Wrap up: Aussie Open 09

This picture says it all about how the Men's bracket went this year at the Aussie Open. Today, it wrapped up two weeks of intense action on the Men's side and a rather tepid Women's bracket.

Serena won both Singles and Doubles (with Venus) fairly easily. Given the game was missing Henin (retirement) and Sharapova (injury), Jankovic and Ivanovic went out pretty early clearing the way for a relatively smooth path for Serena to get to the final. Final's match up was with upstart Safina (Safin's little sister), who had a great 08 but just couldn't pull together any decent stretch of points in her finals match with Serena. She summed it up best her self: " I look like a ball kid on the court today against Serena" for her 6-0, 6-3 drubbing at the hands of the 10 time Grand Slam Champ. It just amazes me how the Williams sisters can just turn it on when they wish and win grand slams. They don't play many tournaments and concentrate on Slams, which explains their longevity and the number of Slam trophies. Maybe other WTA parents should take notes.

Men's side was as exciting as ever. After the big 4, Nadal, Federer, Djokovic and Murry, quite a few younger players lasted into late rounds. Del Portro, Cilic, Simon, Monfils and Tsonga to name a few. As always, a dark horse sailed deep into the bracket. This year was a Southpaw Spaniard, Verdasco. Before this tournament, he is probably better known as Ivanovic's one time boy friend. He went all the way to the Semis, giving Nadal a huge scare before succumbing in 5 close sets, clipping Andy Murray and JW Tsonga along the way. All probably owe it to recent switch to Reyes, Agassi's conditioning coach. Federer had came back from 2 sets down against Berdych who just couldn't miss a shot in the first 2.5 sets. After that it was smooth sailing over Del Portro and Roddick.

Final game was against his nemesis Nadal, who has dominated Federer on clay, challenged and won grass from Fed. If it weren't for the US open last year, Federer has nothing to show for in the past year. This Aussie Open was on Hard Court, a surface Nadal never won a Slam on before. Federer's win would've tied him with Sampras for most Slams. It would also mean RF can defend his turf on Hard Court at least. He put up a valiant fight, had chances in 1st and 3rd set, but faltering on a slew of break points and letting Nadal go up 2-1. A visibly tired Nadal couldn't close the deal in 4th, which took us to the deciding 5th. RF looked lethargic in the 5th and error prone. Nadal seem to have caught 2nd or 3rd wind and finish off the King for the past 4 years. Trophy ceremony was hard to watch as RF started to sob so badly, he couldn't speak after getting the runners up trophy from Rod Laver. After checking him emotions, he gave a brief speech congratulating Rafa and thanked the fans before bowing out of this year's open. I feel horrible for him, as he is literally seeing his chance of slipping away as Nadal gets stronger on different surfaces. I think he was mentally and physically exhausted. Rafa felt so bad for him, he took his trophy and went over and give RF a hug and tried to comfort him. Both men are such classy sports men, I feel lucky to be a part of this era.

After all is said and done, I think RF can still tie or pass Sampras's record. But who is to say Rafa wont break RF's record soon after? The way he is going, Rafa can win on any surface.