RealClearSports: The (Too) Long Nights at the Open

By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com

NEW YORK – “In a real dark night of the soul, it’s always 3 o’clock in the morning.” That’s from F. Scott Fitzgerald, and it came to mind during a changeover and between yawns as Roger Federer battled Juan Monaco.



New York is the city that never sleeps. Nobody wrote it’s the city where it never rains, because Tuesday the U.S. Open Tennis Championships were washed out and there was no play. Well, there was, for 1 hour, 12 minutes.

Read the full story here.

© RealClearSports 2011

RealClearSports: Tsonga Ready for His Biggest Moment

By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com

WIMBLEDON, England -- A door closes, and another opens. Change is the constant in sport, indeed in life. The familiar merges with the unknown, forcing us to consider the future even as we wistfully think about the past.

Tennis has changed. Wimbledon has changed. Roger Federer exits for a second straight year after a quarterfinal, and we wonder once more whether his time has passed.

Read the full story here.

© RealClearSports 2011

Yahoo! Sports: Federer in denial after his shocking collapse

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange

WIMBLEDON, England — It wasn't as much what happened, Roger Federer losing at Wimbledon, but the way it happened — Roger Federer for the first time in his career defeated after he had taken the first two sets of a match in a Grand Slam tournament.

Unprecedented. Never before in 178 Slams. Or as the delightfully disbelieving young man who stunned Federer, indeed stunned all of tennis, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, would sigh, "Unbelievable."

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2011 The Sports Xchange. All Rights Reserved.

RealClearSports: Federer Looks Back, Moves Ahead

By Art Spander
For RealClearSports.com

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — There was clarification along with advancement. Roger Federer had no problems with his opponent in the BNP Paribas Open, Juan Ignacio Chela. "I'm happy it went so well,'' said Federer.

What didn't go well was that Wimbledon quarterfinal last summer.

Read the full story here.

© RealClearSports 2011

CBSSports.com: The Joker prevents possibly 'biggest match of all time' at Open

By Art Spander
The Sports Xchange/CBSSports.com

NEW YORK -- Mats Wilander said it would have been "the biggest match of all time," but it won't happen this year -- and maybe never.

Rafael Nadal made it to the U.S. Open final; Roger Federer didn't.

It was the man they call the Joker, Novak Djokovic, who ruined the plot, tore up the script, defeating Federer, 5-7, 6-1, 5-7, 6-2, 7-5, Saturday in a semifinal of brilliance and surprise.

Read the full story here.

© 2010 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved.