I feel like, you know, especially when you are young, you recover very fast. It's a bit different.
So he's looking right at me and just mocking me, like there I guess this guy.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
Good day and welcome to the tennis for Day eleven of AO twenty twenty five, slightly congested John Huvanas here with all the big news from Melbourne Park every day of the main draw. Today on the tennis, Sinner dashes Demon's dream.
Too many times playing game and seeing the same thing, so I'm not even surprised anymore.
Triontek swifly sweeps into the semis.
I always wanting to be this kind of player that is not gonna just give matches for free.
Plus a preview of Day twelve and Novak Djokovic through the eyes of his former coach Goran Ivanizovich.
Okay, Sinner, he's a favorite. He is the best player in the world at the moment. But Novak is Novak.
That's all ahead.
On the tennis, Cosco back in for demenor up the line by Sinner. He's got too much power for Demino and it's long and that is an emphatic win. A one sided affair in the quarterfinal, the Junick Sinner through to another semi final in Melbourne. The defending jam Bieginea had.
Done really well.
Janick Sinner has kept his Australian Open title defense on track with a straight sets demolition of Alex Steminor. Despite the Aussie's equal best performance at his home slam, he was unable to match the brilliance of the world number one. From the outset. The Italian landed the first blow, forcing Demonor into multiple errors to snatch the first break in the fourth game, and once in control, Sinner gave away just three more points on serve to clinch the opening
set in thirty eight minutes. He inflicted more pain on the Aussie and the majority of the crowd, breaking Demonor at the first asking in set two, the defending champ worked his magic to extend the rallies and push the world's best defensive player to all corners of the court.
With the pressure mounting, Sinna found a second break, much to the chagrin of a deflated demon and with a semi final spot within reach, he went to another level in the third set, his opponent unable to scrap a single point off Sinner's serve until an unforced era in game six, a master class in Melbourne run and win in one hour and forty eight minutes sixty three six two six ' one.
So there I was filling everything. You know, when when days like this and you know you break quite early and he needs that, it's it's a little bit easier.
Sin A semi final opponent is American twenty first seed Ben Shelton.
Tough match, one of the biggest serves we have on tour. He's a very aggressive player and all around player. He can go to the nets, you know, he can stay back.
As for Demonor, he's been stopped frustratingly short of a maiden semi final, stuck at the quarter finals for his fourth slam in a row.
I've seen too many times playing him and seeing the same thing, so I'm not even surprised anymore when I face him and matches like these happened with the conditions a little bit slower and a little bit later at night, it's it's pretty tough to make him miss or hurt him. And yeah, he was bloody good tonight.
She's missed up enough for just the second time in her career as an Australian open. The semi finalist had the pole playing somewhere near the peak of her powers people seen here in Australia.
In what was anticipated to be her biggest challenge yet, IGAs Fontek has crushed Emminavarro to fly into her second semi final in Melbourne. The Poll yet to drop a set at this tournament, and while she's been accustomed to handing out bagels, today she gave away just three games to the eighth seed. The writing was on the wall from the first game, with Sriontek break to love in a tick over ninety seconds, but in set two came
some controversy. At two all, Navarro had her first sniff at breaking the Poll, and after two duces, Friontech completed a contentious hold of serve when a double bounce went seemingly unnoticed. Sliding towards the net, the world number two was a frame too late onto the ball, and without a not up call, play continued. Stunned, Navarro attempted to review the point, but her plea came too late, dashing
any chance of a break of serve. From there, Fiontech went into lockdown mode, denying the American any more break point opportunities for the match. The five time major champion sent down twenty two winners in total and won eighty two percent of first serve points to Rain victorious six one six ' two.
For sure, I like to be intents and proactively and you know, just look for the opportunities to push my opponents. But to focus, I think is like a totally different thing, you know. Um, I just you know, tried to have the same kind of energy and keep the momentum going no matter what the scory is, you know, And that's my opens come back to their game or let them have some space, you know. And yeah, I mean I
think it's a mix. I never think has been working pretty well so far, so hope to continue that.
Navara looking to the positives for her best result in Melbourne.
Yeah, it's tough to not get the win today, but there's a lot to be proud of from this week. In these past few weeks, I think I've I've worked through a lot and kind of felt like I wasn't playing my best tennis coming into just the Australian Swing, and I feel like I'm leaving here with you know, a lot of positives, lots to be proud of and and definitely lots to improve one.
Way, so much came Madison did the semi models of the Australian Open and the run continues.
It was another amazing day for the American contingent with a couple more winners through to the semifinals today Madison Keys and Ben Shelton through to the last four in Melbourne. It is time for our spotlight segment. Blair Henley Johnny again. Hello Blair, Hi, John Simon Ray from gig Hey John and Ryan Harrison back with us on the tennis Welcome, Ryan.
Lovely to be with you guys.
And you got to call Ben Shelton. We'll give you some airtime because you had a front row seat to all the action. In just a few moments. We're going to start though with Madison Keys. She prevailed today after dropping the first set against Elena Spittalina three six six, three sixty four, and she advances to her third semifinal here in Melbourne.
Yeah.
Absolutely, I mean Madison Keys, She's been talked about as having so much talent for so long. I thought it was really unfortunate last year the injury she had in Wimbledon. I thought she was really getting her momentum going, and to see her picking up right and stride now that she's healthy again, it's just remarkable right back on it. No signs of any Russ coming off that injury, and she's right here in the last four.
If you need a framework for how long Madison Keyes has been around, look only to her first Grand Slam semi final, which came right here at the Australian Open in twenty fifteen. She was still a teenager. She now says she's hanging onto her twenties for dear life. She turns thirty in February. But looked every bit the young, fearless youngster today. Was so good against Alena Svidlina didn't let her draw her into those long rallies in the second and third sets, attacked on the forehand, mixed in
the slice as well as the dry backhand. And also I had the chance to talk to her, she said, and I made my way into.
The net slightly more than I felt comfortable with, but it worked out for her today.
Yeah.
Well, I think that the Cause have summed it up really well. I was impressed with some of the improvement that we've seen from Fidelina it's a different fiddelina than what we're seen down here, and ye has gone by. So on serv there's some similarities between these two plays, which did surprise me. So a case serves at one hundred and seventy seven kilometers and now today on average siddeling is one hundred sixty seven. I feel like that's a lot higher than we would have seen her previously.
On second serves, Fideline is serving at one hundred and thirty seven. Madison Keys is down at one hundred and twenty six, So Fidelin has got ten more. K's an nour On second serve, the numbers are really similar in terms of balls in play points one and behind the first serve, but that's where the similarity stop on the service game because when we come through to serve plus one, so the really important third shot that the numbers are
stark in terms of how different they are. So Madison Keys takes the first ball after her first serve inside the baseline. So this is a sign of intent, right, they're both landing their first serve roughly the same amount, they're both winning roughly the same amount behind it, But what type of point is happening and behind the first serve, Keys inside the baseline on the plus one sixty percent
of the time. Fideline is inside the baseline after her first serve just twenty three percent of the time, and that's a little bit of an indication of what started to play on play out from the third ball of the point onwards across the course of this match.
Well, let's have a listen to Madison Keys following her win and paying particular credit to the new of game from Elenis Fittlina.
She's playing, honestly, some absolutely amazing tennis and I think she's kind of changed her approach to how she's playing, and I think it's it's kind of fun to see. And we played juniors together, so seeing each other through different parts of our career and the way that we're evolving and changing and trying different things, it's fun and it's it's nice to see all of these people that you grew up with and played juniors with, are you know, still doing it.
What else did Madison do well, Simon, Well, I think.
Again, it was a little bit different than what I might have expected before the match, because I mentioned the difference in court position at a third ball onwards. The short rallies one, I would have thought Madison would probably dominate Elenis Fidilina in this match. That wasn't the case when the points were short. It was sixty two for Fidilina fifty six for Keys. When the points were mediumly comes out in the wash twenty one to nineteen. But
Maddie had the age and longer rallies. So I think that's where the core position of the third ball onwards does become a factor. It was allowing her to set up the point on her terms more often, and she did some damage with her forehand in a way that we've not seen. There's only two players across the course of this match. There's only two players that have had more heaviness on the forehand side than what we saw from Madison Keys today. Remember, heaviness is a combination of
speed and spin. It's both Maddie's speed and spin forehand heaviness today across this match right up there on our scale. We don't see those types of numbers very often at all. And she was able to do damage across the course of the three sets in behind the fourhand grandy.
And to comment on that a bit also looking at the second serve speed. Mattie Keys can hit the second serve bigger. She's definitely capable of doing that. What she is doing now is she's using the spin on the second serve to get the ball up more. So the speed is dropping, but the ball is hitting and bouncing up a bit more and using that slower speed strategically to get the ball a bit higher, which I think is helped setting her up to build a point.
I was just going to give a quick shout out to both of those players who were the only two players remaining. I believe only two players in the women's draw who've had one hundred or more wins at Majors elenas Fiddelina reached the milestone while she was here. There are only two of six active players. But when you look at the rest of the four Venus Williams, Caroline Wosniaki, Simona Hallop and I'm missing one. Victoria Azarenka was the other one who was out of course earlier in the tournament.
But that just shows their longevity and the fact that they're they've been so consistent over the course of their careers.
That's high quality over longevity as well, all write that stuff.
Good.
You mentioned that means a lot coming from Simony.
Credit from the GIG team. All right. Our second focus match Ryan of day eleven was that of Ben Shelton over Lorenzo's Sonigo. We've just seen a fantastic It was a four set match in the end and the points went to the American. He comes through six ' four seventy five four six, seven six. But it was an almighty high octane battle out there on Rod Laver Arena.
Incredible. I thought that San Diego played beautifully, especially toward the end of the match. I thought that he started finding his range. The temperature dropped while we were on the court quite significantly. When we started in the middle of the day. It was very hot, very lively. That favors the big serving American who was getting a lot of free points on serve. By the end, Sonega was putting so many returns back in the court, and it was all about Shelton holding his nerve at the end
of the match. If he loses that fourth set tiebreaker and that goes five with the momentum and head of steam and Sonego is a momentum player when he gets himself going his top end, very very good. He has some losses. They're a bit strange, and we've seen him have a little bit of variety and up and down. But when he is good, he.
Is really good.
He is really good when he's good. So I thought it Shelton did a great job closing out out in four sets. And then how about that little tumble that we saw him take and the fourth set tiebreaker, and then the push in the push ups doesn't lose a point after doing a couple of push ups. It's incredible.
Now you had just two mats behind that, right. I was right behind that.
Uly.
I was a bit concerned because it was a loud sounds, a loud pop on the side of me. He didn't go in there lightly. It wasn't like he went in there with a very mild hit. It was a loud thump. And so myself and I was sitting there next to James Blake as well, another former American player, and we kind of peaked up. We were like, oh my gosh, he see okay, And then we see him roll over and do a few push ups, and he and I
both just sort of bursting out and laughter. We were like Oh my gosh, because if you know Ben, that's like classic Ben like to turn around and be like, nah, I'm good, I'm going to put this like on my terms, and then he turns around and plays three great points.
And I was sitting there watching with Ble and she coined a new nique name gupher It.
I don't know if it's new or that original, but showtime Shelton, we see a lot of it, and saw a tweet coming through as we were doing the blue Zone today, somebody just saying this Shelton Sonago match is crazy fun. It looked fun for the players, and the fans were enjoying it as well. I do have a question for Simon and Ryan as well, because you were out there watching, because again, all I got to see were the stats and the percentage of second serve points
one from Ben Shelton. So first set sixty seven for him, thirty six percent for Sonago, second set seventy percent to thirty six percent, and then in the third set the percentage of second serve points one for Ben went down to twenty nine percent to Snago's eighty three and then it stabilized a little bit in the fourth. But what was the difference was he doing something different on the serve?
Was just curious.
Well, in the third set, Sonaga started doing a lot better on the return, getting the depth of the ball. In the first couple sets, his returns were dropping a bit short, especially with that spin serve that Shelton has and when and you know, Simon, you could probably have this more accurately than I could. But in my opinion, just on iesight, when the ball hits and bounces off the court, Shelton gets a lot of action and sometimes that can take a little while to get used to.
You don't realize how heavy that serve is. So even when he takes a little pace off, the ball bounces extreme spin and that takes a second to adjust. And I thought that Sonago started doing better and better as a man went on of adjusting, he started adjusting his
court positioning, getting better depth in return. And we saw Ben Shelton having lots of first ball short forehand opportunities early on in the match, and then that became fewer and fewer and we had these long, griindy, exciting rallies toward the end the match.
Yeah, look like Snago did adjust the return position. So the numbers bear out exactly what Ryan's talking to there. All of a sudden got a lot more aggressive on second serve return, in particular returning right up inside the baseline nearly every time he got a look at second serve. In that third set, four set he tries to do the same thing, but obviously Ben Shelton makes the adjustment. Perhaps Brett raises the pace a little bit, challenges the
returner in different ways in the four set. I thought, ultimately first serves unreturn and it was one of your opening remarks right plays a big factor in this match. So it's nearly double. Ben Shelton's able to get thirty two percent of first serves unreturned, so one out of every three points on his serve he's able to get
that breathing space that we know is so valuable. SNA goes down at just eighteen percent, so less than one in five, so he's having to work that much harder, that much more can persistently on his service game than Ben Shelton. I thought it was a big factor in the match. One thought I did have Ryan and I don't know what it looked like from your advantage point
down their court side. I did wonder whether at times Ben can be a little bit more conservative because he relies on his athleticism so much and his shot making ability showtime Shelton, I did wonder at times whether he can almost lull himself into a trapper being a little more conservative than you might choose to have him play from a coaching perspective. He plays a pretty big physical price in this match. So the sprint count, we have a definition for a sprint here. He's sprinted sixty seven
times in this match. Snego thirty four, so double the number of sprints. He covered well nearly four klungbus three thy eight hundred meters. His distance run at high speed thirteen percent as compared to Snago's just half of that at seven.
Percent, because they covered a similar amount of territory, just in different ways.
And Ben loves that.
I know.
Ben's an explosive athlete. He can cover court like we've we've very rarely seen before. But I do wonder if in rely on that, if you want to hold up the trophy here on Sunday evening and you're going best to five every second night. I did wonder whether sometimes he falls into the trap of being more defensive and conservative and trying to come up with the spectacular, perhaps more than maybe advisable out of his camp.
That's exactly right. You hit the nail on the head. And we also saw another statistic where Sonego got into the net around ninety times in four sets, which is an incredibly high off thet It's off the chart side,
and that tells you a couple things. First of all, he's not getting in the net that much if Shelton is getting the ball deeper in the court, So that tells you who is the dictating player, and which is a bit surprising because if you were to look at those guys stand side by side in the locker room, let's just say they'd be in different categories. If they were boxers, right, one guy would be a heavyweight, the next guy would be probably a middle later or lightweight.
So you look at the way that their physique is and you would think that the dictating player would be Shelton by mile, and that's not the case. Sonego is absolutely taking control of the points and running Shelton around. Shelton is a really interesting character though, because he is such a fast athlete. He's so quick around the baseline, but he's also got the big game. So I think that as he gets older and more experienced, reminds you two years ago here was the first time he'd never
left the United States of America. So tell you how yeah staggering to him. Yeah, that's how green he is. He's twenty two years old. People think that just because you know, he's been around now for the last eight nine majors, which seems like a long time. Two years. You know, you're seeing him in the later stages of the Grand Slam, already made the quarterfinals here, semi finals of US Open, So I think people are starting to get familiar with him in the later stages of tournaments.
But as far as his career goes, he's still very green, and he's learning his identity. And when you move well and you have a bomb, sometimes you can fall into a little bit of an identity crisis. And as he gets better and better, I think that Ben is only going to become more clear about who his identity is. And I think that as we talk about he's going to get a little bit more offensive. Not to not to say his service games aren't offensive, because they are,
but in the baseline, rallies. He's going to get more and more offensive.
Hey, Ron's pretty too. I've got a dashboard in front of me. I've got all these notes that I've spent out with here and Ryan said around ninety times. It turns out Senego came in ninety times and just to add credens to the point that Ryan's making there, he won seventy four percent of those points. So it wasn't necessarily a tactic that I don't think worked that well for Shelton. So that's a little watch and see, I guess with the next round in mind.
And he sealed them with an ace.
John Piers line is that's the six four or six spots.
The Aussie wildcards are through to the final here at the Australian Open.
For the first time in the Open era, two Australian teams have made the Australian Open Mixed doubles final and they're both wild cards. Olivia Gadecki and John Piers the first to secure their spot, upstaging second seeds Emily Rutliffe and Michael Venus six four sixty four. Piers, a gold medalist in Paris, sealed the deal with an ace to give the pair a chance to lift their first Australian Open Mixed doubles trophy.
It's always, you know, one of my dreams to make a Grand Slam final, so to be, you know, playing in one at the age of twenty two is pretty cool and to hopefully play another Aussie would be incredible.
Kim Berrel and John Patrick Smith secured their spot with a straight sets win over British pair Olivia Nichols and Henry Patton with a break apiece. The Aussies forced a first set tiebreak, winning the last five points to seal at seven to two. The wild Cards put the pressure on in the second set, breaking in games four and eight to sail home six to two. After Burrel fell to lucky loser Everlease in the first round of singles, Her delight after playing a sizzling second set look to
have put her Australian Open demons to bed. And it's all smiles as mates take on mates in Friday's final.
Super happy for them.
They've had an amazing week and I played in the women's doubles with Lives, so.
I think it's safe to say we know each other pretty well and it's just going to be an awesome night.
We're going to keep enjoying it and we'll come up with a plan and you know, keep backing ourselves.
In the men's doubles, fourth seeds Kevin Kravitz and Tim Pwetts have been made to fight for their place in the last four British pair Julian Cash and Lloyd Glasspool, forcing them to two tiebreakers. The Brits couldn't capitalize on their two set points in the opening tie break, which the Germans won eleven nine. The shootout continued in set two as both teams dominated on serve, but again the tiebreaker fell into the hands of Kravites and Poets seven five.
I think we both didn't win too many points returning, maybe had a few looks here and there, but then maybe missed some returns as well. So yeah, a lot of times it comes down to tiebreaks and then yeah, in the end, it's a bit of luck involved as well. So in the first we were lucky to scratch it out eleven nine, and now he's seven five. It's so close, So yeah, we're just happy and thrilled to be through.
They'll meet sixth seeds Harry Helievara and Henry Pattin in the semis after they went through in straight sets, and in the women's doubles, top seeds Catarina sine Yakova and Taylor Townsend have stormed into the last four, the Czech and American combination defeating Kicki Mildenovitch and Junk Shwi six one seventy five, the raiding Wimbledon champions, sharing the keys to their success.
I've honestly become really good friends with Kad and you know, I think that that helps me personally. All the times that I've had the most success with the partners that I've played with, I've been friends off the court, and so we're able to speak and communicate. And I was like, I'm nervous, like help me, like help me out, and
she was able to raise her level. So you know, I think that that's what it's about, being able to just talk and be able to be free with each other and you know, to know that there's no judgment.
Their semi finals opponents will be Mirr Andreva and Dianna Schneider, who are through after dropping just three games. Let's turn our attention now to Day twelve of the Australian Open. It is women's semi final day. We're going to preview a couple of matches and we'll start with Arena Sablanca, who takes on Powella Badosa. I'm going to start with you, Blair, because you've chatted to you chatted to Powell, didn't you
yesterday after the match? Yes, into her first major semifinal at against the biggest osk on hard court in the women's game.
Yeah, and also her best friend.
They know each other so well off the court, but they have experience playing each other on the court. They actually played three times last year. Savalenka won all three of those. I don't really count those though, because Pala Badosa was still working on her comeback. She was out the last six months of twenty twenty three, barely won a match to the first six months of twenty twenty four, so I'm just wiping the slate clean on those three matches.
Prior to that, Savelenka had a couple of tough, tight wins, and then Pala Badosa won the first two times they played.
I'm tempted to say that.
Arena Savalanka does everything that Pala Badosa does with just a little bit better However, with their types of game, I do think that Palavadosa has the capability to take the racket out of her opponent's hand so that it doesn't matter how well you can do your thing, because she was serving so well against Cocoa Goff and she can hit a winner from anywhere on the court.
Paul is playing great tun us, there's no doubt about that. But what's doing right now? It's been twenty five years since someone did that. She's won nineteen matches in a row at the Australian Open and Martina hingis ninety seven
or two thousand last time that someone did that. So Nelssa say, she feels very comfortable here on rod Lever Arena, and as we saw last night, even when she doesn't have her best stuff where she was down a break in the third twice against Palchhenkova, it just seems like something about it, something about the atmosphere here, it brings out her best stuff under pressure.
Yeah, and I thought credit to her last night because I thought we saw from her arena Sablinka on rod Laverna last night just a little more settled, a little more measured and mild, a little cooler and more methodical under pressure than we've seen her in the past. We know she's an emotional character. She wears her heart on her sleeve, and at times I think in the past, when that scoreboard pressure has been on, it's all gotten a little bit too much for Sablinka. But there was
no sign of that last night. I thought it was a distinct shift in her ability to handle the moment, maintain composure and clarity of thought, and really think her way in, fight her way back into the contest. I'm a little bit like Blair. I was looking at this matchup thinking, gee, I don't know how Bodosa gets this done. One thing that I would point out is on second serve,
Bidosa can generate some heat. On second serve. She's serving about ten k's an hour bigger than Sabalanca on second serve, and the two players their return position on second serve. Sabalanca is about twice as aggressive in terms of how often she's inside the baseline on second serve return compared to Bodosa. So if I'm in the Meidosa camp, I'm thinking, Okay, we've got to play on that. We've got to play to win here. We've got to be bold. We've got
to be brave on our second serve. If we're serving for this matchup five four in the third thirty all we've got to be prepared to hit to serve at one hundred and fifty five kilometers an hour second serve right into the Sabalanca body and jammer up and then we can dictate thereafter. Because if we allow Arena Sabalanca a swing on that second serve return, if we put that thing in the middle of the box and hope for the best, hoping's not going to get it done.
So I think she needs to be bold, brave, and be prepared to go down on her terms to give herself a chance.
You're exactly right and game planning for sable Anca. You have to get a lot of depth on the ball as well. She generates so much power. If the ball is landing around the service line, even if you hit it hard, it's coming back harder. It's just going to go right back and return to send her. So if you're able to go deep, deep through the middle is definitely a good play. If you can jammer up a bit, as you were saying on the serve, good play to
jammer up. Anytime that she has her arms extended, she's great if you can make her have to feel a little bit crowded. The thing is is Arena's always swinging. She doesn't really have a you know, take the pace off the ball.
So if you jammer up.
And she continues to swing from those jam positions, that's when you can see a few mistakes. That's what palajen Covid did really well in the second set yesterday. She was able to push her back through the deep middle to court and then when she got the short response, she then opened her up. But she wasn't opening up the point too early because on the run, Sablenka can still generate and go defense to offense in the blink
of an eye. So we'll see if Bodoza is able to generate a little bit depth through the middle and go at the body.
Wonderful analysis. Get the stripe jacket on Arena Sabolenka. The other semifinal is Medicine k and IgA Fiontech Fiontech coming through on day eleven today against Emma Navarro and Keys. As we mentioned before against Fiddelina, this shapes is a real tussle.
Eager to me, has been playing amazing tennis. I think that Australia was a place that people used to look at Ega and say, oh, that's the one slam that you can maybe make some headway against her. Last year we saw her struggling in the first couple of rounds Ega to me is emulating a path of one of the men's all time greats and Rafael and Nadal, and by that I mean dominant on one surface early on in her career and then making small adjustments to then
become a force on all the majors. And with EGA's age, I personally think that we're going to be looking at Ega in ten years, closing in on twenty Grand slams. I think that she's going to be a person who over the next force. You know, she's going to be one of the title favorites at every major moving forward.
She's made some slight adjustments within her game to where she's now playing so aggressively here on the hard courts, and she's not just using her foot speed in consistency the way we've seen her win on the clay a lot of times. It's been really impressive to see what she's doing.
I'm happy that I'm consistent. You know, this is something that I always work towards to and I always wanted to be this kind of player that is not gonna just give matches for free, you know. So I'm happy that I'm doing that, and I'm focusing on every single match like it's the most important one and I'm not letting go. So at the end, I think this is the result and it's great.
A few things on this topic.
Number One, we know that IgA is an incredible front runner. She's lost just fourteen games so far this tournament. I do wonder if Maddie can work her way into the match just a little bit put a little bit of stress on Fiantech. I wonder how she's going to handle that, especially because she has not felt that stress so far this tournament.
So interested to see that.
I did have the chance to talk to Bjorn Forra TAngelo, who is of course Madison Key's husband and also coach, and he said that in order to win the match, Maddie is going to have to be a little bit uncomfortable, to get out of her shell and probably do some of the things that we saw from her today against Fidlina, making sure you're aggressive in that mid court coming into
the net a little bit. And he also mentioned the fact that they're going to be playing a night match and the ball will likely not be jumping up off the court quite as much as it can with Egoshviontec's forehand in particular, that has so many RPMs on it, and Bjorn was hopeful that that would kind of keep that shot in Madison Key's strike zone. And he also mentioned that as the person warming her up, he said, I really don't like to warm her up because my game is not realistic.
But when she's playing Tech, yes it is realistic.
Yeah, so we said it actually works out when she's playing EGA, especially on the forehand side.
So she'll have a great warm up.
We know that, and we'll see ready, exactly what do you love ins have you got, Raiser?
Well?
I think Blair and Ryan have summed it up really well. I think it's super important for the Madison case to serve well tomorrow, not particularly early in that match. And the reason I say that is and Ryan's given great insight into the thinking on the second sip, going with more of the what we call the hopper down under, going with more of the kicks to get that ball, lifting and rising and challenging the returner in a different way.
But at night tomorrow and Rob Daverena and the weather's cool down here in Melbourne for the last twenty four hours. I just wonder whether you're going to get that same effect. And Eager's going to be on or inside baseline looking to come after every single second serve she gets a look at. If Madison serves well early. I like that
theory of Blairz. I think it's all of a sudden Eager finds herself maybe one four down opening set in a really foreign position, chasing scoreboard and encountering a pressure that she hasn't had so far. So I'm watching the Keys execution on serve early. I think if Madison does execute well on first serve, she can get these points on her terms. Madison's ball striking from the back of the court. She's someone that can absolutely go with it.
She's probably got her own speed off both wings, and she can match her for spin if she needs to off both wings. But if Eger is able to make this physical, if Eger gets Madison, Key's taking one hand off the racket and Madison's got to go to the slice and then is able to utilize her wheels and her movement. I think that's trouble. So I track a lot back to what happens early. I'm with Blair on that and what happens in terms of medicine. Keys is first to being able to do the damage tomorrow.
Not Yeah, I agree, it's going to be one. On serve. You got to look when you're in the coach's hat, like Jorna is right now, you look at the areas where your player has the advantage. And we have enough data on Madison to know, you know, we know who she is. She's improved, but you know who she is as a player, and she has that ability to hit the serve big and also use some variety and use
the kickserf. She has great backbend on the serve, great spin action on the serve, and to your point, if she's getting free points on serve and if she's able to put the pressure on the egoserve by getting through her service game. I would say in a businessman, but we can say business woman like fashion for Madison. I always tell myself to be a businessman on serve, and by that I mean efficient in control and under your own, you know, sort of tempo out there. I want to
see if Madison can do that. That's the one area of the game that I think Madison holds the advantages of being able to generate free points on serve and on return serfs. If she's able to do that, she doesn't give herself a shance a chance if she's having to play all these extended baseline rallies, that favoritism goes. Have you to igo.
With the tennis world still processing the heroics of Novak Djokovic on nine ten, there's one person who can shed light on his unbreakable mindset. Goran Ivanizovich, the former coach of Djokovic for six years, has witnessed some of his most challenging moments. Ivan Izovich has revealed some insights into Novak's inner world. He spoke with Daniella hunter Kova on her podcast The Real DNA.
When you work with the greatest in the history of tennis, is there something that caught you by surprise in a good way that you learned from Novak?
You can learn every day from you. I was lucky, I mean easier for me because we speak the same language you're coming from the same I was one country before Ugoslavia, so mentality is the same. Neighbors. So I understood the better his moves. It's not easy to understand his moves, but you know at least a little bit. But he is a genius. He's a perfectionist who wants everything to be one hundred percent every day. What was
good today is not good tomorrow. And you need to you know, you need to be ready, you need to always be at twenty four hours alert. But it's okay. I learned that and with him, you know, it's how he approached the matches, how he prove the practice, how he takes cares of his body, because if you see his career, he's probably among rough him Roger and Andy. You know, was always most fit and least injury. That's why he was carrying off his body with his eating,
with his exercise. And he's still here. Not that he's here, he's one of the favorite to win a tournaments and he's still going and going. He can still play for a couple of years for sure.
Do you believe he can win an Islam Yes, I.
Think you can come in. I mean, okay, Sinner is a favorite is the best player in the world at the moment, but Novak is Novak, and when he's present on the court, then I always put my money on Novac.
Is there something you don't miss?
I don't miss honestly, but okay, yelling, scream, okain. But in the end I didn't mind that. You get used to it. You know, it's a person nothing personally, it's a tennis match. You need to get your craziness out of system. You cannot kill somebody there or hit somebody there. So it's okay. We we were. We were there for that and now it's much quice on the court. You know, sometimes I don't know what to do with myself. You know, everybody is quiet. It's no stress. But it was okay.
I enjoyed it every minute. I enjoyed it, and it was a huge honor for me to be his coach.
So it's almost you would say to come these days.
Honestly, it's very calm. I say, first couple of practices, I was like, did I'm on the tennis court if somebody's playing, Okay, I need some action here, you know, right now, I'm getting used to this, to this quietness.
That's all for Day eleven of the Australian Open, but join me again tomorrow for all the big stories from Day twelve Women's Semi Finals day. Be sure to subscribe to never miss an episode, and please consider leaving a rating or review so more people can discover the tennis. You can also catch our daily spotlight segment on our YouTube channel Australian Open TV and I'll catch you tomorrow for more of the tennis