Australian Open 22 - 24 January 07
Three of our days in Melbourne were spent at the Australian Open Tennis Championships. On our first day there, we just got a general admission pass which allowed us entry into the second biggest arena (the Vodafone Arena) but not the main arena (the Rod Laver Arena). We spend the day moving further and further towards the back of the arena to escape the blazing sun. Still though, we got to see some good matches. First up was the Bryan Brothers from the US taking on Wesley Moodie and local boy Todd Perry in the third round of the doubles. Bob and Mike Bryan are twin brothers whose only difference as far as I could see is that one is left-handed and the other is right-handed. But that only helps if you know which one is which. The Bryan brothers won the match and as far as I can remember - went on to win the doubles tournament outright... Yep - I've just checked that out on australianopen.com and I wasn't leading you astray.Next up was Anna Chakvetadze (RUS) V Patty Schnyder (USA) in the 4th round of the women's singles competition. Chakvetadze won that, but was beaten by compatriot Maria Sharapova in the Quarter Finals.
Finally we watched some of Tommy Haas (GER) V David Nalbandian (ARG). We didn't watch the whole match because we were a bit tennis-ed out and just about ready to melt so we headed back to St Kilda for a nice cool beer by the beach. Oh yeah - and Tommy Haas won that match by the way.
Our second day at the tennis was actually a night session at the Rod Laver Arena. This was where we saw the great man himself, Roger Federer play Tommy Robredo of Spain. There were a few breaks of serve and even a tie-breaker but in the end, Federer kept his record of not dropping a set and moved on to the next round without too many worries.
Our seats were right up in the back of the stadium giving us an impressive view of the Melbourne Skyline through the partially opened roof. Would you believe that they turned the tennis court into a swimming pool just a few weeks later for the World Swimming Championships? Honestly - it's true!
Our third day at the Open was a day session at the Rod Laver Arena. The first match was the women's singles quarter final I already mentioned between Maria Sharapova and Anna Chakvetadze. Sharapova of course, won this one... but lost to the unseeded Serena Williams in the final.
Next up was the Qtr final between Kim Clijsters (BEL) and Martina Hingis (SUI). This one was a tough one for me because I like them both a lot. In the end, Clijsters won out and went on to meet Maria Sharapova in the semi-final. This match was pretty cool for us because we got to go right down the front for a while when we spotted some free seats there. In the Rod Laver Arena - you are assigned your seats, but people aren't allowed come and go during play. So if a seat is empty just as the players are about to start a game, then it will be empty for at least three games until the next change of ends. So we were looking right over the press box - we could have read the next day's sports column if we'd read over the shoulder of the right journalist...
The final match in Rod Laver that afternoon was the men's qtr-final between Tommy Haas and Nikolay Davydenko (RUS). The match was a bit of a battle by all accounts; Tommy Hass eventually winning out, although it went to five sets and still wasn't over by the time we got back to our hostel. We were too hot and tired to stay for the whole thing so we went for a stroll around the grounds before heading home. And look who we spotted on a practise court - Andy Roddick himself...
A kindly passer-by took this photo of us in front of the exit - just to prove we were there....
posted by Maz @ 11:29 am
0 comments
