CAMELOT FANTASIES

he said he will come back more prepared next year so he can be "more competitive".



that is next year. next year starts today.


he wont win if he doesn't care to win. first you have to find the hunger, drive, and relentless will to compete and win.


he left the match in the 3rd set. the score was 6-1.


he left the match against andy murray in Madrid in the second set. the score was 6-2.


this is what tony had been saying initially before he decided to put a more positive spin on the state of affairs.


his traveling coach said that rafa always won in the past even when limping around. but now he is completely healthy and not winning.


at the current rate he will drop out of top 20 at the end of next year. I said at the current rate because his game and his fitness continues to decline.

also they are all out working him so the rate of decline is significant.


he now drops to 10. could pick up a few points at Wimbledon but then the inevitable will happen. he will run into a top player and get smashed to pieces.

remember that rafa lost 4 straight sets on the red clay to fognini a few weeks back. he got destroyed by djokovic in monte carlo. he checked out there too. the score was 6-2 in the second set.


I was holding on to a tiny bit of hope. I thought maybe rafa will do some problem solving in this best of 5 sets match and get this match somehow. I figured that nole might be off early on.


but I was hiding behind the truth and the reality on the ground in a way: rafa never came to win this. he came to lose here.


he said early on in the tournament that it is not the end of the world if he loses here. and that he had won plenty of times here before.


you go to every battle to win. Federer came here to win. nole came here to win.

Federer is not going to Wimbledon to lose. he is going there to try to win his 18th major.


Federer also stared down history. he did not stop when he reached 11 slams. he wanted to get past 14 to top Sampras.



historians will say the same thing I am saying. rafa had a chance to stare down history and he managed to lose his focus and his drive right in his prime.


that has never happened before. rafa stopped caring for some reason. more on this later.



the tragedy of all this is that I saw it coming. i saw this coming long ago.


he brought about his own decline. he defeated himself before they could defeat him.


so now they defeat him that much more easily.


he had a grand total of 3 forehand winners in 3 sets today. this is from the greatest forehand in history.



he has no confidence because he knows he is not putting in the time on the practice courts and on the fitness front.

i would not be confident either if i hit for just 1.5 hours in practice and waste 30 minutes of that time chit chatting and taking breaks.


i know somebody that went to 4 of his practice sessions. he said his practice sessions are pretty much a joke now.



so he better decide if he wants more conquests or if he wants out of the sport.


his coaches cant say anything because he brings home the bacon. and also because he is already an all time great. they also cant say anything because sponsors don't want to hear that he wont work hard enough to be competitive out there.




i am his greatest fan. i care the most.  but i am not going to sit here and celebrate his past victories in battles just yet. we have a lifetime to do that.

general masterclass will tell you the same thing: we all saw this coming long ago. as early as shortly after his 2013 u.s. open win.


and some of us saw it even sooner.


clay is the wellspring from which he flows. he must get his fitness and his physicality back in order to dominate clay again.

and then he can win on other surfaces. but now the window starts to close fairly rapidly.

so now rafa finds himself in a race against the clock as well.


i will hold out hope for one more slam but the only way to that slam is through clay. he has to get back on that surface and start carving out wins again.