There Is No Favorite

by Savannah

Wonder of wonders. The ATP has given tennis fans truly wide open semifinals for its year ending WTF at the O2 in London England. I know the PC thing is to always spell out World Team Finals but if they had the balls to call it that knowing what the abbreviation would be I'm just the person to keep using the abbreviation.



David Ferrer who played the best tennis of the tournament didn't drop a set until today against Tomas Berdych. Due to the arcane rules of year ending round robin play Ferrer gets to face a man he's never won against,
Roger Federer.



Federer wanted this more than any of his top ranking peers and the level of his play during round robin showed it. It would appear that his road to the final is clear since he's going up against Ferrer who will be coming in with less than twenty four hours rest after his three set match against Berdych.



Berdych isn't the favorite against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. In fact I think that this match up is pretty even and could turn out to be a barn burner if both men play up to their potential.

The WTF's need for both semi's to be good. The level of play hasn't been the best and some appeared to sleep walk through their matches.



The usual thoughts come to mind. The season is too long. Scheduling sucks and the players are required to do more than just show up and play tennis. Of course some of the off court requirements have to do with the endorsement deals players sign but the tour requires a lot of it's top players as well.

Enough of that though. Regular readers know I don't do predictions and I'm not going to do that now. As I often say I'm a fan of tennis before anything else. Matches like Ferrer vs Berdych today are what creates tennis fans. The first two sets were riveting. Ferrer lost focus in the third set and was lucky to win a game. Of course that neon pink shirt could've had something to do with it but again I digress.

Tsonga and Federer will come in rested. I think the collective FFT will do cartwheels if Tsonga makes it to the Final no matter who he would face. I wonder if Yannick Noah will be courtside?