The OCC: Tuesday

By TW Contributing Editor, Ed McGrogan

Hi everyone.  Pete is currently on vacation until the 14th, so I'll be commanding this ship in the meantime.

I called five matches for the peacock network (NBC) yesterday, starting with the Bryan brothers against the Baha Men (Bahamas' doubles team) of Mark Knowles and Devin Mullings.  Bob and Mike had little trouble and cruised to a straight sets win.  Knowles, a seasoned doubles star, could only do so much, as the Bryans targeted Mullings, the weak link, repeatedly.  But in spite of the drubbing, it was nice to see Mullings relish the moment afterwards with his partner.  It's probably one of the few times he'll be in such a spotlight.

Two dreadful women's matches followed.  Tennis teachers will show the Venus Williams/Iveta Benesova and Jelena Jankovic/Alona Bondarenko matches to students so they can point out what not to do on a tennis court.  Both matches were flush with errors, especially the latter.  Jankovic didn't do a good job convincing people that she's the "true" number one in the women's game - but a better question might be, if not her, then who is?  But she advanced, which is all that matters.  Venus did too, but she didn't look to be in complete command against Bondarenko.  Amongst the Williams sisters, Serena looks to be stronger right now.

Second on court for the night session was Rafael Nadal's match against Lleyton Hewitt.  It was the most hyped match of the day, and turned out to be - by far - the most entertaining match of these five.  Hewitt lost 6-1, 6-2, but the score is not indicative of his gutsy performance.  He played as well as could have, considering all the tennis he played the day earlier (it included a 4-6, 7-6, 18-16 doubles win).  But Nadal was in his dominant, aggressive mode that we've seen for the past few months.  Rafa looked shaky in his opening round match in Beijing, but regained his swagger against Hewitt.

Finally, Roger Federer took on Rafael Arevalo, who was affectionately named "Rafa 2" in yesterday's comments.  That's fantastic - keep it up guys.

After seeing how well Federer played against Dmitry Tursunov, and how ineffective Arevalo's game looked at the start of this match, I thought we were headed for a double bagel result.  If you've never heard of Arevalo (I didn't before this match, so don't worry), he's from El Salvador, is ranked No. 447 in the world, and plays with a game that's not going to threaten Top 100 players consistently.  Rafa 2 roams way behind the baseline, hits looping groundstrokes without much power at all behind them, and doesn't have exceptional speed.  He's the exact opposite of Rafa 1.

Roger won the first set easily, but it was an entirely different story in the second set.  Federer captured an early break, but his play was lax, and the score was nearly 4-4 at one point.  Regardless of who you are, that's a dangerous spot to be in when your opponent has absolutely nothing to lose.  Federer's forehand often missed long, to the dismay of his fans around the globe.  He won the match - which is all that matters - but it was interesting to watch.  Next for Federer is a much-anticipated Olympic rematch against Tomas Berdych.

Arevalo played his heart out in the second set, and never once gave in to the insurmountable odds he was facing.  He played the match at his own pace, and had an experience that he'll never forget.  It's my favorite moment so far in these Olympic Games.