Murray's Grand Slam dream shattered in Oz

ANDY Murray has to play the patient game, after being beaten in another Grand Slam final.  He was outplayed and outclassed on Sunday in Melbourne, losing the men’s singles final at the Australian Open to the Serbian Novak Djokovic.

CELEBRATION: The Djokovic winning team pose for the cameras

It took Djokovic, the world no.3 just over two and a half hours to wrap a comfortable 6-4, 6-2, 6-4 success, the scoreline sadly backing up the fact that Murray didn’t bring his A-game to the court on Sunday.  For Djokovic, it’s his second Grand Slam title, his first since winning the Australian Open himself back in 2008.  Then, it failed to kick-start his career – but following recent Davis Cup success with Serbia, he may now have the confidence and conviction to threaten Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer on a regular basis.

Djokovic has largely cantered his way to the final.  His performances against Wimbledon finalist Tomas Berdych and Federer in the quarter-finals and semi-finals were simply majestic.  Novak is currently playing the best tennis of his life, looking almost a completely different figure to the one that kept choking on the big stage in 2009 and 2010.  Finally, that shock 2008 second round loss at SW19 to retired Russian Marat Safin seems to be out of his system.  This was the Djokovic we knew from when he burst onto the scene as a promising teenager.  Thanks to an injury for world No.1 Nadal, which denied him the chance at the ‘Super Slam’ and the early exit of Robin Soderling, world No.5 Murray had also been largely untroubled on his way to Sunday’s showdown.  However, the Scot’s marathon semi-final with Spaniard David Ferrer on Friday looked to have caught up with him 48 hours later.  His returns were weak, the lob shot he liked to play simply wasn’t coming off and his service game, almost unbreakable throughout the tournament was effortlessly exposed by the determined Djokovic.  Once the Serb broke Murray’s serve to clinch the first set, the game looked up as a contest.

AGONY: It was third time unlucky on Sunday for Andy Murray

He stormed into a 5-0 advantage in the second set, and fair play to Murray, he never gave in and stirred a couple of brief rallies.  However, he simply couldn’t keep the momentum up throughout against an in-form and frankly, better player.  The Scot couldn’t hide his disappointment at the end, but he seemed very phlegmatic in defeat afterwards, admitting the better player had won.  This was his third appearance in a Grand Slam final and once again, he fell at the final hurdle; yet to win a set in a major final.  Fingers crossed that Murray can continue his form for the rest of the year though; 2010 went downhill once he made his final appearance in Melbourne.

Once again, Serena Williams was missing a major tournament through injury and when Venus had to pull out of a third round match, the opportunity to win a Grand Slam in the women’s game was wide open.  Justine Henin couldn’t take her chance, and after a nagging elbow injury affected her in a third round loss to Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova, the Belgian announced her retirement from tennis again; this time for good.  She follows Amelie Mauresmo and Elena Dementieva to have given up the game in the past eighteen months.  Jelena Jankovic will surely head the same way very soon, after another pitiful display Down Under.  Even Maria Sharapova looked back to her best, until a fourth round exit.  In the end, it was Kim Clistjers who marched through to take her maiden Australian Open final, winning a hard-fought final against China’s Na Li in three sets.  Li was playing in her first major final and showed no nerves, by winning a closely matched first set.  As the match wore on however, Clistjers settled into her stride and stay more composed on the decisive points to wrap up back-to-back Grand Slam titles.  Once again, the world no.1 failed to win, with Caroline Wozinacki losing in the semi-finals to the impressive Li.

Congratulations to Novak Djokovic and Kim Clistjers on the triumphs in the first Grand Slam of the year, after an absorbing fortnight of tennis.  For Andy Murray and Britain, the long wait for a Grand Slam winner goes on a little longer.  Ah well, there’s always Wimbledon in the summer!

Serbian Hooligans Force Abandonment of Euro Qualifier

HOOLIGANS shamefully returned to the football world, forcing the abandonment of a Euro 2012 qualifier between Italy and Serbia.

The match, between two teams who failed to deliver on their promising potential at the World Cup this summer, was only seven minutes old, when the referee was forced to take the players off the pitch in the stadium at Genoa.  The match was stopped, due to a series of horrendous incident, the worst being flares thrown onto the pitch by Serbian hooligans in the Italian goalmouth, with the target being the Italian goalkeeper Emiliano Viviano.

Viviano had to hide for cover, as one of the flares hit him on the back of the head.  His opposite number, Vladimir Stojkovic of Partizan Belgrade was hit by a flare on the Serbian team bus, when leaving the team hotel.  Amazingly, the flare thrown came from Serbian fans.  Emotionally tormented after the incident, Stojkovic refused to play in the match.  Kick-off was delayed by half an hour, due to crowd trouble involving both sets of supporters.  There had been trouble all day in the Italian city, with scuffles forcing riot police on the streets.  In the carnage, a police car was attacked and set on fire.  Pictures from Italian television showed some supporters leaving the stadium before the match eventually kicked off, already sensing that more trouble was ahead.

17 people have been arrested by Italian police, with 16 supporters being injured in the clashes throughout the day.  The two teams, who are in the same Euro 2012 group as Northern Ireland will not play a rematch, as it is thought that UEFA will award the Italians a 3-0 victory.  UEFA are investigating the trouble, which certainly looked pre-meditated and planned, rather than something in the heat of the moment.  The Serbian Football Association face a heap of trouble, with the president of the Serbian FA immediately saying he was “embarrassed” to be associated with a country on nights like this.  A severe fine, and the possibility of playing the rest of their qualifiers behind closed doors is more than likely, even expulsion from the tournament could be a possibility.  Time after time, UEFA have fallen weak at the final hurdle, when it comes to maximum punishments.  This time, they must make an example out of Serbia, to prevent this sort of trouble happening again. 

Let’s just hope that this was just an ugly day for football….and not a return to the dark old days of the 1980’s.

World Cup Report - Day 7-9

The second round of group games in the 2010 FIFA World Cup is well and truly underway.  In the past three days, we’ve seen tensions rise in camps; some players show a lack of team unity and the first side to be well and truly eliminated from the competition.  Here is a brief round-up of the past three days, excluding the England match yesterday.

Thursday 17^th June: Argentina 4-1 South Korea

Diego Maradona’s Argentina became firm favourites to land the World Cup, after an impressive 4-1 victory over South Korea in Soccer City that all but virtually booked their place in the last sixteen.  Real Madrid striker Gonzalo Higuain was in fabulous form, hitting a hat-trick, after an own goal from Park Chu-Young.  Despite an error by Martin Demichellis, which allowed Lee Chun-Soo in to score for the Koreans with the last kick of the first half, Argentina weren’t in any major danger and raised the standards for the other favourites in the process.

Thursday 17^th June: Greece 2-1 Nigeria

Sani Kaita’s daft dismissal after 33 minutes left Nigeria on the verge of elimination and helped Greece on the way to a first-ever World Cup win.  Nigeria dominated the early exchanges, took an early lead through Kala Uche’s free-kick.  A deflected strike from Dimitrios Salpingidis drew the Greeks level, before Vasiledios Torosidis capitalised on a spill by Vincent Enyeama to thrash the Euro 2004 winners to an essential victory.

Thursday 17^th June: France 0-2 Mexico

Mexico took full advantage of a French team lacking any spirit and cohesion, to virtually book their place in the knockout stages and send the 2006 finalists packing home.  Javier Rodriguez, Manchester United’s new striker put the North Americans infront, making the most of a horrific French onside trap, to slot the ball past a despairing Hugo Lloris.  A France team that looked lazy, old and lethargic conceded a dreadful penalty by Eric Abidal, converted by 37-year old Cuathmatic Blanco, which sealed an impressive win for the Mexicans.

Friday 18^th June: Germany 0-1 Serbia

Serbia blew Group D wide open, with an unexpected victory over pre-game favourites Germany in Port Elizabeth.  A fussy and poor referee didn’t help the Germans cause, with Miroslav Klose unluckily sent off for two clumsy, if not malicious challenges.  Lukas Podolski had a shocker, and became the first German to miss a penalty at the World Cup in 28 years in the process.  Serbia’s winner came five minutes from half-time from Liverpool bound striker, Milan Jovanovic. 

Friday 18^th June: Slovenia 2-2 USA

In a pulsating encounter at Ellis Park, the United States stormed back from two goals down, to record a hard-fought draw with Slovenia.  The Europeans were coasting at half-time, 2-0 up, through efforts from Valter Birsa and Zlatan Ljubijankic.  However, the US recovered well, helped by an early second half response by Landon Donovan.  Michael Bradley’s dramatic leveller eight minutes from time ensured a share of the spoils and a very dubious refereeing decision saw Maurice Edu and the Americans have a goal wrongly chalked off in the dying stages.

Saturday 19^th June: Holland 1-0 Japan

A hard-fought victory in Durban over a spirited Japan side sealed Holland’s birth in the last sixteen.  The only goal came in the 51^st minute, through a swerving shot from Inter Milan playmaker, Wesley Snejider. 

Saturday 19^th June: Ghana 1-1 Australia

It was a missed opportunity for Ghana, as Australia earned a hard-fought draw in Rustenberg.  Another goalkeeping gaffe, this time from Richard Kingston allowed the Socceroos a 11^th minute lead, through Brett Holman.  However, Galatasaray winger Harry Kewell was dismissed for a deliberate handball on the goal-line, with the resulting penalty converted by Asamoah Gyan.  Despite Ghanaian pressure, the Aussies held on to ensure that all four teams in Group D still have a chance of qualifying for the knockout stages.

Saturday 19^th June: Cameroon 1-2 Denmark

Morten Olsen’s Denmark produced a stirring comeback in Pretoria, which eliminated Cameroon from the 2010 FIFA World Cup.  A horrendous error from Christian Poulsen allowed Samuel Eto’o in to put the Africans infront.  However, two brilliant team goals won the night for the Scandinavians, courtesy of Arsenal misfit Niklas Bendtner and star of the show, Dennis Rommedahl.  As a result, Cameroon becomes the first side to be eliminated from the tournament.