Tennis - Toronto Roger Federer Out of Juice...Andy Murray Prevails!

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Far too many questions started to pop up about what happened in Toronto. Why Roger Federer was out of juice and allowed an extremely erratic Andy Murray to prevail?!

In my opinion it goes back many years and to Wimbledon 2010.

Going back many years, Federerer has never been fit or worked hard enough at his fitness contrary to what many pundits report or Roland Garros would have belonged to him four or five times! That said, my bar for tennis fitness is set at Roland Garros and Federer has never been ready, even the year he won Nadal had to lose before the final or...well, you know the rest.

After Wimbledon 2010 Roger Federer was officially off on holiday a week earlier then previous years after a scathing defeat in a four-set quarter-final shut-out to Tomas Berdych.

Even though many think Federer is 'Mr. Nice guy' he did not give credit to Tomas and said, "I couldn't play the way I wanted to play. I'm struggling with a little bit of a back and a leg issue. That just doesn't allow me to play the way I would like to. 'Under the circumstances I think I played a decent match. But I've been feeling bad for the last two, three matches now. It's just not good and healthy to play under these kind of conditions. If there's anything good about this it's I'm going to get some rest, that's for sure.'

For the experienced observer, those famous last words (' I've been feeling bad for the last two three matches') unfortunately were covering Federer's last defeat in Halle, Germany as well.

In my humble opinion Roger would have done much good to himself by simply saying something nice about Tomas Berdych and keep it quiet about his 'injuries' and my hat would go off to him!

Anyway, Roger chose to stroke his own ego instead and took a holiday where among other things he hired Paul Annacone, in an attempt to solve his ills and went into a 'closed to press and public' training camp in Zurich.

Results from the 'top-secret' training? The same unfit Roger Federer, not doing anything different. Also the so much expected serve and volley and chip and charge game I was dreaming Paul would train him to do was non-existent!

This begs the question, is this another one of those 'trading ideas' contracts similar to Jose Higueras for Annacone? That's another developing story.

Many of you will say; 'Sergio, you are nuts, Federer played great and won in the quarters against Novak Djokovic in three tough sets 6-1, 3-6, 7-5 and did the same against Tomas Berdych with a 6-3, 5-7, 7-6(5). To do that you have to be super fit!'

Sure dear friends, that is exactly where the pig twists it's tail. Both of those three set matches.

In the first match against Djokovic, Federer came out swinging, playing aggressive (nothing new, I have seen him do that in Monaco, Hamburg, Madrid, Roland Garros everywhere!). Federer fails because he just can not sustain this rhythm physically or mentally for two sets in a row!

Therefore the break down in the second and the struggle in the third set.

The same happened against Tomas Berdych. I must say, that Federer escaped in both cases thanks to:

- First, the fear these players have of Federer,

-Second, because Federer was determined and fought like a caged lion.

- Third, Djokovic and Berdych were more magnanimous than any charity I know and the litany of donations in the form of unforced errors and missed opportunities won those matches for Federer.

To finish this analysis without looking at the final, I would not be giving you the full scope of why I think Federer continues not to be fit and does not work physiquely which some pundits pretend he does.

A fit player within a few hours of any match is recovered and ready to go.

Did we see such a player in Federer in the Toronto Rogers Cup final against Andy Murray?

No we did not!

We saw a tired, sluggish, unconvincing Federer, struggling with his lack of physique, creativity, aggression or execution.

No matter how much Andy Murray tried to give Federer the first set, e.g. in a stretch of almost five games not having served a single first serve in! Federer did not cash in on it!

My gosh! If you count just that as 20 second serves (if each game was 40-0), but it was not. Those games were all close with several ads, to be nice let us assume there were at least 30 second serve opportunities!

Imagine now:

- Those were 30 opportunities, that Federer did not do anything with!

- Can you imagine how many break point opportunities could have been created by Federer? No need to say!

Further more, Andy Murray has as much fear/respect for Federer as Novak Djokovic and Tomas Berdych do. Murray instead of giving Roger a corrective lesson in the whereabouts of 6/2, 6/3 allowed a close 7/5, 7/5 match marred with gifts you only see Santa deliver at Christmas!

Do I need to say that Roger Federer is not fit? No I do not, at least to the level I consider fit for a top tennis player!

If Roger was fit he would have won all three matches against Tomas Berdych, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murry at the Toronto Rogers Cup 6/2 6/3 each one of them!

In Toronto Roger Federer was out of juice and Andy Murray simply prevailed!

For the ones who may think conditioning is found in a bottle, please read my articles on  Speed Training for tennis here.

Let's hope that Annacone reads this article and 'Exchanges my thoughts and ideas' with Roger, we want Federer on the circuit and winning for at least another five years!

'Winning a tournament is always great, but it's the first time I beat Roger and Rafa in the same tournament, which is probably the most pleasing thing, and then didn't drop a set against either of them," Andy Murray said. "So it's good for the confidence for the next few weeks.' I hear you Andy!

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