[quote=“Manuel Zelaya, post: 774759, member: 377”]You’re assertion that to ‘win on clay you have to be a more complete player’ has to be the front runner for idiotic post of the year. If you’ve ever even played a set of tennis on a clay court, you should known this is clearly not the case. Here’s a few simple pointers to clay court tennis which seem to have escaped you. Because clay courts are so much slower, the ball bounces much higher, the clay takes the pace out of the ball and keeps it in play much longer. Its much more difficult to hit a winner than on regular or faster courts. There’s less emphasis on volleying, quick reflexes or intuitive natural tennis ability because the ball sits up for so long and you have practically all day to hit it.
Its universally accepted that the clay is a real leveller. Average players who wouldn’t come with in an asses roar of winning a tournament on any other surface, can do so on clay. You only have to look at the recent lists of winners in the respective Grand Slams. In the last quarter century, the following ten players - Michael Chang, Anders Gomes, Sergi Brugera, Thomas Muster, Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Gustavo Kuerten, Carlos Moya, Alberto Costa, Juan Carlos Ferrero & Gaston Gaudia have all won the French Open. The one thing all ten had in common, it was their only Grand Slam win. Similarly in the same time span the French Open has thrown up finalists in Alberto Berasategui, Andrei Medvedev, Alex Corretja, Magnus Norman, Martin Verkerk, Guillermo Coria, Mariano Puerta & Robin Soderling - again, all of whom have never featured in a Grand Slam final outside of Paris.
Any list of the greatest 10 players of all time would surely include Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg & Pete Sampras. None of them every won on the dirt at the French Open. Connors & McEnroe operated at a time when the top players either didn’t compete or take the Australian Open seriously. Other than that all 5 are multiple winners at Wimbledon, US Open and at the Australian Open. I take it applying your logic all of the Roland Garros finalists I’ve mentioned are more complete players than Connors, McEnroe, Becker, Edberg & Sampras?
Your dismissive attitude towards tennis other than on clay, shows you have no feel or understanding for the game of tennis. Your interest in tennis seems to exclusively revolve around your obsession with Nadal.
Nadal is at this stage the greatest ever clay court player, that is beyond doubt. He’s more than a clay court specialist in that he has had success and won Slams on the other surfaces. He has undoubtedly been helped in that all surfaces are now very same, same - in that the grass courts and hardcourts have been slowed down considerably.
To base an argument that a tennis player is the greatest ever because of their record on clay is akin to arguing that a cross country specialist is the greatest ever distance runner regardless of what they may or may not have achieved on the track. You’re like a teenybopper at a boy band concert when it comes to proclaiming the greatness of your precious Rafa. Frankly, your teenage like infatuation with him is downright creepy.[/quote]
Are you a retard?
The stats prove that hitting a winner of clay is much harder than doing the same on a hard court or grass court so saying hitting a winner on hard/grass courts is harder is a lie. You’re like a poisonous little teenage girl who is out to sabotage the other girl who took your love away from you because she’s not the bitch you are.
The reason the likes of McEnroe, Edberg, Connors, Sampras and Federer have had such little success on the clay is because their game is not complete enough for clay. Your game has to have so much more variety on the clay, you have to work harder for the winners. Grass and hard courts rewards goons with big serves, clay doesn’t. If I was to relate tennis to football, people who prosper on grass and hard courts are akin to the likes of Stoke City who try and bludgeon their way to win whereas clay court players know they have to be more savvy, more tactical and run harder.
Nadal had to adapt his game for the hard courts and grass courts and succesfully did won, taking four grand slams on them so far. Federer only ever took one grand slam on clay which will always have an asterisk beside it as he didn’t have to beat Nadal to win it. There’s a reason why tennis connoisseurs like Special Olympiakos and I favour clay - it’s the best and it separates the good from the greatest. Nadal and Bjorg are the two greatest tennis players of all time.
