Welcome to the Open
-
- August
- 25
This is Harold Gutmann live at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center (now known as the USTABJKNTC). I’m thrilled to be back for another exciting year. This one should be even more exciting — when was the last time there wasn’t a clear favorite on either side?
For the men, obviously you have Roger Federer going for five in a row, which hasn’t been done since Bill Tilden in 1924. Rafael Nadal is trying to be the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to win here, Wimbledon and the French in the same year. And Novak Djokovic is hoping to spoil the dream finals matchup.
For the women, you have the Serbians, the Williams, and the Russians. The Serbians have the top seeds but haven’t proven they can win here. The Williams have the titles, but they’re both coming off pretty bad losses in the Olympics, and of course they must play each other in the quarters. And the Russians may be the hottest players coming in, with Darina Safina earning the U.S. Open Series title and Elena Dementieva winning the gold medal (and No. 3 Svetlana Kuznetsova is also a former champ).
Anyone want to make some predictions? I’ll go first — Nadal over Djokovic, Serena over Dementieva.
As always, I’ll be here the next two weeks with the latest news, gossip, weather and traffic reports, etc., so stay tuned and please feel free to join in the conversation.
This entry was posted
on Monday, August 25th, 2008 at 11:26 am by Harold Gutmann.
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