Friends Don't Let Friends Lose To Friends.

Interesting quotage from James LaRosa's blog on friendships on tour.  Much like James, I too am obsessed with wanting these girls to (a) be buddies on tour and (b) be buddies with me (well not all of them, just the awesome ones, cuz that's how I roll).  It's cute to see CanWoz down on court and congratulating Caro in her semifinal win in that fake clay tournament that I can't think of right now, or Caro coming standing courtside cheering on Sorana, despite the fact that she was already out of the tournament.  And I like to think that, especially among the veteran players, that as crazy as I make these women out to be, they're actually way awesome people that I just want to drink beers with and watch get into bar fights (I'm looking at you, Flavs). 

Unfortunately, it looks like the stakes are just too high these days, for both the men and the women.  Per Marat:

Lest we think this is all just a chick thing, Marat Safin chimed in last week declaring the ATP tour too is full of loners in the locker room. "Nobody is friends with anybody," said Safin.  "Everyone travels with his group, there is no more friendship like when I could hang out with [Patrick] Rafter or [Mark] Philippoussis.  I don't have any friends on the tour."
...

"Sometimes it's really tough," says Cibulkova.  "Like at Roland Garros, I played against Agnes Szavay to go into the quarterfinals.  We're great friends, and to be against her on this very important match, it was tough.  But I handled it.  At first she was pissed.  We didn't actually look for each other in the locker room.  A few days after she was fine, she said well done."
...
It's that inability to separate the professional from the personal that motivated Ivanovic's original statement.  One she stands by.  "Obviously there are friends [on tour]," Ivanovic elaborates for the Sweet Spot.  "You chat with all the girls here.  [But] it's very hard to build a close friendship.  A friendship that would last after a tennis career.  It's very hard because of [that] competition."

So what you're saying is that *after* tennis you and Dina will be BFFs?  Sigh.  Fine, I'll take it.

Oh, and just because I can and should, y'all should follow James on Twitter.  You'll thank me later: http://www.twitter.com/JamesLaRosa