THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2010


KLMNO TENNIS


Top seed Wozniacki advances easily u.s. open from D1


(7-5), 6-4, to earn a spot in Fri- day’s final againstAmericansBob and Mike Bryan, also straight- sets victors onWednesday. “Ifme andRohancanget along


so well on and off the court, there’s no reason the Indians and Pakistanis can’t get along with each other.” Bopanna and Qureshi have


competed together off and on since 2003 despite the fact that the neighboring countries have been to war three times since becoming independent nations in 1947. Their pairing started drawing notice this year after they launched their “Stop War, Start Tennis” campaign, with the slogan printed on their warmup jackets. With each match they’ve


played since, they’ve seen their support grow. “The crowd is getting bigger,”


Qureshi said. There are “more Indians and Pakistanis coming. They’re allmixed together sitting in the crowd. You can’t tellwho is Pakistani and who is Indian. That’s the beauty about sports. That’s the beauty about our play- ing.” The two U.N. ambassadors


congratulated both players after Wednesday’s victory on Louis Armstrong Stadium and prom- ised to return for Friday’s final, in which the U.S. Open crowd will almost surely favor the Bryans. For now, the Indo-Pak Express


is one victory away froma Grand Slam event title and well on the way to delivering a message that transcends sport. “We’ve always said sports can


reach placeswhere no religion or politics or politician can reach,” Qureshi said. Wednesday’s 30-mph winds


were felt most dramatically in Arthur Ashe Stadium, where the marquee players compete. The 23,000-seat grandstands rise like the Roman Colosseum above the tournament’s featured court, ex- aggerating the effect of whatever wind is blowing. The gusts blew trash on the court, toyedwith the balls’movement and brought the competition to a dead halt at times, as servers refused to toss up the ball until it subsided. They also proved the undoing


of Gael Monfils of France in his highly anticipated quarterfinal against Djokovic, who managed the conditions far better and prevailed, 7-6 (7-2), 6-1, 6-2. In limited English, the French-


man explained that he wasn’t prepared for the way it wreaked havoc on his game.Atremendous athlete with crowd-pleasing speed and power, Monfils strug- gled to play the conservative tennis that is best suited to high wind. “With thatwind, you can really


find my weakness,” Monfils said. “I’m very physical and speed[y], and now we need to be like very focused on every shot. . . . You have to think, ‘I need to put the ball here and not too close [to the lines].’ On this, I know I need to improve a lot.” For 31st-seeded Kaia Kanepi,


the odds of upsetting Zvonareva, the seventh seed, for a place in the semifinals were remote from the start. Kanepi quickly found that her biggest challenge wasn’t Zvonareva but the wind. Zvonareva, hardly known as


anemotional rock, proved steadi- er, defeating the short-circuiting Kanepi, 6-3, 7-5, to advance to a semifinal meeting with Wozni- acki,who beat Slovakia’sDomini- ka Cibulkova, 6-2, 7-5. “This felt like playing in a


TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE VIA GETTY IMAGES


Frenchman GaelMonfils said after his loss toNovak Djokovic, “With that wind, you can really findmy weakness.”


hurricane!” Wozniacki said dur- ing her on-court interview. Kanepi committed a stagger-


ing 60 unforced errors (to 18 winners) in the 1 hour 53-minute match. She blamed half her gaffes on the wind; the rest on herself and Zvonareva’s superior play. “The weather was definitely


not for the good tennis out there,” said Zvonareva, this year’s run- ner-up to Serena Williams at Wimbledon. “The most impor- tant thing was to find the right balance between being patient and being aggressive. I think I did it well.” Nearly all tennis pros would


rather compete inwithering heat than in high wind, which is regarded as an equalizer, forcing players capable of making high- risk shots to attempt pedestrian ones instead, adding hefty mar- gins of error in case the wind yanks the ball wide or long or stops it short. And most players trudge off


the court slightly demoralized in the end, aware they haven’t dis- playedtheirbest tennisunder the conditions. Later Wednesday, second seed


Roger Federer defeated fifth- seeded Robin Soderling of Swe- den, 6-4, 6-4, 7-5. clarkel@washpost.com


EZ SU


D3


With reworked serve, Nadal is rolling along


Spaniard chases


elusive U.S. Open title with a potent game


BY LIZ CLARKE


flushingmeadows, n.y.—It has become routine, if not ex- pected, for the superstars of ten- nis to debut new outfits for the U.S. Open, which is played out on the sport’s biggest stage, in the world’s biggest media mar- ket. Rafael Nadal has done that


this year, much like Roger Federer, Venus Williams and Maria Sharapova, unveiling a different ensemble, in fact, for day and night matches on Ar- thurAshe Stadium. But Nadal has also used the


2010 U.S. Open to unveil a new serve — far more potent than the perfectly adequate one that has helped him to eight major titles (five French Opens, two Wimbledons and one Austra- lianOpen) by age 24. With his sights set on win-


ningthelonemajor titletoelude him(ifnot thisyear inNewYork, then soon),Nadal has reworked his game so it has more punch on Ashe’s hard court, which many,Nadal included, believe is playing evenfaster thantheoth- er courts at theUSTABillie Jean KingNational Tennis Center. The evolutionbeginswiththe


serve, with the Spaniard now cracking aces upwards of 130 mph — a good 10 mph faster, if notmore, than before. Nadal has provided few de-


tails about where this extra power comes from, saying sim- ply, “I change a little bit the grip.”But it has been a key to his impressive results to date. Not only has Nadal reached


the quarterfinals without drop- ping a set, he has yet to lose his serve in fourmatches. In Nadal’s case, developing a


EMMANUEL DUNAND/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE VIA GETTY IMAGES Strong winds affected play and CarolineWozniacki's hair, but theNo. 1 seed beat Dominika Cibulkova.


powerful serve is critical given thepunishmenthe exacts onhis body, particularly his knees, as he thunders around court re- trievingball afterball.Last year, all that pounding triggered a


flare-up of tendinitis that pre- vented him from defending his 2008Wimbledontitleandlimit- ed his effectiveness at the U.S. Open,where he fell in the semi- finals for a second consecutive year. Cliff Drysdale, the 1965 U.S.


Open finalist and an ESPN ana- lyst, is among thosewho’ve not- ed the adjustments. “He has changed the grip a


little bit so it’s not quite as far around as it was, so he can hit the ball a little flatter,” Drysdale explained in an interview Wednesday. “He helps that by throwingtheball insteadofover his head, he throws it more to the left side. [Nadal is left-hand- ed.] That enables himto let the wrist go looser. Instead of com- ing around the west side of the ball, he’s able to hit through the ball more, and that’s what is generating the power.” In addition, Nadal has con-


tinued to flatten out his ground- strokes, using less topspin, for more effectiveness at Wimble- don and on hard courts. With each round here, his


performance has improved. Nadal’s 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 victory


over countryman Feliciano Lo- pez, which ended at roughly 1 a.m. Wednesday, was his most efficientmatchyet, lastingjust2 hours 8minutes. Despite a gusting wind, Na-


dal landed 63 percent ofhis first serves. When he made his first serve, he won the point 90 per- cent of the time. As a result, Nadal faced only four break points, fending off all of them. Andhis groundgamewas clean. He struck 30 winners and com- mittedjust 14unforcederrors to Lopez’s 41 — a remarkably low number given the whipping wind. “I think I am playing well,”


Nadal said afterward. “But I [am] not playing yet atmy high- est level. . . . To be in quarterfi- nal of the U.S. Open without [losing] a set and without [los- ing] a serve, two things must work very well: the concentra- tion and the serve. Without these two things, you gonna lose, for sure, the serve, no?” clarkel@washpost.com


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