I imagine this is about as well as Sam was seeing the ball today against Nadia. She won three games and was lucky not to get bageled in the second. It started off all fine and dandy with an immediate break of Nads' serve.
And then it all went downhill. Fast.
First off, credit to Nadia. She played great. She served well and really attacked Sam's backhand, which is what you need to do to get her on the move.
And Sam was hitting that backhand slice like crap today, floating it a good 4-5 feet up over the net. Sitting ducks for Nads.
After one partiularly bad one she walked over, looked at DT, and seethed "I can't hit the fucking ball."
But when you're talking about Sam, her game revolves around her serve.
If she doesn't serve well then she's immediately in a hole. That
happened today. She couldn't buy a first serve when she needed it, and
she hit five double faults to ZERO aces.
I got to watch the match sitting behind Team Stosur, though, which was fun. They're a pretty quiet group, just a few hushed "Come on, Sammy" and "Right here, this point" style cheering. Oh, and my crush on DT has grown exponentially. He was sitting in his socks, collar popped, scribbling notes into this little Moleskine notebook and threw in a few quiet, "Come on. Keep playing" notes of encouragement. I quite love that Sam is one of the few players who doesn't call coaching timeouts. Gotta respect that tough Aussieness.
Really hope I get to see her at the Open. Hell, I might reschedule my flight to make sure that happens.
