By TennisWorld Contributing Editor Andrew Burton
Morning, all.
Someone in Novak Djokovic's camp needs to have a word with the young chap and explain to him that "best of 3" or "best of 5" means that your allowed to win the match in two or three sets, not that you're required to go the full distance each and every time. Djokovic has gone to a final set in seven of his last eight matches - Sam Querrey is the only player who let him off with a light four set workout.
Pete Bodo and I were in this stadium when Djokovic backed up his 2008 Australian Open title with a win in what was then the Pacific Life Open. To chants of "Serbia, Serbia," Djokovic held off Mardy Fish, who'd been playing the tournament of his life. Djokovic's trajectory seemed irresistibly upwards.
By 2009, the irrepressible chest thumping 20 year old had been replaced by a young man going through his first career crisis. Djokovic went out in the quarter finals to Andy Roddick, and he played sad sack tennis all match. His last two matches with Roddick had finished unhappily: SARS-gate in New York was followed by a wobbly retirement in Melbourne. Perhaps Djokovic feared that an American crowd would take it out on him if he took it to Roddick that day, or maybe he was still feeling out his new racquet. Either way, he was a shadow of the conquering warrior of a year before.
So which Djokovic would show up today?
For the first 11 games Djokovic played with power, poise and purpose (hmmm, triple P - who does that remind me of?). He was moving Kohlschreiber back into the ad corner and dictating the play. Djokovic went up an early break in set 2, and then the wheels came off: his opponent did start swinging freely, connecting with a gorgeous down the line forehand. But the bigger change was in Djokovic: it was as if someone had pulled an air hose from his back, and he began to slowly deflate.
As he had in his match with Fish on Saturday, Djokovic lost six straight games to lose the second set. Then he lost the first three games of the third. He gestured mournfully towards his box; at one stage, I thought I saw Todd Martin pull his cap down over his eyes in resignation.
Out of nowhere the match took a second twist. Kohlschreiber was still looking to take the initiative in the rallies, but he began dumping his inside-in forehand into the net on key points. From having two BPs in the fourth game, Kohlschreiber lost four straight games to go down 4-3; then he broke back for 4-all, and held for 5-4. At this point, we'd gone a mind boggling 17 straight games in an ATP match between seeded players without two successive service holds.
Djokovic promptly went down 0-40, but (as he did against Stepanek in Basel last year) he made sure he got his first serve in, and when Kohlschreiber missed a makeable CC BH pass, the gig was up. Djokovic made it unscathed to the tiebreak, and coaxed his opponent to make the unforced errors that settled the match. Djokovic didn't celebrate wildly, but I did see a brief jig beside the umpire's chair.
Which Djokovic showed up? Lots of them. "My name is Legion, for we are many." The grafter, the moper, the tactician, the escape artist, they all took their place on the court.
I still feel there's something not quite right about giving Djokovic the number 2 seed, especially when he's followed onto the show court by the number 3 seed, Rafael Nadal. Nadal was stunning this afternoon: his opponent, Mario Ancic, was making helpless gestures towards his own box midway in the first set. The score was 6-2, 6-2, but it wasn't as close as that: Nadal won 60 points to 29 for Ancic, a thumping of the first magnitude. When I first saw him in the press room two years ago, Nadal's knee was bouncing spastically under the table as he subconciously fought to hold in all his nervous energy. Today, it was still. The number 3 seed is a picture of confidence and calm; the player ranked one place higher is a hall of mirrors.
I had the pleasure of watching the Djokovic and Nadal matches with Trish Brandt, an English journalist with whom I've watched several matches at Indian Wells in the last three tournaments. After Nadal's match, she sat down with me in the players' garden to talk through our impressions of the top 4 seeds so far - you can see our conversation on YouTube here.