“What the hell. Let’s go for it.”

That quote just about summarizes Mardy Fish’s game this past Saturday – pound in the serve, rip the ball to corners, and don’t give the guy any time. In other words – go for broke. Fish has always been one of the perennial underachievers of tennis – the guy has a game to die for, but his mental sloppiness always undermines that. In unkind terms, Fish is notorious for being a ‘choker’ – throwing the match away right when he has it in his pocket.

 But not this week, no. This week, he looked like a man on a mission.  Davydenko (poor guy, he’s seemed out of sorts ever since the infamous betting scandal) was his first victim. This was followed by victories over Hewitt and Nalbandian – both coming in third set tiebreakers (in all honesty, I wouldn’t have put my money on Fish for either match, what with his nasty habit of choking). And then came the big one.

Fish ripped apart Roger Federer on Saturday (and mind you, ‘ripped apart’ is a relatively mild metaphor in this context). The score? 6-3, 6-2. Roger seemed to have resigned to Fish’s dominance – the top player in the world (well, I don’t think that’s going to stay put for very long) was being cornered and baited, just as a lion pounces upon a hind and devours it (forgive the gruesome metaphors).

 In conclusion, I think this exchange betwen Federer and Bud Collins, a tennis journalist, sums things up:

“Are you well, Roger?”

“I’m well. How are you?”

“I don’t have to run.”

“Well, I didn’t run much, either.”

~ by leelasn on March 25, 2008.