Nadal is already the defending Wimbledon runner-up, he's bagged three non-clay Masters Series titles, and he's 2-2 vvs. Federer on hard courts.So for all the talk about CCSs owning the European spring circuit, the bottom line is that you have to go pretty far down the roll of Roland Garros champions before you hit anything like a true CCS. It seems to me that being a CCS has less to do with having great results on clay than it does with having lousy results on everything else, which represents an odd leap. But that standard, posting better times in the 220 meter race than in the 440 makes you a "220 specialist."
You could put it that way, but why would you want to?
The term is most frequently applied to professional players on the ATP or WTA tours rather than to average players.
That's flat-out fifty per cent crazy; there is no such thing as a CCS on the WTA Tour (and yes, I do remember Ivanna Madruga), period.
Many players from Latin America and Spain are considered to be clay-court specialists, due to the prevalence of such courts in these places. They are thus accustomed to the unique skills the surface requires.
At the end of 2006, six players from Spain and Latin America were in the Top 25: Rafael Nadal, Tommy Robredo, David Nalbandian, Fernando Gonzalez, David Ferrer, and Juan Carlos Ferrero. Guess who comes closest to qualifying for CCS from the group? Okay, I'll bet some of you thought it must be Ferrer. According to our very own Rosangel's recent surface rankings, he was No. 16 on hard, 18 on grass, and 12 on clay. That's a clay-court specialist? How about the clay-encrusted Latino dirtballer, Gonzo? He's No. 35 on clay, and No. 3 on hard courts. Robredo comes closest to conforming to a CCS stereotype, because he's only No. 11 on hard, 40 on grass, and a whopping 3 on clay. But does anybody watching Robredo think, "Dirtballer! This guy's the second coming of Sergi Bruguera."
All in all, the two sentences from Wikipedia would be more accurate if they read: Many players from Latin American and Spain are especially good on clay courts, which often carries over to their hard court results, perhaps due to some similarities between the playing properties of those surfaces.
And that stuff about clay requiring "unique skills" is ill-considered hooey. I'll tell you what requires "unique skills." Getting your face out of the way of a Nadal passing shot on any surface, being a Marat Safin fan, or sitting through an entire Nikolay Davydenko match.
For example, a common feature of clay-court specialists is their ability to slide on the surface to get to the ball, something that hard courts and grass courts do not permit.
Okay, grass and hard courts do not "permit" sliding, unless you're name is Kim Clijsters (Hey, did anyone hear? She's getting married and isn't that into tennis anymore!). Whats that got to do with the price of tea in China? And while nominal CCSs indeed have the ability to slide on clay, so do you and I. It isn't that hard, trust me. In fact, some of those guys are so busy sliding and striking poses (Emilio Sanchez was great at that!) that they have no chance to pivot and push off to deal with the return of the shot they just hit. Sanchez was the kind of the show-off slide and he never won jack (Grand Slam-wise). The CCS's ability to slide is about as distinguishing a characteristic of a great player on clay as my ability to use a comma in the right place makes me a good writer. It's not about the commas. It's not about the sliding.
Many of them are also very adept at hitting the drop shot, an especially effective shot on the surface because the ball tends to bounce much lower than on hard courts, grass courts, or other surfaces
The drop shot was officially placed under the protection of the ESA (the Endangered Species Act) when Kuerten blew out his hip. If your use of the drop shot qualifies you as a CCS, Nadal is something other than that. Oh yeah - anybody care to do the research on which surface produces a lower bounce for the drop shot, clay or grass?
Additionally, the clay surface tends to be much slower than other surfaces, meaning the ball does not bounce as quickly, so the rallies are longer, which requires a great degree of mental focus and physical stamina. Most important, perhaps, is the fact that a serve-and-volley player is at a distinct disadvantage on a clay court, because his or her service is slowed down enough to let the receiver handle it cleanly, even aggressively, rather than defensively, as can be the case on a faster surface. Their effectiveness at the net is therefore greatly diminished.
