Australian Open 07

The Australian Open is over for 2007. The biggest surprise for me was Serena Williams monstering Maria Sharapova on the way to winning her first major title in a while.

Much less of a surprise was Roger Federer’s expected win, taking him to his 10th grand slam title, closing in on Pete Sampras’ record of 12.

Fernando Gonzales played a good final, and had two set points on his own serve in the first set, only to end up losing it in a tie break. Federer took the next two fairly comfortably for the win, but had it not been for so many unforced errors by Gonzales, he could have really had a go at Federer. The way Gonzales played in the last week was phenomenal, but you only rarely saw some of that perfect placement that saw him railroad his last few top-ranked opponents.

Federer won the title having not lost a single set the whole tournament, a feat not achieved in a grand slam tournament since Bjorn Borg 27 years ago. This isn’t exactly going out on a limb, but I’ll say Federer is going to be the greatest tennis player of all time. Based on his playing ability I think he already is the greatest, but he’ll soon officially be the best if you’re only going by record wins and other statistics.