Davydenko joins big time, handles Del Potro to win ATP finals
LONDON -- Nikolay Davydenko won the first big tournament of his career Sunday, running down just about every ball and using a consistent serve to beat U.S. Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro 6-3, 6-4 to win the ATP World Tour Finals.
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| Davydenko has quite a weekend, knocking off Roger Federer and Juan Martin Del Potro to win $1.5 million. (Getty Images) |
"Maybe I had good concentration. I was surprised," said Davydenko, who has reached four Grand Slam semifinals but never made a final. "I was coming in from first point [with] 100 percent concentration. It was, I think, important for this match today."
• ATP World Tour Finals bracketDel Potro had three chances to break Davydenko, but the Russian saved them all to complete a sweep of all three of this year's Grand Slam champions at the season-ending tournament.
"He's very fast. He plays like PlayStation," Del Potro said. "He runs to everywhere. It's very difficult to make winners."
Davydenko also reached the final of last year's tournament for the top eight players in the world, but he lost to Novak Djokovic. That tournament was played in Shanghai.
The Russian earned the only break of the first set while leading 2-1. Del Potro saved the first break point he faced with a forehand winner, but while serving at deuce he was called for a foot fault. He stared at the linesman before serving again, and then popped Davydenko's return long.
He then put a backhand into the net on the next point to give Davydenko the break.
"After that foot fault ... he took the way of the match," the 21-year-old Argentine said. "But I don't know if I did [foot fault] or not."
Davydenko, who overtook the injured Andy Roddick as the sixth-ranked player on tour, finished the match with 25 winners and only 15 unforced errors. Del Potro had 20 winners and 19 unforced errors.
Besides facing each other at the O2 Arena, both players had to contend with a crying baby.
While trailing 4-1 in the first set, Del Potro played one point despite the cries of a baby behind him. He lost that point, bringing the score to 40-15. He then waited to serve to while the baby was carried out of the arena.
"Maybe he's bored watching our match," Del Potro joked.
In the second set, it was Davydenko's turn to wait while he was serving to even the score at 3-3. He paused while the baby quieted and then held his serve.
Now with an ATP finals title to his credit, Davydenko's next challenge will be to win a Grand Slam tournament. But he thinks it'll be tough to win his first major playing in best-of-5 matches.
"If Grand Slams come best-of-three sets, yes," Davydenko said. "I need to have very good physical preparation for the five-set matches in Australia. You need to run not like two hours, you need to run for four hours."
This season, Davydenko struggled early in the year with an injury to his left heel, forcing him to withdraw from the Australian Open. But he returned in April, and later reached the quarterfinals at the French Open.
He won his fourth title of the season at the Shanghai Masters -- a victory needed to help him qualify for the ATP finals -- and stretched his record to 5-0 in championship matches in 2009 by beating Del Potro.
In London, Davydenko lost to Djokovic in his opening Group B match, but then beat Australian Open champion Rafael Nadal and French Open finalist Robin Soderling to advance. In the semifinals, he finally got the better of Federer, who had beaten Davydenko in each of their previous 12 meetings.
Federer won both the French Open and Wimbledon this year and clinched the year-end No. 1 ranking for the fifth time in his career.
"He is a great champion," Del Potro said of Davydenko. "Nobody knows how we can beat him."
In the doubles final, Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan beat Max Mirnyi and Andy Ram 7-6 (3), 6-3 to win their third season-ending title and claim the year-end No. 1 ranking for the fifth time.
