Louk
An Irish player has qualified for the Australian Open main draw!!! Louk Sorensen qualified for the main draw by beating New Zealand player Daniel King in straight sets.
He is the first Irish player in over two decades to get into a Grand Slam main draw. He plays Yen-Hsun Lu from Chinese Taipei in the first round whom is currently ranked 101.
Good look to Louk in the first round and I’d love to see him do well and maybe inspire many people.
The man of the moment
First of all, sorry for the lack of updates but there has been alot of stuff going on at college and I just didn’t have the time to blog. 
. This time I am really back for good!
I’m sure everyone already knows the unfortunate news. Federer couldn’t make it six in a row and lost his title to Juan Martin Del Potro. Well done to him though, his forehand was pretty amazing through the whole match. Did anybody else notice Roger is getting more and more ’saucy’ later in his career? By saucy I mean he’s getting irritated more easily and not at his very best behaved. His couple of arguments with the umpire about line calls were not impressive and I didn’t like it Nevertheless , Mister Del Potro walks away with his first grand slam title and it really leaves questions for Andy Murray. Andy was well ahead of the Argentine and was second favourite to lift the title. The point I keep making that Andy isn’t good enough is yet again possibly proved. I don’t think he has a slam title in him.
I still feel that Kim Clijsters isn’t getting enough credit for lifting the title at the Open. She is a mother who has been off the tour for the two years, she came back, didn’t even had a ranking when she entered this tournament and she now leaves as the world number 19. Truly amazing. It’s been overshadowed by Serena Williams and her neanderthal antics. In case any of you have been living in Kerry ( :p ) since last week, here’s a reminder of what happened…
Roger Federer won his 15th grand slam title to make him the most successful man in grand slam history and will regain the number 1 ranking on Monday. An epic battle that lasted over 4 hours with a final score of 5-7 7-6 7-6 3-6 16-14. A real match that ended on a Roddick error but the final set could have gone either way.
Alot of credit has to go to Roddick, he came out and played his best and really fought hard and if he didn’t miss that volley on set point in the second set, who knows? It was a great two weeks for Roddick and I’m sure he will gain alot of confidence.
Something disappointing though at the presentation when Federer showed off a jacket with “15″ on the back of it which he put on when he lifted the trophy. Very arrogant I (and many others too I’m sure) think.
Federer
Federer v. Roddick
A very exciting match today. Federer takes on Andy Roddick who he beat in the final here twice before. Roddick is playing very well lately and Federer is playing pretty amazingly it has to be said.
The head to head record is phenomenally top heavy in favour of Federer
Pete Sampras said he also may attend the final so the pressure will be on with some of the all time greats looking on.
Play starts at 2pm.
Enjoy watching history being made 
:)
(Image thanks to Krist on the RogerFederer.com forums.)
The moment
Federer outplayed Soderling the whole of that match, showing us his best shots and the kind of form that took him to 13 previous grand slam titles.
Federer has to put up with a man who ran onto the court at one stage with a Barcelona football flag wrapped around him and tried to put a red hat on Federer. Security were slow to react but he was tackled to the ground by security and carried off the court by 3 security guards. The man was jailed for questioning and could be charged with illegally entering a sports stadium. AH YES!… Oh, he also claimed to be a Federer fan….
The key shots in his win were is first serve and forehand dropshot which brought him countless winners and took Soderling completly out of his comfort zone. Federer wasnt broken once and saved each breakpoint with sometimes amazing shots.
The Final score 6-1 7-6 6-4.
The trophy was presented to Federer by Andre Agassi, who won the title 10 years ago, also completing his career grand slam. Federer is now tied with Pete Sampras for the most mens singles grand slam titles with 14 titles. He will have a chance to beat that record in a couple of weeks on the lawns of Wimbledon.
I think this proves Federer really is the greatest of all time.
Del Potro v. Federer
The match we have all been waiting for!! The title is within Federers reach and is the clear favourite to take it and this is most likely going to be the most difficult match he is going to face this week. Del Potro is a step above all the other opponents he has played and is in great form this week. But considering Federer is also playing amazing and has been in this situation so many times before, I really think Federer wont let this match get away from him, nor the title he has been wanting for so long.
Federer leads the head-to-head 5-0, including taking Del Potro apart in the Australian Open and winning comfortably in Madrid a couple of weeks ago on clay. Del Potro has never even won a set against Federer.
Federer in 3 sets.
Forehand winner
Number 2 seed Roger Federer came back from a thirst set deficit of 1-5 to defeat Jose Acasuso of Argentina in 4 sets. The Swiss saved set points in the first set but the Argentine leveled at one set all by taking the second. Federer eventually won the match fairly comfortably in the 4th set.
Gael Monfils, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Andy Roddick, Jeleana Jankovic and the Williams sisters all safely through to the 3rd round.
13th seed and Local favourite Marion Bartoli was completely outplayed by the Italian Tathiana Garbin of Italy. Jelena Djokic retired whilst leading number 4 seed Elena Dementieva.
Watch out for Rafael Nadal as he takes on an inspired Llyeton Hewitt tomorow as well as Andy Murray against Janko Tipsaravic. It could be a very difficult match for the Scot.
Stade Roland Garros
One of my favourtie tournaments of the year is finally here and I’ve never been more excited. The French Open (named after famous French aviator Roland Garros) is the second Grand Slam event of the year and is held in Paris. Its definetly the most physically demanding tournament in tennis, with the men needing to battle through 7 best-of-5-set non-tiebreak matches on the slow clay to win the tournament. Nadal has taken the title here the last 4 years and has NEVER lost a match on the Parisian clay courts so he is going to be very touch to get passed.
Federer beat Nadal on his favourite surface, in his home country and Federer won his first Masters 1000 title since 2007 less than a week ago so the Swiss should be supremely confident entering Roland Garros this year. Federer has been in the past 3 finals here losing each time to Nadal on each occasion including being taken apart in last years final. I have a feeling this year things will be alot different, I think Federer has never been more ready to take the title. I expect him to have a tough time in the Semi-final with Djokovic, but take down Nadal in the final with the same strategy he used in Madrid in either 4 or 5 sets.
On the Women’s side it’s pretty open, bit I think Dinara Safina will go one better than the final she made last year. She has been playing well the last few weeks and I think she wants to really reinforce that she is worthy of her number 1 ranking which Serena Williams is clearly jealous of. (Serena keeps saying she is the best player in the world. Well if she was she would be ranked number 1! So shut your mouth Serena. Fool)
Quick facts:
A look at the draw released earlier:
Players to look out for this week:
Play starts this Sunday so check out the official store for some overpriced but nice towels and stuff!
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