and it was definitely more of case of it being a game Daniela lost rather than Cornet winningThat's a line I frequently read on this and other tennis forums when a power player loses to a retriever who would get outgunned if that power player played consistently. Most of the time it's used as a consolation or to show that if the aforementioned power player bothered she would've won. It's quite a misleading concept though as it leads you to think that Daniela was in control of the match while in fact she wasn't, at least not in the last two sets.

I didn't mean it as a dis-credit to Cornet, but it seemed when both players were on song Daniela seemed to be the stronger. I realise it's not fair to say that any power player that plays a retriever, inherently gets tagged as the 'better player' and as the player with 'the game on their racquet'. But i think it was an accurate observation for this game. Daniela gifted Cornet a hell of a lot of points, yet she managed to remain competitive. Often Cornet didn't have to do something spectacular to a clench an extended rallie, she'd just loop a ball back, Daniela would allow it to bounce (because she didn't seem confident to appraoch the net) and the point would start again until Daniela made an error. I just felt that Daniela didn't have that killer instinct to go for that final blow a lot of the time - probably because she was hitting so many unforced errors (something which i don't think was entirely a testament to how well Cornet played).

BMC mentioned the margin of error over the net. That is about standard for tennis.

Indeed, but it seemed like even Daniela's routine shots have a low clearance. I realise that it seems like i'm making a rather amatuerish observation, but i'd venture to say that her clearance is lower than most.

Come on Martin you know as well as I do that the BH DTL is Daniela's signature shot,I've seen her nail hundreds of them throughout her career from a lot less promising positions than the point in question.To be honest I don't buy into this "trademark shot" stuff. Most of the time it's an image created by media that are quick to jump on the bandwagon, needless to say how inaccurate such image can be. Daniela's backhand down the line was labeled as her trademark shot by tennis journalists after she beat Hingis at IW 2002, where I admit her backhand dtl was fast and accurate shot, which caused a lot of damage (at that time you could even see her hit inside out backhands, but she doesn't do it anymore). Apparently it has maintained that label until now. Once you have a label it's tough to get rid of it, that's how it goes. I believe that nowadays she hits her backhand with the rackethead more opened than she did in 2002 to add a bit of topspin, relies mainly on depth and accuracy and doesn't go for dtl winners as often as she used to when she emerged on the tour. It's easy to figure out why, because in general it's a low percentage shot and when Daniela isn't confident and her footwork is a mess like now, she misses. And I've seen her miss hundreds of them throughout her career. To add one rather ammateurish observation, it seems to me that since 2003 she doesn't put as much body rotation into the shot making it a little bit softer, but maybe someone will call me on this. Jankovic's bh dtl could be named her signature shot, Daniela's not as much, especially not if we consider that forehand is her stronger groundstroke.

^^ But you do realize how slow she is when coming forward?

^^ But you do realize how slow she is when coming forward?

This is true.

Maybe even the occasional serve-volley could be an option.

A middle age couple in Taipei were watching the match.

"She going to hit dropshot again. See I tell you she hit dropshot again."

A student in Buenos Aires was watching the match . . .

Daniela and Ai won the first set in doubles, 6-1. The set played closer than that as they saved all seven break points.

They thrashed their opponents in the second set 6-1, 6-2. Up next, either Black & Huber again or perhaps Azarenka & Zvonareva.

Dani and Ai just won 6-1, 6-2... They looked pretty happy. It was cute seeing how many japanese fans Ai has. Danka and her signed stuff after the win...

Like Artur said, they were smiling, happy and joking. Fascinating. Where does this great easiness come from?

I don't know but i would like to see that more often