Davydenko crown a perfect week beating Del Potro
No. 7 in the ATP World Tour, Nikolay Davydenko, capped a perfect week after winning the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals with his triumph 6-3, 6-4 win over Juan Martin del Potro at the O2 Arena in London.
Davydenko, who had been a finalist at last year’s edition in Shanghai to play Novak Djokovic, is the first Russian to win the tournament in its history (since 1970). His effort this week will be worth a check for U.S. $ 1,550,000 and will also snatch the No. 6 South African Airways ATP Rankings to Andy Roddick.
“I was watching (the cup) until the year 2008, there were so many names there, like Djokovic, Federer, Sampras,” said Davydenko, who played his fifth tournament in consecutive order. “In 2009, Davydenko tell forever. I think it’s spectacular. In the history of the Finals that my name is there is incredible to me.”
On the way to win the most important tournament of his career, Davydenko defeated the winners of the four Grand Slams this year: the Australia Open champion Rafael Nadal in round-robin phase, reversed a 0-12 record against the winner of Roland Garros and Wimbledon, Roger Federer in the semis, and now in the final conqueror of the U.S. Open, Del Potro.
“The other year is interesting for me because winning the last tournament of the season is fantastic. I know the tournament will be for five years in London. It was a big stage, everything was perfect. Sure you will enjoy another year in London. I hope that the organization is equal or better “.
“The tournament is a great champion like Nikolay,” confessed Del Potro, winner of three ATP World Tour titles this year. “He worked very hard to beat every week. You may have to improve a bit some small details. But he played much better than me, that’s all. He played an unbelievable tennis and I won fairly.”
From the start the pace was well above Davydenko Del Potro with his usual depth and precision, to an Argentine who was not physically in better shape to withstand the game. In the fourth game the Russian capitalized on his second break chance to take the lead 3-1. He saved a break point in the seventh game before closing out the part.
In the second Russian pressure remained constant on the serve of Tandil, who had to save two break points in the fifth game. Then in the seventh Del Potro had his big chance with two break points but Davydenko responded with two great services that enabled him to get on with the game.
The coup de grace came Davydenko, of 28 years, s in the ninth game where errors took advantage to break Del Potro at zero, and thus serve for the match. Thanks to his seventh ace-lost only five points on his first serve throughout the match-point game and was holding a rivet broke out after the Argentine tried to answer but left in the mesh to end the game.
“I’m surprised it was 6-3, 6-4 in just an hour and 24 minutes,” said Dayvdenko. “Before I played three-set match, very hard, more than two hours. In the end I think I had good concentration. I was surprised. I was from the first point with 100 percent concentration. It was important for this game today.”
“He’s very strong,” said Del Potro. “I’ve never won on hard courts or indoors. It’s very fast. Play like Play Station, run to every ball. It is very difficult to get winners. But I think it is a great champion. Nobody knows how we can beat him.”
The Russian won five ATP World Tour Final played this season, all of them since July. Davydenko was physically limited the first five months of the year with an injury to his foot, which prevented him from defending the crown of the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, but returned with great pace in the second half of the year.
The Volgograd resident won consecutive titles for the first time in his career at the International Belgium Open (v. Mathieu) in Hamburg and the ATP Studena Croatia Open (v. Ferrero) in Umag, before becoming the main protagonist of the Asian tour where Proton won the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur 2009 (v. Verdasco) and ATP Masters Shanghai 1000 (v. Nadal).
He now have an impressive mark of 18-5 in ATP World Tour Final. It is the second time in his career to win five titles in a year, which was also achieved in 2006.