The second Grand Slam event of the year has been in progress for the past couple of weeks, with the great and the good of the tennis world playing their hearts out at Roland Garros. The French Open has seen plenty of surprises this year, particularly on the women's side of the draw, and it has all been building up to today, the women's final.
Credit: Frédéric de Villamil / Flickr
Francesca Schiavone defends her title
Francesca Schiavone has put on a dominant show to defend her French Open title, but she faces stiff competition from Li Na, a somewhat unexpected finalist. Na triumphed over Maria Sharapova in two sets in the semi-final, to book her slot against Schiavone today.
The action begins at 2pm GMT+1, and the Factbyte Factbox will be live for step by step coverage from 1:30pm.
I'm putting my money on Schiavone.
Shall happily come join the live commenting awesomeness once I am off this silly bus. Li Na gets my support as she made me laugh after the Australian open final :)
I'll be happy either way, which is odd for a GS final :)
In other tennis news, Lleyton Hewitt, who had to pull out of RG, is playing Halle on grass and gets Roger Federer in the first round. Lleyton did beat Roger in the Halle final last year which made me positive Rog wouldn't win Wimbledon :)
Novak has pulled out of Queens with the official reason of patella tendonitis, I think exhaustion will be playing a big part too.
I want flowers.
Home now, yay! Time to tune in.
Just in time!
that pink looks awful on Franny
Reminds me of ice cream.
I feel if she wants to change her shirt she should change her skirt too.
In other news, mmm ice cream.
I want the figure of a lady tennis player.
I think being 5'1" means I can't have legs like that though :)
I imagine you have to play a lot of tennis to get it though.
that too. I'm currently in my bed eating chips so there goes that dream.
Schiavone is sloooowly creeping back into this first set
not quick enough :)
MARAT! *swoon*
I'm glad sue Barker was thinking who are they too :)
she doesn't know who Marat is? I hope she was talking about someone else :D
I think that's what she said, maybe I misheard her. She presents a question of sport and all the tennis, you'd think she'd know!
if she did I'll have to ban her from tennis forever, it's not like he's been retired for long and his sister is still mostly around :)
I don't think it was him she was confused about. It sounded like an anecdote without any real story, so it got a bit confusing.
ahh ok. I have the Aus commentators, I like them :) They're very old school.
She confused me so her confusion worked :)
so many old champions there, I need to be an old champion so I can go to lots of tennis.
I don't think these plans through.
I keep telling you, you'll have to play tennis.
I tried 20 years ago, I'm blaming mum and dad completely for my failure to be #1 in the world.
you need to invent a new tennis where you win, like 20/20 in cricket but Amy-ized
my first rule would be to ban anyone over 5'3"
every adbreak I get a Longines ad with Andre and Steffi. I'm 100% positive they're one of my favourite couples ever.
Go Li! Or. Li Na, even. I'm not sure which sounds better
if you want to call her by one name it's Na :D
I don't get it. Some people are saying Na, some are saying Li, some are saying Li Na. How are you supposed to know?
Go Na!
Now it just sounds like I'm talking to my nan
or to be even more confusing, Nails as the tennis blogging world call her.
I found out by having Chinese friends.
But I guess Li works too, because we do refer to some players more by their surname.
Player 1 and Player 2 would be better.
Definitely!
very computer game. I like it.
Schiavone isn't giving up just yet. I bet Li Na just wants to get these final few games done now.
This year at Wimbledon Roger for once won't be accented in gold, he'll instead be trying to camouflage in the grass
http://teamrfederer.blogspot.com/2011/06/roger-federer-wimbledon-2011_01.html
The tennis version of wikileaks
http://tennisleask.blogspot.com/
Ooh!
Awesome!
those pesky writers and their transcript ban won't keep me away from Roger trying to be funny!
Q. I want to say thank you because of the best tennis match I saw in my life.
ROGER FEDERER: Okay. Any time. (Laughter.)
Fran is not a happy bunny
the French crowd are so good at jeering anyone who dare argue the umpire, even when its the one they're backing
I love their dramaticness :) there's been a few times I've been watching and they've had a jeer and a woop and a boo
They loooove Roger and they hate Rafa, I find that rather amusing :)
Can you/have you tweeted about that? We wants to retweet.
Even in tennis european crowds seem to do the white stripes chanting. You hear it a lot on german football for some unknown reason
I have now :)
We're all about keeping things secret :)
heheh. The journos say that they can't release the transcripts so they can do their jobs, so reading this the other day made me angry:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2011/05/roger-federer-tennis-french-open.html
Yeah, no one cared enough to get any relevant quotes for the ENTIRE ENGLISH SPEAKING WORLD. GRR.
This has been a pretty back and forth set :)
I think that could be the slogan of the WTA :)
:D
I kinda want Fran to win now because I've preferred her this set than the first one #fickle
Although Li na sems to be on the edge of winning.
Here comes that gazillion match points.
blow my mind when people call out to their favourites as they're trying to serve for the championship. DO YOU WANT THEM TO MESS UP
Kinda surprised she managed to win 7-0 in the tie break after how back and forth it was
tie breaks, evil things
lovely to see her win but I can't help but feel tomorrow will be a billion times more stressful/epic :D
Tomorrow I am going karting so I am going to have to tell them to put the tennis up on the scoreboard clearly
I do like that Paris gets all epic with anthems and flags, no other slams do.
I do tend to enjoy a sappy bit of patriotism though :)
Thats a diddy little runner up cup
thats the wrong trophy, thats the replica of the winners one #oops
Ooooh, Murray documentary advert.
they've made a documentary about him? "the man who never wins"?
I am watching mens doubles and got confused to see the Bryans because I know they're not in the final, but this is some form of replay. This must mean it's time for the best song ever. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xT74EJ8vbw
Whoops, wrong murray, I should've said, Murray Walker instead :D
what is this F1 business, is this not a tennis site? :D
jaw = dropped
Is this actually happening?
possibly the only time I've been amused by James Corden http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04mt1hBZi
Malformed video id, noooooo
nooo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04mt1hBZi-U&feature=related
haha, andy is proper cringing and everything.
its one of those things you'll do and then hope no one ever ever ever mentions :D
although Novak also performed live http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqfV_CqXUJM&feature=related
If there were ranking he'd get some and Andy would need some taken away for not showing up :)
Heh, awesome. He loves it :)
I've literally just realised there was no Roland Garros karaoke this year and now I'm upset. Here's Murray from last year to blow your mind some more :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TRuRhIW5-U
I wonder why he's singing on a boat, what with the excessive swaying :)
Amy you are overloading me with awesome links. I don't think I can handle all this amazingness.
they've done it every year since 2007, it wasn't until I saw Rafa sing La Bamba http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jp0ciOGeRk that I realised Spanish people actually know the words to that song. Blew my mind.
That will be my last awesome link of the night, I am off to sleep so my Sunday is not as much as a write off as my Saturday was :)
heheh, much awesomeness shared. you should prepare for tomorrow :P
night amy!