Modern men’s tennis is a ruthless game. Men’s tennis has featured many styles over its years; serve and volley, the power game, the clay rat. Players were easy to pigeon hole into specific styles, and you knew what you were going to get. Even players as late as Roddick and Hewitt had specific styles and shots they were likely to play, but also with some very distinct weaknesses.

Existing at the top today requires being the full package. All of the top four serve well, dictate play, play great defense, run for days and make incredible shots off both wings. Players such as Tsonga, Berdych and the much missed Soderling could simply over power their opponents by hitting right through them.

David Ferrer, aged 30 and listed at 5’9 and 160lbs (rounded up?) is enjoying what is the best year of his career. He can’t make Federer wonder shots, he doesn’t possess Nadal’s strength or spin, nor Djokovic’s agility. He doesn’t have nearly the power of any of the seven players listed above. How then, does he do it?

David Ferrer is both a champion of extreme fitness and extreme concentration. Due to his build, Ferrer is almost immediately behind most of the players in the top 20. Truly, it can’t be underlined enough. The man is 30 years old. Thirty. And he hasn’t missed massive amounts of time due to injury either.

The energy Ferrer brings to the court is astonishing. Yes, he’s speedy. But quick means very little if your footwork and endurance is not at peak physical ability. First off, let’s break down exactly what we’re talking about with “footwork”. It’s a nice buzz term to use, but how does it work?

Footwork doesn’t necessarily refer to how quick a player can move, but how quickly a player can move their feet to adjust to a shot. This means a few things. To start, a player is likely to commit fewer errors, that’s pretty obvious. Secondly, a player is going to have an easier time placing the ball where they want; they can adjust their body to get a more acute angle, and so on. Thirdly, it means a player can accelerate quicker and play much better defense. If a ball is tricky to reach, the player is more likely to be able to get something on the ball to get it over the net in some sort of decent position. Ferrer does this exceptionally well on the backhand wing.

There’s also something Ferrer does exceptionally well that is not often mentioned. He gets the ball deep. If Ferrer simply ran and got the ball back over the net, he would be destroyed. Even when not pushing Del Potro around last night, he pinned him back with excellent depth of shot. Del Potro, trying to find a way to take advantage of a short ball from Ferrer was left with little hope and instead was forced to simply respond to what the Spaniard would fire at him next.

Finally, Ferrer’s concentration is absolutely superb. I truly believe that concentration and fitness go hand in hand. So much is made of a player’s mental strength, and so much narrative wrapped around it. In shorter matches, I often find this incredibly overplayed, but it is difficult to understate in long matches. If you have been playing tennis for four hours, you’re not only going to be physically tired, you’re going to be mentally exhausted. One way to keep from being mentally exhausted is to be physically fit.

I’m not sure you could make a case for anyone being more physically fit than Ferrer. Not only is he 30, the way he must play, run, and hit the ball deep requires a ton more mileage and effort than players like Federer or Djokovic. That a player can win Paris on a Sunday, fly to London, and then dismantle Del Potro in three sets on a Tuesday night is truly remarkable.

While the players in the top 4 are incredible tennis players, and should be celebrated as such, Ferrer is truly one of the greatest athletes this sport has seen, and a real victory for the everyman (AKA us small guys!).

Enjoy Ferrer not just for his size, but for the rules that he breaks week in and week out. Run, “little man”, run.

Poor Ryan Sweeting.

How many times have we seen lesser players crack under the mental pressure of pushing a top name to the limit? Ryan Sweeting had unexpectedly gone up two sets to one, on Ferrer. Incredible hitting to the corners, Sweeting was ripping Ferrer’s short playing, moving forward and dictating play. Impressive stuff from the American who had never made it past the second round in a slam.

Ferrer wasn’t much interested in being pushed around in the fourth, however. A little bit deeper was all he needed to keep Sweeting from getting on top of the ball and made rushing the net more difficult to set up, and more dangerous to attempt. Heading into the fifth, the match would only go one way.

Serving at 4-4, things were tense for Sweeting. A fantastic backhand down the line winner from Ferrer followed by an excellent return that caught Sweeting by surprise and suddenly he was down triple break point. A double fault and a horrendous return game and the match was over in the blink of an eye.

For Ferrer it’s an escape that puts him in his proper place; one of the greatest in the game today. While many lower ranked players often collapse under the mental pressure of facing a big name, Ferrer takes this and forces you to physically collapse. The level of his game in the fifth set was but a sliver away from his form in the first set and he dominated on serve to keep the pressure on Sweeting. After winning the fourth set, the outcome of the match was never in doubt and rightfully so. The man is a machine.

Other Notes:

- Tough start to the year for Fish who was visibly frustrate at the Hopman Cup in Perth weeks ago and didn’t fair much better versus Falla. Bad timing, slopppy footwork and all around low confidence, this is the biggest upset for the men so far. The American hard court swing should give him the boost he needs to jump start his year.

- A tough injury to Andy Roddick leaves him out for a few weeks. The real pain is that it knocked him out versus his long time rival Hewitt and denied the chance for a rematch of what was a fantastic 2011 Memphis final versus Raonic.

- Speaking of which, you have to like the Canadian right now. When he’s serving well, he’s darn near impossible to return and break. If he wins that, Djokovic is next. That would be a fantastic match to gauge exactly where both players are right now heading forward.

- Lastly: This has been an incredibly slow first four days as far as the women go. That’s fantastic news. A lack of upsets means that the upcoming match-ups, starting as early as today, will be fantastic and continue to be fantastic regardless of who wins. What a way to kick off 2012 this will be for the WTA. I can’t wait.

Weapons: Fights to the end, flat forehand and backhand whip through the grass
Weaknesses: No power weapon, can get hit through on quick surfaces like grass.

While David might seem like a strange choice for the top 10 grass seeds as a clay specialist, Ferrer has had solid success on grass. Combined with his fighting attitude and crazy fitness, he can often outlast lesser opponents in a long grind. His backhand in particular has a bit of zip to it, and can really move through the grass on a quick day. You can’t ever forget about Ferrer, who often sneaks his way through slam draws and before you know it, he’s in the fourth round or quarters.

Weather, resilient opponents, court changes, continent changes, the kitchen sink… it really doesn’t matter what you throw at Novak Djokovic right now. He extended his winning streak to 8 gazillion and is looking as confident as ever. (OK, 29 straight wins this season, equaling Lendl’s record for consecutive wins to start a year.)

A lot of love must be sent Daveed’s way, who despite going down a set and a break, fought back to reclaim the break and then broke at the end of the set to force a third. He looked as aggressive as I’ve seen him in a while. Not content to play defensively, he was clearly looking to get in as many forehands as possible and go down the line when available. He was getting balls deep and was changing directions effectively. Unfortunately for him, Nole turned up the heat in the third, stretched Ferru wide and the errors started to creep into his defense.

It was impressive to see Nole fighting off his inner demons in the third after some close calls and tough games. You could almost feel the glue melting and the pieces separating, but Nole kept his snarl and shook them off (literally). Before you knew it, the match was over and the streak was very much alive.

Nole takes on Bellucci in the semis, who deserves a serious shoutout. The kid has real talent on clay, and if he can keep his confidence up and head straight, he’s likely going to be a serious force on clay for years to come, especially as many of the Spaniards age.

If a picture says a thousand words… well, here’s a picture of Rafa moping on a changeover. Is there much more to say?

Instead of a potential blockbuster night time quarterfinal showdown between Rafa and Ferrer, Rafa was once again denied due to injury. The whole situation is made even worse by the fact that Rafa had been practicing well and, from what he felt, done away with the sickness that had been plaguing him in earlier rounds.

But if you’re going to lose, what better way to lose than to a friend? In his presser, Rafa absolutely insisted he not be asked about the injury and was both noble and completely respectful of David’s victory.

Q. What can you tell us about the injury? What did David say to you at the end of the match?

RAFAEL NADAL: I can say nothing about the injury. Seriously, I would prefer don’t talk a lot about the injury.

Tonight, first of all, I don’t know nothing. Second thing, for respect to the winner and to a friend, I prefer to talk about the match. I think he played at a very high level. I just congratulate him and wish him all the best for the semifinal. I think he’s doing a fantastic tournament. If he keep playing like this, he going to have a good chances.

What David told me at the net is for me and that’s it.

Q. It’s going to be difficult for us to write a piece without appreciating how well you could move. It seemed to us you couldn’t move as well as you would like to have been moving tonight. Is that a fair statement?

RAFAEL NADAL: You see the match?

Q. Yes.

RAFAEL NADAL: So you are ready to write everything. I don’t have to tell you about what I felt on the court because I tried my best all the time. But is obvious that I didn’t feel at my best. I had a problem during the match, in the very beginning. After that, the match was almost over. So that’s what I can say.

But you know what, for me is difficult come here and speak about. In Doha I wasn’t healthy. Today I have another problem. Seems like I always have problems when I lose, and I don’t want to have this image, no? I prefer don’t talk about that today. If you can respect that, will be a very nice thing for me. Thank you.

Q. What was the problem, though?

RAFAEL NADAL: You are listening me? I can’t tell you which problem I have. First thing, because I don’t know. That’s my answer.

Sorry, but… really, press? The dude is hobbling and tearing up on court, and you just absolutely have to know what it was that was bothering him? He’s not Jay Cutler, leave him be. That’s story enough.

As for Rafa, wow. While Rafa Nation silently weeps the loss of their man, at least you can go out of this tournament with a head held high. Not only does he not want to draw special attention to the injury, he doesn’t want to be seen as someone who only loses due to injury (keep in mind he finished the match) and gave full respect to David (who, yes, is having a fantastic tournament).

So there you have it. Fed/Nole tonight, Muzz/Ferru tomorrow. I would think that Muzz should be ok to get through, but that will very likely be a fantastic, high quality match. As for Fed/Nole? I’m not even going to try. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s blood on the court by the end of the night. Nole is playing at the top of his game, Fed has been slightly inconsistent at times but will want sweet, sweet vengeance. I’m not going to be getting very much sleep tonight, am I?

Tough day today for the Armada, to say the least. Starting with JCF, taking on the last American man standing Robby Ginepri, he struggled and looked a bit tired in the first two sets, standing little opposition. But just like that, JCF started turning things around and before you knew it, it was off to 5 sets.

Ginepri turned things around in a hurry in the fifth set, despite being broken early with a lot of bad errors. He broke Juanqui back at love and was having a much easier time holding. Really was due to his big forehand and ability to push JCF back and keep him on the run. I actually thought JCF’s experience would help him pull it out, but in the end, he was just having way too hard of a time holding.

Not much to say about Daveed. Melzer came out firing and wasn’t interested in staying in long rallies. It seemed that nearly every close point was going his way and he dictated play the whole way to a straight sets win.

Fer toughed out a 5 sets win over Kohlswhatever, but was hurting and looked seriously burned out. Rafa circa 2009, anyone? The guy is bound to hit a wall sometime, and I’m not too sure he’ll have enough left in the tank to get his ass handed to him by Rafa.

By Rafa’s insane standards, it was probably a rough walk in the park, but for everyone else it’s a solid 3, 4 and 3 win over Lleyton. Rafa had some uncharacterstic errors in the second set and he had some trouble on break points, but overall he’s looking quite good, and I still don’t think there’s anyone around in his half to stop him.

Before I get started, can we take a brief moment of silence to stare at Rafa’s left bicep?

…

Welcome back. Hey! I’m over here!

First thing’s first. My exam are over. I had to celebrate. I’ve been distracted, but I’ve been catching matches, don’t worry. But it’s all good in the hood. Since I’m still working on getting my sorry ass employed, expect some live blogging later in this week, as early as Tuesday I’d say.

First, I must take my hat off to Ernie. I’m not gonna lie, I was both impressed with his win and underwhelmed by the shit show that was Fed during that match. But you really have to give half of it to Ernie, he was putting the pressure on Fed to do something, which is definitely something Fed isn’t used to. I said “taking a set off Rafa would be an event” and boy was it ever. I wasn’t worried for a second, but it was exciting to see. Keep on practicing boy. Believe in the Power of Curls!

After seeing Rafa get THAT (^) pumped up over beating Rafa, I knew poor David didn’t have a shot in hell. He did, sorta, but he needed that first set, and it was too bad that the weather ended up ruining the final result. Few more errors from Rafa, but that’s the point. He’s one of the toughest to beat when he’s NOT playing perfectly. It was like David was at high gear and Rafa was in medium gear but it didn’t much matter. And it’s not really not fair. Not like I care.

I’m not entirely sure of what to think of you, Andy Murray. I missed the match, but 3 and 4 against Ferru really ain’t bad considering how crap he’s looked all week. It’s like he’s constantly asking himself “why aren’t you giving me anything to work with?” and aimlessly wondering around the baseline. Regardless, and even after serving 41%, he won 76% of points off his first serve and half off his second. Unfortunately, he only got 20 off Ferru’s serve, and didn’t break him all match. Huh. Whatever dude.

Thanks to my curse (I was pretty angry at myself for not picking Ljubs in tennis pool, so I was sending him all my negative energy to lose) Ljubs retired at 0-0. Old man just can’t keep up. Ernie won the match of the day in a crazy third set tiebreak. Jo bounced back, Sod was useless, and Fer keeps on winning. Somehow. Though I’m pretty convinced that he’s mega screwed (read: exhausted) against Nole, who took out Thomasz 4 and 4. And that Rafa dude is still that Rafa dude.

Oh, and as I tweeted earlier… who picked The Womanizer vs. The Woman Buyer as the night match? It’s like Ernie is a local hero for beating Fed and and Italian in epic matches. Maybe they just know he needs the rest after Feli got the day off. Believe in the Power Of Curls.

Damn straight people. As the Olympics end, so does a week with a billion tournaments, leaving us with an absolute lull in action. And you know Nole is excited. So excited he just wants to reach out and hug Sven. Just a bit more reach there man.

It was extra painful for him, as the final was delayed on Saturday due to rain, and resumed on Sunday. Nole being up a set naturally dropped the second one just to make sure things were extra dramatic, but pulled out the third against The Iron Commander and successfully defended his title. Good job Number 2.

Why Venus, an American, who hates clay, and is a Williams, continues to play this small Mexican clay tournament is beyond me. What’s even more beyond me is how she actually seems to really enjoy it… and you know, win it. You could teach your sister a thing or two, methinks.

Solid win by Ferru too. The real props go to both him and JCF though, who have made the finals of both the last two week’s clay tournaments, and won one each. Holy. So much for these guys being old, or on the decline, or… anything. They suddenly become guys to watch for the clay season.

CURLS. Representin’. First ATP title. Over a 31 year old Ivo. Bitches.

Aaaand the Sweaty Ponytail over Elena in Malaysia. So… yeah. See you in Bali or something.

Well hello there.

After dropping the first two sets, breaking a racquet… and then pulling one out of his bag, STILL in the plastic and breaking it… Marcos somehow calmed down, won the next set in a tiebreak, and beasted out the next two sets 6-3, 6-1, and while cramping at the end of the last set.

A collapse for Ferru, for sure, who had a 2-0 record against Marcos, but really just a great comeback for Baggy. If you’re a fan of the charismatic Cypriot, it’s awesome to have him back, and he’s obviously looking fit as ever, and is playing with impressive variety and movement. He’ll play the winner of Lleyton/Young that’s going on right now… and if he wins that, he could play Fed. Um, YES PLEASE.