Originally Posted by: paul_pipkin

Originally Posted by: Dartagnan

Originally Posted by: paul_pipkin

Avatars? They come & go, lol. Seems they are back now. 

Hey, Masha's nose was evolved for pre-heating volumes of Arctic air. Snot goes with the territory. I'm good with her snot. :P

Forget the crowd--the Parisians are gonna be down on Masha this time no matter what. Various reasons, none of which are personal. Firstly, the understandable Bartoli-factor, but construe:

The French organizers have pulled crap on the Russians all thru this RG: the Russian Quarter, targeting Masha with the "wildcard" phenom--Yank commentariat pre-scripted to drag in the testimony of Navratilova. Tell me that "just happened".  

Then take a glance at how Caroline Garcia "just happens" to be set up to take out the top Russian girls thru quarters, semis & final of the Juniors.  That may not work so well, but it IS the "plan".

There is no doubt in my mind the crowd is salted with "cheerleaders" to guarantee the "correct" expressions. If that doesn't work well enough, broadcasters will simply mechanic the audio input to support their "narrative" (also pre-written.)

Fortunately, Masha is no Princess who must be loved to play well. 

But Maria Sharapova is not the first Russian girl who has a chance to reach the final of Roland Garros. Kuznetsova won this trophy 2 years ago. So I think that the French people know that our Russian girls are champions.

And many french men are going to support Maria SHarapova for her beauty and talent. 

That's all true--and why the question of perception is so important the broadcasters will mechanic it. The mercurial character of the Paris mob is legendary & their reception of Maria is no exception. One year they love her, another they hate her. This year the atmosphere is not so good--but outcomes don't need to be overly influenced by that.

Roddick, Williams, Wozniacki may drop the ball 'cause they get their feelings hurt--but Sharapova is made of tougher stuff. 

No matter how Maria plays, she isn't the French's sweetheart. The reasons? First, she's Russian. Second she's too American. Third, she can't say a single word in French. The only Russian girl that French fans truly appreciate and love is Elena, simply because Elena speaks French, she loves Paris (she has an appartment in Paris suburb where she used to stay when she came to the French Open). Even Myskina wasn't in the crowd's heart when she won RG. I can remember fans supported Elena over Myskina in that final.

French people love beautiful tennis, great style and classy players, not glamorous players. They made an exception for Anna Kournikova; they don't love her for her tennis but for her hotness (who wouldn't?). French fans find Maria a little arrogant in her press conferences and vulgar for her shrieking on court although they appreciate her beauty. Her tennis is very powerful, sometimes unstoppable, but she doesn't have a beautiful tennis like Graf or Henin, the two most appreciated by French fans.

How the crowd is going to react in the next two matches? In the semifinals, I think the crowd will pick Na Li over Maria because Maria is supposed to be the favorite. If she plays against Bartoli in the final, she definitely will have the whole stadium against her. If Schiavone is the finalist, the Italian will have the crowd's favor.

In short, Maria can only count on herself and her power to outmatch her opponents and win the trophy.

Originally Posted by: paul_pipkin

Thanx, M-Lover. All good, arguable propositions.

Just one additional tid-bit: In the American ESPN2 replay of the quarterfinal, the Paris crowd reactions sound (perhaps oddly) not nearly as adverse to Maria as the Eurosport original. 

One or the other broadcaster mechaniced the audio. Just saying... 

Meh. The crowd were great with her today, the best they've been the whole tournament, even heard a few "Allez Maria's"

I think they're starting to realize she's not so bad after all. Even so i imagine she'll still get rough treatment later in the tournament, if she progresses that is :-) Not to worry, she thrives on it. Keep booing i say!

Originally Posted by: goran.k@gmail.com

I woke up this morning thinking it was time to watch the match...when in reality I overslept and entirely missed it! What an amazing surprise to wake up to. 6-0, 6-3 is great, even though after watching the match- it was not as easy as the score may assume.

Regardless, I am SO HAPPY with this win :D!! She seems to be improving with every match and will have to continue to improve to take on Li Na. Hopefully, she blasts her right off the court :).

Does anyone think that Maria has a great advantage over Li Na (having her former coach)? Do you think that will be a factor?

Absolutely! A few people have mentioned this now. Could be crucial. I'm sure Thomas has briefed Maria earlier, now all she has to do is execute the plan as she did against Petkovic today and we'll be sorted. According to the commentary earlier Maria was quoted as saying shes delighted that Hogstedt had coached a player against her in the past, as he's analyzed her game from a different perspective, has seen flaws and thus i imagine has endeavoured to resolve them. 

Welcome to the forum 

Compare to other opponents Na Li is more mature and steady" Mindwise". However, I think Maria is well aware how good Na Li has been playing so far, but not because I'm a fan of Maria I think Maria confident is very strong, thanks to her new coach and her fiance with her. I think she is ready for a battle!!

Best of Luck Maria!

The longer the amtch goes, the more it favors Li. Sharapova should start strong here because Li Na tends to be slow at the beginning of a match. Sharapova should take all her chances hit accurate strokes and make Li off balance. Li, absolutely a better mover than Sharapova and that's very important when playing on clay. 

Sharapova was just confident in her quarterfinal match, she should be able to cary that momentum against Li. Plus she lost 2 CONSECUTIVE times to Li Na. Losing thrice is TOO MUCH fore her. The grit for revenge is gonna be there for Sharapova.

Exceptional stuff from Maria this clay court season, the entire world knows she despises the surface yet she managed to win one of the major tournaments and make it to the semi of the slam in Paris, her best results in any single year. I'm sure she'll be a little down right now but there are so many positives to take from the last few weeks. Can't wait for Birmingham and Wimbledon :D

On the match today, Li was excellent, great tactics and she handled the wind better thus she won. Had the conditions been still, there was only one winner imo. It's no coincidence that Maria won 90-95% of the points when it was calmer and she attacked, Li couldn't handle it her. Unfortuantely there were far too few points like that with the balls swerving around. Anyway well done Maria!!!

Originally Posted by: Philli

Dont you just hate me when I'm right? Maria's slogging game was no match for a player that uses her head as much as her racquet. Na Li completely outplayed her and made her look like an average player who gets in one or two good shots but mostly they are way off or double faulted. Na Li played exactly the same tactics that she used to beat Maria in Birmingham last year. Seems like Maria has a very short memory.

I repeat my answer on the yahoo group while we couldn't access the forum:

And you probably noticed no wind at all, duh?  Which for several obvious reasons affects Masha's play more than most other women players. The play today was nothing to write home about--by either player in either set.

I'm intrigued by the medium-level grudge both Eurosport (which I did hear during the warmup) & ESPN2 hold at Thomas. Did they suppose his China deal (which was broader than simply his involvement with Li) obligated him to sign onto the Yankee Cold-War agenda?  Stay tuned.

I'm gonna irritate some fans in that I temper this loss with some relief.  I wasn't gonna say so before the outcome, but I kept recalling the Dementieva situation. Arguably, to some small degree we lost her thru the wrong-headed notion her "last chance" at a major had passed.

I could too easily visualize Maria receiving an RG victory as Well, I've done everything now except the Olympics--and we'd need to fear retirement after London next year. In that I believe the cold war in tennis & sport generally will heat up from that time, I'd like Maria to remain on court for another two-three years. This (still needs to win RG) adds further motivation.