18 Observations of the US Open

Recently I was fortunate enough to have worked at the US Open. As a first time visitor to this or any tennis event, I've made some observations. Regular tennis events attenders may find some of these to be blindingly obvious so apologies in advance. Some are tennis related some are well, not, but enjoy and please add your own in the comments section below.

No. 1 TV does not to justice to this sport. This point is fairly generic as I'm yet to come across a sport that looks as good on TV as it did in the flesh but I was blown away by just how hard the players hit the ball. When I first seen pro-boxing live, I was mesmerized by the power behind the punches and just how much punishment the boxers take. At the tennis it’s the court coverage and speed of the ball that most impressed me. When I was playing Leinster schools tennis at Gormanston College (under the watchful eye of Kingbet founder Peter Kingston - dishonourable mentions here also to fellow bloggers Gary Sinnott and Kevin Walsh for having a role in my tennis failures) one of the things they drummed into us was having your shot selected long before the ball arrived at your feet. I now understand the importance of this as watching Djokovic and Nadal smash forehands at each other, there is no way they could have time to pick their shots on the run. While the serve has historically come under the attention of the speed gun, I would love to see a gun track the speed of some of the ground strokes. Strikingly while the players are nearly all adapt at slugging the ball across the net, like all good fighter they're also able to box. By this I mean their touch around the net and ability to use the drop shot is frightening. To see Roger Federer take all the speed of the ball and make it drop stone dead just beyond the net is a thing of beauty.

2. The athleticism of tennis players is much undervalued. Again the observation can only be appreciated when you see them play live. The court coverage of all players is amazing. While their ability to sprint from the base line to the net is probably widely acknowledged, their stamina is often not. These players do repeated efforts unique across sports. They're on court for at least a couple of hours at a time yet never, noticeably anyway, seem to drop the speed they hit the ball at or in getting the ball back. To back that up with the same intensity the very next day is mightily impressive. Of all the players the most athletic is probably my favourite........ 

 

3. Gael Monfils is a legend. After losing a first round match in five sets and being on court for a little under five hours the last thing a player wants to do is play another tennis match, right? Well in the case of Gael Monfils after his epic five setter lose to Juan Carlos Ferrero he turned up two hours later to play a doubles match with compatriot Marc Gicquel. Okay so it's fair to say that he didn't play to the best of his abilities but he still entertained the crowd. Check out his antics here.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a92HAM7-6c8&feature=related) The guy is a born entertainer, even breaking into a dance after winning a shot on a couple of occasions. I blogged on this before -www.kingbetireland.blogspot.com/2011/06/drink-drugs-and-sausage-rolls.html - but it's the Gael Monfils and not the Andy Murrays of this world that make sport the experience it is. The admiration his fellow pros have for him is evident. On match point Gicquel stood aside and let Monfils play against two players, who played their part well by making him run all over the court. Monsieur Monfils, J'adore tu. (For more on this read here http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/sportingscene/2011/09/gale-monfils-and-losing-in-style.html)

Us and Them: The Irish Rivalry with England.

Ourselves and England have, to put it mildly, a lot of history together. There's a certain segment among each society that looks upon the other as, depending on one's point of view, an oppressive overlord who thought nothing wrong with starving a quarter of their colony's population to death, or a group of ingrates who try and blow up innocent civilians. Let's be realistic, if the laws of geology allowed, Ireland would long ago have moved elsewhere. The weather's all wrong, and we've spent the past millennium arguing with the neighbours.

And yet, like the bickering couple that can't divorce because of the mortgage, Ireland and Britain (We only use England to try and form a common cause with the Welsh and Scots, after all) are deeply intertwined, 1916 and all that notwithstanding. The vast majority on both sides have no animosity towards the other. In reality, Britain has been nothing but a friend to us in recent years. David Cameron, a Conservative, had no hesitation in both accepting the results of the Savile Inquiry and apologising unquestionly for Britain's actions on Bloody Sunday, and Britain had no compunctions about contributing to our bailout in 2010. On our side, the Queen has recently completed a highly successful visit here and, the likes of Republican Sinn Fein, Eirigi, The 32 County Sovereignty Committee and any other miniscule group of rejectionists aside, the vast majority of Irish people bear no grudge against the English. On their side, there is even less of an animus. After all, the English have had lots of enemies over the years, and in the great scheme of things, a small island next door doesn't count for much.

Of course, on the field, everything changes, at least from the Irish point of view. Beating the English is the most heroic thing an Irish sports team can achieve. When Ireland beat England at cricket in India this year, the sudden upsurge in interest in cricket was nothing to do with the sport's merits. Nor was it to do with the fact that in winning, Ireland broke several longstanding records in World Cup cricket. Nor was it the scale of the achievement. After all, in 2007 we went even further, managing to reach the Super 8's after beating Pakistan. Quite simply, it was the fact that we beat the English at a quintessentially English game. When the match started, only a very small percentage of the population would even have been aware it was going on. Once we had won, though, it became the proverbial talk of the country. No doubt in years to come, like the half million or so Munstermen who were in Thomond Park when Munster beat New Zealand, a far greater number will claim to have watched the cricket than mere TV viewing figures would suggest.