melbourne

“this is very special, it’s a dream to win here, a grand slam on hard court. i have worked very hard… all my life to improve my tennis outside of clay. i have six right now, i’m happy with my six. when i won my first one i didn’t know if i would win any more. you never know when that will stop so you have to be cautious and be humble.” - rafa nadal, on winning his 1st aussie open title. he now has won slams on 3 different surfaces and is the first spaniard to win the title in melbourne.

what a glorious sunday! after serena williams waxed dinara safina in women's final, tennisdom was treated to another historic showdown between 2 of today's bests and probably 2 of the future all-time greats - rafa and roger! 2 geniuses going at it, trading all-court shots, with rafa winning in the end... yay! 71 winners and 64 unforced errors from roger, while rafa hit 50 winners and committed 41 unforced errors... but roger won 1 more point in total - 174 all in all.

i couldn't stand watching all the 4 hour battle, so when rafa won the first set, i set out to do my grocery, so as not to jinx his winning ways. it turned out that he lost the 2nd set, 3-6. when i got back, they were on serve in the 3rd set, even if nadal needed treatment due to cramps. when they headed to a tiebreak, i shifted to other channel... baka malasin ulit, hehehehe! but when i came back, he already clinched the 3rd set. i watched the first 3 games of the 4th set, only to see roger breaking rafa. i decided to take a break and see other shows. and true enough, rafa lost the 4th set, again 3-6. at that point, it was visible that rafa was tiring. and whatever vijay predicted that rafa would win in in 4 sets, evaporated in the 4th set. i only went back to the live match when i saw that rafa was ahead by 4-2 in the fifth. he then served out a 5-2 lead. after some tense rallies, rafa finally won on roger's final error! yeheeeeey! i think the guard (just outside my unit) could hear my cheers all throughout the match!

rafa remains to be a big stumbling block in roger's quest to top sampras' 14-slam record... and i hope that it stays that way! rafa has fastly improved - more aggressive game, effective serve and flattened strokes. all the greats - sampras, laver, mcenroe, borg, connors, predicted that roger would win this one and tie pete's record. it was only vijay (who is always all praises to the great federer) who bravely put his money on rafa, on the basis of his performances leading up to the semis, such as his match against tommy haas, fernando gonzalez and gilles simon. and he was right all along. (",) jake niall of the age sums it up: Federer does not serve below 50 per cent against Roddick or most players. He does not double-fault on set point, as he did in the third set tiebreaker, against others. Nadal's ability to neutralise winners into rallies (or losers), to keep forcing deuce when Federer is serving, to not concede a single point, drains the magic from Federer's racquet.

matches like this only prove how great tennis is as an individual game. skills are definitely prerequisite. but strategy, killing instinct, ambition should also be there. most of all, physical and mental strength and endurance are key factors in winning. this is what rafa and roger showed yesterday... the better athlete won!

all australian open 2009 winners came from the bottom half of the draw (except top seed rafa): serena williams (women's singles); bryan brothers (men's doubles); williams sisters (women's doubles) and mahesh bhupathi & sania mirza (mixed doubles). oh and there was a pinoy in this year's list of winners! francis casey alcantara won the boys' doubles title with cheng peng hsieh. it would be nice to see alcantara mature and join the ranks of pros in the international circuit. best of luck to him. mabuhay ang pinoy!

roland garros in may! the season has just started, i hope that 2009 will be another banner year for rafa. vamos rafa!!! (",)