Friday, August 27, 2010

Women got balls too..






I've had this on my Ipod player for a long time and I feel compelled to share this with you.

My love of tennis has been evident throughout my blog and although I am not playing this sport anymore (for fear of getting tennis arms hahaha) I am still deeply in love with the sport and follow it from the sensationalism of the players to the technical aspects of the sport. From the title holders to the mechanics of the game, I seem to have a firm grasp of how everything works.

This is a lovely segment of the match between two of the best women players the game has ever seen.This match has never really ceased to amaze me. This was way back 1993 and the technology of the equipment used was still not advanced compared to today. But these two players can pound the hell out of the ball. Monica with her rocket-paced heavy two-fisted groundstrokes and phenomenal angles and Steffi with her thunderous forehand and precise backhand slices provided for us a wonderful match which will remain as one of the best Australian women's singles final in the Open era.

Focus on the rally of the match which literally comes at 4:28 with the two players trading forehands and backhands for more than 24 shots and at eye-blinding pace. Because Monica is a left-hander her double-handed forehand shot goes crosscourt to Graf's backhand. Monica's tactic in this match is pretty simple - keep the ball away from Steffi's forehand and feed her backhand which is a mere slice and not as offensive as her forehand. This particular exchange highlights that tactic real well. Steffi's advantage though is her slice is so deep and low to the ground that more often than not Seles cannot hit the ball too aggressively because of the low height of the ball. Still she attacks the Graf backhand with cross-court shots in this rally and perseveres on with what little power she can muster despite such low slices. Graf meanwhile anticipates the crosscourt shots by leaning more on the ad court - her backhand side of the court in layman's terms. This proves to be her undoing though. In the end Monica wins the
exchange with an intelligent shot - a forehand down the line where Graf was nowhere to be found.

The crowd bursts into tremendous applause after the rally and rightly so. It was one of the best rallies the tournament had ever seen! The next game saw Monica breaking Steffi's serve and consequently her spirit as Monica proceeds to take the second set and then the third.

What a wonderful game tennis is!!! Did anyone of you understand what I was ranting on? Capish???? hahahahah

PS here is the video!!!


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