Canucks Close in Canada, But Favorites Prevail

Of the countries that host important tennis tournaments, few have less of a chance of producing a hometown singles champion than Canada (though the Monegasque are even less likely to produce a local winner in Monte Carlo).   Daniel Nestor is about as good a doubles player as you can find, but in singles the pickings are decidedly slimmer.  Aleksandra Wozniak has recently planted herself in the top 30 on the women's side, but the men don't currently have anyone in the top 100.

Despite their apparent lack of contenders to make noise at the Rogers Cup in Montreal, all three Canadians in action Tuesday impressed against quality opponents.

The eldest of the Canadians, Frederic Niemayer, got the unenviable draw of Roger Federer in the second round, in the Swiss's first match back from paternity leave.  Niemayer had already won a round in the main draw of Montreal (against free-falling Igor Kunitsyn), and played admirably against Federer, pushing the world #1 to 7-6(3), 6-4.

Peter Polansky, the other Canadian in second round action Tuesday, also went down in straight sets to a top foe, losing 6-4, 7-6(6) to #4 Novak Djokovic.  Polansky responded to the stage admirably, but really this match was about Djokovic looking awful in his first match since Wimbledon.  Djokovic can play his way into an event and gain form as it goes along, but he looked extremely unimpressive and vulnerable against Polansky, who is currently outside the top 200.  Djokovic shouldn't run into any tests until Roddick in the quarterfinal, a match Roddick should dominate based on recent form.

The most impressive Canadian on Tuesday was 18-year old Milos Raonic (right), who got a wild card into qualifying where he beat Teimuraz Gabashvili and Michael Llodra.  Raonic took advantage of a somewhat unsuspecting Fernando Gonzalez early in the match, taking the first set 6-4, and even having a match point in the second set tiebreak before Gonzalez recovered to win 4-6, 7-6(6), 6-4.  Raonic never looked rattled at any point in the match, even after missing out on his match point, a lack of short term memory that should continue to serve him well in tennis. 

While there were a lot of positives to take away from Raonic's game (incredible fearlessness, big serve), there are definitely things he needs to improve if he's going to be the player to put Canadian tennis on the map.

The main concern with Raonic's game is his volleys, which were frankly pretty awful.  Plenty of players aren't tremendous volleyers, but Raonic had a bigger penchant for coming to net than most players of his volleying caliber.  In the long run he needs to work on strengthening his volleys, but in the short run he needs to stop coming to net on crucial points, because the way he blew point after point up there was cringe-worthy.

Speaking of Canadian tennis, I got the chance to sit down with Canadian #1 Frank Dancevic (who ran into a wall of Gilles Simon in his first match in Montreal) last week during the Legg Mason Tennis Classic in Washington.   We talked one-on-one about the state of Canadian tennis, his game, and how his career would have been different had he been born just a few miles away on the other side of Niagara Falls.  That interview should be up (in a few parts) in the near future, so keep an eye out for it.