Missing Ivan Dodig

Here is a list of facts I know about Ivan Dodig:

1) He is from Croatia.
2) His first name is Ivan.
3) His surname is... wait for it, drumroll please... Dodig.
4) He is humanoid. (Probably. I assume.)
5) He plays tennis.
6) He is pretty good at playing tennis. (I think.)

Seriously, had anyone heard of Ivan Dodig before this year? I have totally never heard of him. The first time he popped into my frame of vision was at the Australian Open this year when he played that epic late night match against Karlovic. I could have stopped by and seen a little bit - I was in Rod Laver Arena that night - the night that Djokovic beat Granollers - and that session finished before this outside court epic.

But I didn't stop by. Me and Ivan Dodig missed each other again.

Dodig lost in the second round of the Australian Open (there is another fact I can add to my list!) which seems pretty unremarkable, until you consider who he lost to. You might have heard of him. His name is Novak Djokovic and he's been doing pretty okay recently.

So okay, in fact, that he only dropped one set in the whole tournament. He played a bunch of awesome guys - Federer, Murray, Berdych. But that one set he lost to was to some guy named Ivan Dodig. Of whom I had never heard.

I didn't see the match. I missed Ivan Dodig. Of course.

But clearly his set-winning was a sign, because Ivan Dodig, of whom I have never heard, just went and won himself a title at Zagreb. He's also got a pretty good 2011 record - he's won seven matches and lost twice, or so the ATP website tells me. And those two losses came to Djokovic at the Australian Open and Berdych in Chennai, so he's not exactly losing to Mickey Mouse opponents here. Ivan Dodig - whoever he is - has very suddenly made the big time.

Zagreb had a couple of local hopes in there who were real chances at the title. Marin Cilic was one. Ivan Ljubicic was another. If either of these dudes had taken out the title, then it wouldn't have been surprising. But this Dodig guy? He's the homegrown hero that no one expected. Because as far as I can tell, he just popped into existence this year.

I wish I could say something more meaningful about him, but you've seen all I know about him in my awesome List of Ivan Dodig Facts. (To which I can add this, courtesy of the ATP website - he is coached by a dude called Martin Stepanek. Any relation, do you think?) What it really proves - once again - is the depth of the field. I think I'm pretty knowledgeable when it comes to, you know, knowing tennis players exist and stuff. Put me in front of a Challenger draw and I'll recognise a bunch of the names. But before this year, Ivan Dodig wouldn't have been one of them. And now he's gone and won not a Challenger title, but a full tour title.

That is a major-ass achievement. There is a whole ton of tennis players out there - very successful ones - who have never won a title. Never come close. Look at Janko Tipsarevic, for example. We all know who he is, but he's never won a title. Same with Potito Starace. Rendy Lu. But this Dodig dude has. He's smashed through the wall that these dudes never have.

And all I can tell you about him is that he is humanoid (probably). Tennis can always surprise you.

100% Top 100

ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ!

If you look at that string of crazy ALLEZs and assume that I am a little bit happy about something, then you would be right. My new best friend Nicolas Mahut has gone and won himself a Challenger title in Courmayeur in stunning style, and I am a little bit pleased about that. Just a little. Not a lot.

ALLEZ ALLEZ ALLEZ!

Okay, so quite pleased.

This win will put him squarely back inside the top hundred - if my calculations are correct, he will jump nearly 30 places and land at about #90. How about that?! He said at the Hopman Cup earlier this year that his goal for this year was to get back inside the top hundred. In the past month, he's jumped about 50 spots to achieve this goal. That is 100% pure awesome.

The real battle, of course, will be staying in the top hundred. Breaking in is one thing, staying in is another. Amir Weintraub could probably write a lot more eloquently about the vagaries of ranking. However, just getting in at all is hard enough - Mahut's been out of it for about two years, what with injury and whatnot. And the fact that he's jumped back in at around #90 (as opposed to #99 or something) gives him a little cushion.

There is no rest for those hungry for ranking points, of course. Mahut's been given a wildcard (it feels oddly satisfying to say those words) to this week's Challenger in Quimper, where he will be the top seed. If he can pull a good result here, he can go even higher in the rankings. And according to a French article I read (or tried to read, given as I don't speak French) it seems likely that he'll be given a wildcard to the ATP tournament in Marseille.

Honestly, all these people jumping late onto the #wildcardformahut bandwagon... I thought of that WEEKS ago. It's raining wildcards!

Also playing in Quimper this week is Amir 'Awesome Writer' Weintraub, and I'm going to try and catch one of his matches if I can. I want to see if his game is mightier than his pen. (Also, Nicolas Mahut should seriously consider giving a column a try. I think he'd have lots of amusing things to say. He seems like that kind of guy.)

The fact that I'm already talking about Quimper shows (yet again) how the satellite tour never sleeps. You win one tournament and already you have to think about the next one. There is no sleep, no rest... just an all consuming quest for rankings points. It's brutal. It is 100% hard to the core.

But for now, let's just say ALLEZ! Nicolas Mahut has gone and won himself a Challenger. And I, for one, think that is pretty awesome indeed.

Not A F%^&ing Tourist

It is no secret that I am not exactly the biggest tennis patriot ever. However, I was/am genuinely interested in the Fed Cup tie between Australia and Italy going on in Hobart, and I am totally devo that they are only showing it on pay TV, which I do not have.

The live scoreboard is good, though. Why don't they use it at all the tournaments?

It's also no secret that I currently find men's tennis more interesting than women's tennis, but the Italy/Australia tie is as good a match up as you will ever hope to see and kicks the arse of a lot of Davis Cup ties. In the Italian corner, we have Francesca Schiavone and Flavia Pennetta. In the Aussie corner, we have Samantha Stosur and Jarmila Groth. Let the games begin.

It's one of those ties in which no result is surprising. I wouldn't have been surprised to find either team 2-0 up after the first day, and so 1-1 is, I guess, kind of an expression of that. And yet it was still surprising. The one point for Australia comes from Groth, who upset Schiavone. Stosur went down to Pennetta.

And yet, even though Stosur is ranked way higher than Pennetta at the mo, I am somehow not surprised. Because all four singles players playing this tie are 100% absolute quality.

I couldn't tell you how Stosur lost or why Pennetta won or anything like that, because of the whole not having TV problem. What I can say is this: this is one of the best results of Jarmila Groth's career. Beating a Grand Slam champion and defending Fed Cup champion... wow. That is something else.

Particularly after coming back from one set to love down as well. That is an awesome result. When I saw Groth play Wickmayer at the Aussie Open, my immediate impression was of a player with heaps of talent and all the shots, but who could go AWOL mentally at any second. She could light up (ie. second set) but also come crashing down to earth without any notice (third set).

What Jarka showed me here in Fed Cup was that she can grit her teeth and get it done. And if she keeps gritting her teeth and getting it done... well, I could see her definitely making top twenty. Because she is majorly talented. And she is, in her own words, not a fucking tourist.

Reverse singles today (and doubles), with Groth taking on Pennetta and Stosur taking on Schiavone. I'm going with another split result here - I say Groth and Schiavone coming out on top. I don't see Frankie losing two days in a row, and I think Jarka might be on a roll. So this fascinating tie could come down to the doubles...

This is the kind of tie Fed Cup needs. I often talk about how maligned Davis Cup is, but Fed Cup is worse. Probably also because it has such a boring name. But with awesomeness like the awesomeness in this tie... Fed Cup could be on its way up.

(Also, Nicolas Mahut is into the final in Courmayeur! He'll play Gilles Muller. And also, he and Gicquel won the doubles. And I think making the final will send him into the top hundred! Mahuberfans unite!)

Worth Watching

This week, I watched my first ever Challenger tennis. I've always known it was out there, sort of in the abstract... you know, out there, existing, but I never thought of watching it. Or even checking the results.

You have Nicolas Mahut to thank for my transformation. With a soupcon of Amir Weintraub, because his column has got me absolutely fascinated with the hardcore life these players live.

The match I watched was an absolute cracker - a Hopman Cup reunion match in Courmayeur between Ruben Bemelmans and my beloved Nico. Mahut ended up winning in a third set tie break. It was engaging and entertaining and generally, the level was pretty damn high. I mean, neither dude is Federer or Nadal, but only two dudes get to be them. It was a good match. I don't think it would have been out of place in a tour level tournament.

Amir Weintraub writes in his column about how playing Australian Open qualies really made him feel like he was on the same level as the guys ranked #100-#200 and how he could really send himself skyrocketing up the rankings, how it was real and tangible and could really happen. But then the next week in Eylat he lost to a guy ranked in the #600s and he got all depressed, because he felt like maybe he wasn't doing as well as he thought.

What this really highlights for me is how good so many guys are, how close. It's a fight for every ranking point on the Challenger and Futures tour because one ranking point can be a big difference. At the top of the game, it wouldn't matter whether Nadal gained a point or lost a point, because he'd still be 3,000 points ahead. On the satellite level... if you gain a point, you could jump quite a lot on the computer.

If Nicolas Mahut wins in Courmayeur, I'm pretty sure he'll go back into the top hundred. I felt pretty gypped on his behalf when I found out he got 45 ranking points for making second round at the Australian Open - I felt like that was barely anything. And then I read Weintraub's column about how happy he was to get eight ranking points just for playing first round qualies - how he played the tournament in Eylat in the hunt for 17 points. 17. It seems like nothing. But it's everything.

And yet the level of these guys, if the Mahut/Bemelmans match is used as an indicator, is not so far off the tour level. It's a very fine line between good enough and not quite there. And it seems to me that there must be a lot of luck involved - as well as talent and skill and tenacity and whatnot - in getting there. Getting into the top hundred, playing on tour level instead of being stuck in the satellite dogfight... everyone works for it, but only a few get lucky.

There's part of me that wants every single guy on this satellite circuit to make it - for their hard work to pay off. The reality is that not every guy is going to make it. Not every guy gets the fairy tale. Some guys are going to be stuck here slogging it out forever, in this world where one ranking point can make you or break you.

But that doesn't mean that they're not awesome tennis players.

Challenger tennis. It's worth watching. For reals.

Going Solo

The Amir Weintraub column has really made me think. (See yesterday's post, if you are all like 'who is this Amir Weintraub of whom you speak?') The difference between life for a player ranked #25 and one ranked #250 is something I found very, very striking. Hence devoting that whole post to it yesterday and stuff.

One thing which I found particularly remarkable and that I thought deserved a little more space was the fact that players on the Challengers and Futures tours generally can't afford to bring their coaches with them. Weintraub notes in his column that some people do travel with huge entourages - sometimes they're top echelon players on their way back, other times guys who are somehow scraping the money together because they are so desperate to succeed - but for most dudes like Weintraub, it's a solo act. He brings his coach with him to a tournament in Israel - where he's from - and even that is a massive financial stretch.

I talked a bit yesterday about the striking link between tennis and money - the top guys earn heaps and never have to think about it, the little guys earn pretty much nothing and are constantly pre-occupied with it as a result - but that's not so much what I want to talk about here. I often say that one of the reasons I love tennis so much is that it's a true gladiatorial battle. Two people walk onto a court, with only their wits and their abilities to recommend them. Two men enter. One man leaves. Welcome to Thunderdome.

In the upper echelons of the game, people travel with massive entourages. Not only do they have coaches, but they have fitness trainers and physiotherapists and all kinds of crazy things - quite apart from their families. But when you get down to the satellite tour, all there are are the players. They might have coaches, but they're not there. They truly are alone.

I don't know if this somehow makes satellite tennis a purer form of the game or whatever, but the court must be a very lonely place for people down there. If you're a top seed playing on Rod Laver Arena or Court Philippe Chatrier or wherever, you might be by yourself on the court, but you've got a whole support team who've carried you there. They're there looking down on you, and even though they can't help you on the court - much as they might try to help you, coaching warnings be damned - you know they're there and that they're there for you. And there's a whole crowd to carry you too.

Let's cross over to the satellite tour. No coach. No player's box. Probably not even a crowd. Just you. You are all you have to depend on.

And in a way, that's kind of awesome. Not that players shouldn't have coaches or coaches should be banned from matches or whatever - nothing crazy like that. I'm not suggesting a revolution. But there's something very appealing to me about the idea that you - your mind, your body, your skills - are literally all you have to depend on.

Which is why on court coaching is such a freaking stupid idea. (Sorry. Had to get that dig in there.)

It must be horribly, horribly hard to be so alone. But in a way, it must be character building too. If you can survive all by yourself on the satellite tour with nothing but yourself to depend on... if and when you make it to the top echelon of the game, you'll be tougher for it. And a player who can throw down when the chips are down, who knows that if they're in a hole, they'll have to dig themselves out of it... that's the makings of a good tennis player, right there.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Wow. Just wow. If you have not Amir Weintraub's column what life is like when you're ranked #270-odd, READ IT NOW. Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four.

When we write about tennis, when we talk about it, when we think about it, we think of it as a rich sport. We think of Federer and Nadal and their massive entourages, of Sharapova and Ivanovic and Wozniacki with their huge endorsement deals... of rich people who got rich by being great at sport and who basically attract money like giant magnets. We see them on red carpets, on billboards, at fashion shows, at soccer matches... modelling Armani, driving in Mercedes Benz cars, wearing Tiffany earrings. And we see them holding aloft massive trophies with massive cheques shoved in their back pockets, and this is normal.

What we don't think about is the guy for whom playing the first round of qualies and picking up eight ranking points and $3000 is a massive, massive achievement.

"In the next few weeks I'm going to tell you about my life, about the life of a pro tennis player, and how it is nothing like you would imagine." This is the first sentence of Amir Weintraub's first column and he is dead on the money. I don't know about you, but this is not how I imagined the life of a professional tennis player.

He writes about getting to Brisbane for his first ever 'big' tournament and then learning he has no hope of getting into the qualies... so turning around, going back to the airport and flying to Noumea for a $75,000 event. So that he can get free accommodation, he has to play singles and doubles (after a night or two crashing on the floor in another player's room). "You need to understand that a big part of the considerations players in our level make have to do with how to save costs," he writes. "Sometimes those considerations exceed the professional considerations."

I'd heard that life was hard on the satellite tour. I didn't know how hard.

He gets injured in his victory in the second round of qualies for this tournament and the doctor and physio tell him not to play today. He replies, "I didn't make all this way from Israel to this hole so someone could tell me whether I'm healthy or not." He plays - injured. He loses second round in both singles and doubles. He doesn't even break even on the whole trip, but, as he says, "what's money in comparison to the chance to earn a few more ranking points?"

To do this - to live the life that Amir Weintraub does - takes guts, chutzpah, dedication and heart. Huge amounts of each. But most of all, it takes a great love for tennis. How much do you have to love a sport to keep living flight to flight, no certainty, no surety, never knowing what will happen next?

And alone, too. "Me, like other players in my status, are a one man industry," he writes. "No family, no coaches, no nothing. I don't want to make it sound like an excuse, but I have too many thoughts about things other than tennis, about the future and about procedures, like flights. In general, flights and flight arrangements occupy about a third of a player's time." I cannot even begin to imagine how intense living in that kind of uncertainty must be.

And why do you do it? For the chance, that one, small, tiny chance, of playing in Slam. Weintraub doesn't even know if he'll make the cut for qualies - he's two spots out - but he's so excited about being an alternate and getting two cans of new balls for practice (instead of three old balls) that it all seems worth it. But damn it, he wants that badge that says 'player' on it - the alternate badge brands him as an outsider.

And he gets it! He's the last player to make the cut for qualies. He gets his player badge and access to all the facilities that go along with it - including a locker next to Andy Roddick's.

He loses in the first round of qualies, but he's pleased with his performance. He's exhilarated by the whole Slam experience. And he's determined to get back next year. "Leaving Australia. Swearing I will do everything, but everything everything, to be back here sometime. This can't be my first and only time." I hope it isn't. Because if you're back in Australia next year, Amir, I am going to come to at least one of your matches - and I'm going to cheer my freaking head off.

Because this dude clearly loves tennis so, so much. Listen to this:

"For the very first time I able to understand what fellow tennis players and friends are talking about when they tell me, 'Come on, Amir. You haven't seen a thing. The day you reach a Slam you'd understand'. Understand why people won't give up their careers, why they are willing to hold on to this dream by their fingernails, why they won't retire even when they know it's over."

Hot damn, Amir Weintraub. You can write. Someone get him a book deal, stat.

He goes on to write about playing a Futures event in Eylat, Israel - which he describes as like leaving a Champion's league game to play a C league one. I won't spoil it for you, because you need to read it yourself. Seriously. AMIR WEINTRAUB. His column. Read it. I cannot emphasis this enough.

It's so easy to forget that under all the glitter of the upper echelons of Slams is this world, where players play week in, week out, where getting one ranking point is huge, where players live or die by tournament cutoffs - to quote Weintraub, "'The Cut' is the term players in my level die by". To get to the top, you usually need to go through this world - but not everyone makes it. Some people stay here, in the dogfight, for their whole careers - Weintraub talks about a guy he once played whom people were saying was destined for the Top 20, but he forgot how to hit a forehand literally overnight and gradually lost all his ranking points. It's a hard life - a demanding, stressful, full-of-pressure life. I think Weintraub says it best when he says this:

"I'm back to the reality where victory is worth one ranking point (how can you move ahead like that? It's like trying to conquer Everest when you're only allowed to take one step every day) and to a financial reality where I spend more money than I make."

And why do this? Why live this life? Why live like this, with all this pressure: "The pressure to get ranking points. The pressure not to mess up in small tournaments, the pressure not to mess up in Davis Cup. The pressure to start and make some money. Pressure." Why do it?

For the love of the game. For the chance to go to a Grand Slam once again. The chance to play the qualies. It's a mountain, one that Amir Weintraub and hundreds other like this are trying to conquer. "Point by point. Game by game," he writes.

And that love - the simple love of tennis - is enough. Enough to keep fighting. And that is something else indeed.

The Foot Of The Mountain

One of the strangest things about the time immediately after a Grand Slam is the fact that there is still tennis going on. There is no quiet time, no downtime... the players who gathered in Melbourne have scattered to all corners of the earth, unable to put their racquets down. Tennis players must feel like they're wearing the fairy tale red shoes sometimes - they just can't stop playing.

Of course, if you're Roger or Rafa or one of the top dudes, you can take a break. But for the little guys, there is none of that. You need the points to claw up the rankings. Every week is another battle. And just because a Slam is over and the whole tennis world is trying to catch its breath doesn't mean that you get the luxury of a break.

No, no, no. You are in Santiago or Zagreb or Johannesburg, trying to win a few rounds and gain some much needed points if you're a little little guy or notch up a tournament win if you're slightly bigger. Or some little guys might be in Courmayeur or Burnie or Kazan playing on the Challenger circuit, trying to grab the win and the valuable points there. And this is what you do, week in, week out.

When you're at the top, you can care about sensible scheduling. When you're not, then every week is another dogfight.

My newfound great love for Nicolas Mahut, he of the awesome hair, means that there'll probably be a lot more of the little guys on this blog - which is a good thing, I think. The little guys need some love. It's easy to be a Fedal fan (which, as you know, I am LIKE WHOA) but when you're not so famous, when you get shunted to the furthest court there is when you manage to qualify for a Slam... you deserve some screentime.

Mahut is the fourth seed in the Challenger in Courmayeur this week, and he had a first round win against Dieter Kindlmann last night in two breakers. Yay! He also jumped fourteen spots in the rankings up to #118 after his second round showing at the Australian Open! Also yay!

I tried to stay up to watch the match - Courmayeur has a livestream - but it didn't, you know, happen. However, I am definitely going to make an effort to watch at least a little of this tournament this week. Challenger tennis is something I don't know much about, and that's something I endeavour to change. Grand Slam tennis may be the pinnacle of the mountain, but Challengers and Futures are all about the climb.