MELANIE Oudin sat in a corner of the U.S. Open’s players’ lounge yesterday. She was unsure of her immediate plans, amidst the public disclosure that her father had filed tawdry divorce papers a year ago, alleging Melanie’s mother had an affair with Oudin’s coach.
“Haven’t booked a flight yet,” said Oudin. “Just not sure what we’re doing.”
It was a dreary, rotten day at the Open yesterday, the first day Oudin was no longer part of the tournament, no longer the feel-good story.
There were too many doubles matches on Ashe Stadium on the day card. The wheelchair tournament filled the outer courts and did not draw the big crowds it deserves.
And then came the weather. Gloomy, cold and windy in the day, the first rain of the Open tumbled at night. It forced the Rafael Nadal-Fernando Gonzalez quarterfinal to be postponed at midnight after being stopped twice, the second amidst a second-set tiebreaker.
The storm system is threatening to wreck the Open’s final weekend, potentially postponing today’s two women’s semifinal matches and the resumption of Nadal-Gonzalez.
But there is one ray of sunshine peeking through yesterday’s rain clouds. The Open still has Nadal and Roger Federer alive today, and that’s all that matters.
A good Open becomes a great one if Nadal and Federer can get it on in Sunday’s U.S. Open Finals for the very first time.
“One of the best rivalries in sports deserves to play on another grand stage,” Federer’s agent, Tony Godsick, said.
“That’s what everybody wants, that’s what I want,” said esteemed tennis historian Bud Collins, covering his 55th U.S. Open Championships.
This was not the Open Federer and Nadal were supposed to meet in the Finals, not after Nadal fell off the radar. Nadal lost to Federer on clay in Madrid, lost stunningly at the French Open and pulled out of Wimbledon because of knee tendinitis as Federer set the Grand Slam record. Great rivalry on hold.
“My knees are perfect,” Nadal said the other day.
His stomach is not. He reaggravated his abdominal strain last night after slipping and was attended to by the trainer after winning a first-set tiebreaker.
The tennis cognoscenti has called Nadal-Federer the best tennis rivalry ever. For Americans, it is not the truth. Rafa-Roger is not Borg-McEnroe, not Sampras-Agassi. Not here. Not yet. Not until Nadal-Federer battle at Flushing Meadows before a wild New York crowd and make the rivalry complete.
Even Nadal wasn’t sure he would get this far. His Flushing Meadows performances have been erratic, the courts too fast, his knees too sore from the year-long pounding. His semifinal appearance last year was his best-ever showing.
Most tennis insiders don’t think Nadal gets to Sunday. His stomach injury will hamper his serve and Juan Martin del Potro, the tall, young, hard-serving, beast of the summer hardcourts, looms in the semifinals.
“Del Potro is going to be a tough match for Nadal,” Tennis Channel’s Justin Gimelstob said.
If Federer, who faces Novak Djokovic in the semis, wins his sixth straight Open to tie Bill Tilden’s record, it becomes a more impressive accomplishment in his sport than Derek Jeter tying Lou Gehrig. But it will feel much bigger if Federer does it against Nadal, ailing or not.
Please, tennis gods: stop the rain and get the two of them to Sunday.