneak some sleep at work. The tournament starts on ESPN2 in the U.S at 7 p.m. eastern—and only gets later from there as the days go on. Like I said, I’m ready.
