It was a day of the comeback kids as Ivan Ljubicic followed in Jelena Jankovic's footsteps to lift the BNP Paribas Open crown at Indian Wells. Ljubicic outlasted fellow big server Andy Roddick in two tight sets to put the icing on a remarkable comeback 7-6 (3), 7-6 (5). It was Ljubicic's first Masters Series crown and he certainly did it in style with marvelous wins over World No.2 & 3 Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal en route to the final. Ljubicic said during the tournament that he was now playing with the monkey off his back and it showed in his ice cool demeanor during the tie-breaks and in wiping out the handful of breakpoints he did face. Roddick for his part did little wrong but just missed out on the big points in the tie-breaks. Matches like these tend to come down to a few big points and Roddick on this day came out on the wrong end of them. It's been a long wait - 4years - since the American's last Masters Series title and it looks like the wait will last some time longer. Ljubicic is known to be quite stoic but the emotion on the tournament's oldest winner's face at the end was genuine and heart warming.
In a match between two highly accomplished servers, both of whom delivered on the night, touching speeds of over 135 miles per hour consistently. The match however was nowhere near the boring serve fest that some had predicted it would be as the players engaged in some marvelous rallies that explored the breadth & depth of the tennis court. Andy Roddick consistently creamed his forehand while Ljubicic also struck firmly from the back, especially his backhand down the line, while mixing it up with some delectable drop shots. Roddick in recent times has been surprisingly patient in his play from the baseline, showing a greater willingness to keep the ball in play and work on keeping the ball out of the hitting zone of his opponents. He continued that today and allowed Ljubicic to be the aggressor while drawing errors from the Croat. As the match progressed though he became increasingly offensive himself, especially on the forehand side and this made for some superb viewing.
Jelena Jankovic turned the clock back today and reminded us all of her glory days in late 2008 when she finished atop the WTA rankings. Since then she has had a torrid time failing to proceed beyond the 4th round of the last 5 majors and reaching just one quarterfinal of a WTA mandatory tournament. But today all that was history as she played a match reminiscent, perhaps even better than her 2008 form to dismantle the challenge of her young Danish opponent, Caroline Wozniacki 6-2, 6-4. In a little under an hour and a half she displayed a high quality vein of form that saw her thoroughly dominate to win the first WTA mandatory event of the year. Wozniacki's ascent to the second step of the WTA rankings was some solace for the pretty Dane who looked a touch woebegone at the end of the match. Jankovic was understandably thrilled at the result and will surely look at this as a springboard back to the top echelons of the Tour.
The BNP Paribas Open has been a turbulent experience so far with the big-names & top seeds showing all the inclination to remain at this desert as the Israelis did for Egypt in biblical times. The semi-finals followed the trend as the higher seeds were taken out leaving unlikely contestants Andy Roddick & Ivan Ljubicic in the final tomorrow. Ivan Ljubicic continued his fairy tale as he took out defending champ Rafael Nadal in a magnificent comeback 3-6, 6-4, 7-6. In the other semifinal Andy Roddick took out Robin Soderling in a fascinating battle between big servers 6-4, 3-6, 6-3.
It was a day of straight set wins at the BNP Paribas Open with none of the seven matches venturing into three set territory. Caroline Wozniacki showed more than ample proof that has seen her break into the top 5 in the world as she took just 98 minutes to power past good friend Agnieskza Raswanska in the second of the two women's semi-final. Waiting for her in tomorrow's final was former world no.1 Jelena Jankovic, who needed to work a little harder than her future opponent to defeat Australia's Samantha Stosur.
Defending champion Rafael Nadal stayed on course towards defending his BNP Paribas Open title by recording a hard fought win over no.19 seed Tomas Berdych in the quarter-finals on Thursday. Up next for Rafa is 30-years and 364 day old Ivan Ljubicic, who followed up his win over Novak Djokovic in the 4th round with a three set win over Juan Monaco of Argentina. In the women's draw, Wednesday's victors Caroline Wozniacki and Agnieszka Radwanska were joined in the semi-finals by Jelena Jankovic and Samantha Stosur.
