In the end, Federer is a gold medalist, though as a doubles gold medalist. He and Stanislas Wawrkina won the  gold medal today having survived some very tough doubles teams. Djokovic also was victorious over Blake to take the Bronze. I guess these two guys will head to the U.S. Open with some bit of confidence though Nadal will still be the firm favorite to win the U.S. Open if he beats Gonzo tomorrow.

Both Gonzalez and Nadal were pushed really hard by Blake and Djokovic but both dug deep to come through and reach the finals of the Olympics.

Gonzo was very lucky to escapte Blake after being down 0-40 and a bunch of match points against Blake but Blake did his choke job again and Gonzo will be going for his Silver now.

Nadal was lucky due to circumstances really. Novak didn’t look as though he was 100% and he pretty much gave away the first set. The second set, Djokovic showed his true hardcourt form to win it 6-1. But in the third set, Novak stayed with Nadal until the very end where he made 2 bad mistakes to give away his last service game. The last point of the match ended with Djokovic putting an easy overhead out after being in control of the point for the whole point.

Nadal will be the clear favorite in the final though Gonzalez has the game to trouble him. I still think Nadal wants this more than Gonzo, so it should be tight three setter. Djokovic will probably lose the bronze match as he has shown he is not very good when he is not fighting for the tournament (as we saw at Shanghai last year). So there you have it. Nadal wins Gold, Gonzo wins Silver, and Blake wins Bronze. Nadal will then head to the U.S. Open as the firm favorite (it’s three out of 5 sets guys) and will probably win that one as well to complete one of the best possible years for any tennis player. Move over Roger!

So much for Federer turning his year around. He lost in straight sets 6-4, 7-6 to American James Blake (for the first time in 9 tries). So Federer will probably have to end his career without an Olympic medal. But more importantly, with his current form, he might finish No. 3 in the world at the end of the year.