Davis Cup returned this past week, and we now know the finalists for this amazing international tournament. The U.S. team will meet Russia in the rematch of last year’s semi-finals, but here is the catch: the games will be played in the U.S. where the court will be either hard or grass. Roddick was the hero for the U.S. and he seems destined to achieve one of this ultimate goals, winning the Davis cup. But on a more surprising note, the more than capable Swiss team found a way to lose the Czechs even though they possessed the most dominant athlete on the planet in their ranks: Roger Federer. Roger Federer was his dominant self against the Czech team, but Stanislaw Wawrinka was a huge disappointment as he lost both of his matches, when he was expected to at least pick up a point. But the Swiss lost the match in the second day when Federer and Allegro had a couple of match points against the Czech team which would have allowed Federer to seal the deal against Berdych. But now, Federer’s team is out of the World Group, and Federer can’t hope to win the Davis Cup next year. Will he win it the following year? Not if his team doesn’t step up to return to the World group. Once the Swiss team gets there, they need to make sure that they have a motivated Federer in their ranks, and they also need to provide good backup for him. Federer has no reason to dedicate himself to the Davis Cup if his team can’t win despite of him winning all his singles matches! A lot will depend on Federer’s ability to beat Sampras’ record next year. If he does that, he could take his mind off of smaller tournaments and focus on the Davis Cup. Of course, with young guns coming up so fast, teams such as France, England, and even Serbia will be hard to beat, so it seems Roddick will have the better of Federer in one department. For now anyway!

Roger Federer won his 12th Grand Slam at the U.S. Open by besting the up and comer Novak Djokovic in straight sets. There have been many stories in the past few weeks from analysts who predicted Federers fall from throne at the U.S. Open at the hands of Djokovic, but the truth of the matter is Federer is in a different league right now. It takes the best his opponents can conjure up for them to hide the gulf of class between themselves and Roger Federer. Federer has the ability to best anyone, anywhere, if he plays his best tennis. To be honest, Federer hasn’t done that in the past two years. He has had moments of brilliance in his matches with Roddick, Gonzalez, Nadal, and even Djokovic, but he has never come close to the level he was when he bested the legendary Agassi at the U.S. Open 2005. But he never has had to produce that level of tennis to beat his opponents. He has the ability to play the bigger points better than his opponents (maybe not against Nadal on clay), and that is why he has kept on winning even when he is only in his 2nd gear.

So what’s next for Federer? Olympics 2008, and Sampras! With this year’s ATP race for No. 1 all but wrapped up by TMF, Roger can look forward to his exhibition matches with Pete Pistol Sampras. I, like any other tennis fan around the world, am intrigued by this match up. I just hope that we will not see a one side match when Federer and Sampras meet in November. I understand that Sampras believes he has the game to beat Federer, but as far as I can remember, he lost quite handily to Robby Ginepri in his early days back with Tennis, and Federer is no Ginepri. But the more important aspect of this match is the current mindset of Mr. Federer. It is given that Federer has been in cruise control in his past few GrandSlams, but he has taken his feet of the gas pedal on smaller tournaments, and I wonder if that will hurt him in slams as well. For someone like Federer who wins 15 times more than he loses in a year, dropping matches to players such as Canas and Volandri can be a big confidence killer. The timing of this exhibition matches seem to be a little bit off. Federer perhaps could’ve waited till he had more or two slams before committing himself to play Pete 4 or 5 times.

Why not let Nadal take a crack at Pete. Of course, we all know that Pete cannot beat Nadal’s physical presence and his fitness these days, so he may not be willing to play him. In addition, I believe Pete does not consider Nadal a true star. Pete considers Nadal a claycourt specialist even though Rafa has made it to the finals of Wimbledon twice in a row. The problem for Rafa is the fact that he has failed to make any impression on American hardcourts. He is consistently injured or off his game when in America, and his Miamis AMS win in Spring is not a distant memory. But, Nadal is the king of kings in the mental game, and he can outplay Sampras, Agassi, Federer, and even Connors in that department. He will win a hardcourt GrandSlam someday, and when he does, he will truly be worthy of Federer’s throne. Until then, Sampras will not want to face the Spanish Bull. Going back to Federer, he needs to focus all his might on next year. He needs to win at least 2 GrandSlam next year, and he is more than capable of doing that. The young guns are now going to be harder to beat, and days of seeing the likes of Roddick and Hewitt in the finals seems to be over. But, Federer can technically tie Sampras’ record by Wimbledon or even the French Open, if manages to win it. If he does that, it will be hard to imagine anybody above him as the GOAT.

Can Andy Roddick win the 2007 edition of the U.S. Open? He has played limited minutes so far thanks to his opponents retiring left and right. But his next opponent is going to be 10 times tougher than anyone he has faced at the U.S. Open this year. I’d like to believe that Andy was hoping for a few minutes last night for Lopez to pull off the upset against the World No. 1 Roger Federer. Lopez was oh so close to taking the No. 1 to a second set tie-break, and he had 3 consecutive break points in the first game of the third set. But, Andy should have seen it coming from a mile. After all, Roger has done it against Roddick times and times again. Good serve, better forehand, Ace…. and games over. But all is not lost for Andy. He has to fancy his chances now that he knows how to attack Roger Federer. Lopez exactly showed how to unsettle the world No. 1, but it came down to execution in the end. He managed to execute flawlessly for a set and half, but once he started missing his shots, it was all over. One thing that Lopez had going for him was the fact that he was a lefty. For some odd reason, Roger believes that he is not supposed to be returning lefties serves as well as he does let’s say John Isner’s. That may be due to a certain Rafael Nadal who has managed to baffle Roger with his less than perfect serves. Roddick’s serve however will not be new to Federer. I expect Roger to read it better as the match goes on, but Roddick will have the home advantage of playing at night, which will be trickier for Federer.

So what are the chances that Roddick can pull off an upset. It depends. If he wins the first set and somehow manages to pick up the second or third set, his chances will be very good. But if Roddick loses the first, just like he did in last year’s final, it will be tough for him to come back. Roddick hasn’t played awfully well this year. An injured Berdych was inches away from taking the first set off of him. But, he will be ready for Federer. That’s for sure. Whether he manages to pull off the upset, that is another story.