Sunday's finals at Legg Mason pitted two hot players. David Nalbandian faced off against Marcos Baghdatis. On Saturday evening, Nalbandian made quick work of Cilic with identical sets of 6-2. After watching Nalbandian's ground strokes and serve that evening, he was the odds on favorite to beat Baghdatis and win his first US soil tournament. The only thing that could have derailed David is being tired from playing the night before and from playing so many matches in so few days. To further augment the pressure on Nalbandian, his draw was much harder than Marcos. In order to reach the finals at Legg Mason he had to dispose of Gilles Simon and Wawrinka, before facing Cilic.
Nalbandian's forehand was strong all tournament. He was hitting winners from all over the court and spraying the ball to the far corners of his opponent. He made the shots look easy, but Marcos did not give up many easy points.
After Nalbandian won the first set 6-2 in under 40 minutes most spectators thought the second set would be equally quick. Fortunately for the fans, the second set was more competitive, but not because of Baghdatis picking up steam. From our view it looked like David was just tired from all the play. He started to double fault in the second sit, hit a lot of unforced errors and basically let the game come to him. In the previous night's session and first set versus Baghdatis, David was jumping on short balls and hitting lots of winners. In the second set he was waiting for the ball and game to come to him. He was on his heels and hitting a lot of balls off his back foot. This caused him to hit a lot of unforced errors and allowed Marcos back in the match. Eventually the second set went to a tie break and Nalbandian beared down to finish the match.
David can hardly be blamed for being tired, despite all the matches both played the heat and humidity were sweltering. A woman in the stands passed out and the DC humidity was unforgiving even with the 3pm start to this match.
Overall, Legg Mason did a great job running the tournament and the finals seemed sold out. Congratulations to David Nalbandian on his title and if he plays like he did at the US Open look for big things from him. His game looks very strong and we look forward to him playing giant killer in Flushing in just 3 short weeks.
Written by:
