21.03.2010
Before the beginning of the 2010 season I was in doubt that Andy Roddick can keep his top 10 ranking until the end of the year. Now he is in the final of the first Masters 1000 Tournament of the year, his 8th career Masters series final. And on top of that he plays Ivan Ljubicic, ranked outside the top 20 in the world in front of his home crowd in the USA. I see him as a 80% – 20 % winner in this match up and improve his record against Ljubicic to 8 – 3.
I am sure that the Indian Wells title will boost Roddicks confidence and especially his motivation for the rest of the year so much, that I have to take back my prediction that he will drop out of the top 10 by the end of the year. With this boost he might be able to keep up the faith to win another Grand Slam tournament, the one thing that keeps him going like he says. I think that he will never come as close again as in last years Wimbledon Final where he almost beat Roger Federer. I think he is far away from winning another Grand Slam, even with a newly found confidence and high motivation.
He might do well in Miami too, but the clay court season is coming soon and his confidence will go down the drain again. He will have a lot of pressure defending his points in Wimbledon and I don’t see him in the semi-final this year. The top 4, and even Del Potro and Davydenko are just too strong for him and he will face one of these players in the quarter-finals already.
But with a win in Indian Wells he might be able to hold off players like Tsonga, Soderling, Cilic, Verdasco, Monfils and Gonzales for bit longer. Without his fortunate draw at Indian Wells I am sure he would have not been able to go this far in a Masters 1000 event.
With Del Potro and Davydenko injured, Roger probably only thinking about a possible Grand Slam, Nadal out of form, Djokovic not able to control his emotions in a match-up of Serbia against Croatia and Murray losing surprisingly to Soderling, he could have not asked for more circumstances.
But what will the top 6 do in Miami. Even Roger will try to do a little better, and we will see how much Roddick has left in the tank after 10 days in the desert of California.
If he really wins the final tonight he will pass Soderling, but I doubt that he will be still ahead of him in the rankings after Miami. He has a Quarterfinal to defend, while Robin Soderling lost in the 2nd round last year.
So, is Roddick back on track? I don’t see it. He might get a boost for a little while, but in April we will see different players with confidence and faith. A lot of them will carry a Spanish passport by the way…
H F Hesse
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