Stan the man to beat

What an epic Australian Open it has been. First the 42 degree heat battering players on court and now this.

Stanislas Wawrinka has beaten the odds.

Despite his victory over World Number two Novak Djokovic in a titanic battle 2-6 6-4 6-2 3-6 9-7 just five days ago Lollipop did not even pip Wawrinka to win his first grand slam – The Australian Open.

Somehow the Swiss has done the unthinkable and beaten the top seed Rafael Nadal 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 at the final. Of course pundits and reporters will comment on Nadal’s obvious back injury that caused him such anguish in the second set. But Wawrinka had to fight to become the new grand slam champ.

In the third set Nadal was rejuvenated and won convincingly. The court was set for an incredible comeback from the Spaniard. Wawrinka clearly had other plans. He was rattled after Nadal’s medical treatment as he demanded to know what was wrong from the umpire. His concentration was unhinged but he still managed to beat the French Open champion and celebrated in a subdued manner out of respect for the injured Rafa.

No one would have picked Wawrinka to win this tournament which makes it even more special for the game.

From tomorrow the champ will be the Swiss number one and the world number three. By winning his first title Wawrinka has changed the rankings. It’s no longer between Djokovic, Murray, Federer or Nadal. It’s between Wawrinka and whoever is ready to up their game.

Before the Australian Open Wawrinka had only reached one Grand slam semi final- the 2013 US open where he lost to Djokovic in five tightly contested sets.

He then went on to the ATP World Tour Finals for the first time in his career beating Tomas Berdych and David Ferrer in round-robin matches. Although he lost to Nadal in straight sets for the twelfth time in his career he has clearly learnt from his mistakes today.

The 28-year-old becomes only the second Swiss man to win a Grand Slam singles title after 17-time champion Roger Federer.

At the presenting of the trophies Wawrinka said, “Last year I had a crazy match, lost it. But in one year a lot’s happened. Right now I don’t know if I’m dreaming or not. But we’ll see tomorrow morning.”

Tomorrow Lollipop will see that the top four have been overturned by one man who is going on to do incredible things in tennis grand slams.

With Murray not up to his best after his back surgery in the summer and Rafa now questioning his form Wawrinka has picked the perfect time to challenge his opponents.

The French Open is now the next grand slam in 2014 and despite Rafa winning the title eight times in his career Wawrinka could cause another upset as he considers clay his best surface.

Rafa is still number one but Lollipop and I can see a blossoming rivalry between him and the other Swiss guy in 2014.

Unless someone else has anything to say about it…

 

Heat vs Murray

When it’s just a lowly 6 degrees in Manchester it’s hard to believe that Andy Murray beat Frenchman Vincent Millot with temperatures reaching 28 degrees at 23.58 Melbourne Park.

Play was suspended in the afternoon when the heat soared to 43 degrees. Clearly Murray had the easier challenge as his brother Jamie suffered from heat stroke after his game. The Wimbledon champ overcame the heat and his opponent to win 6-2, 6-2, 7-5 hitting an incredible winning 23 points in a row towards the end of the set.

Lollipop was ecstatic with the Scot’s second round triumph and believes that despite the heat, his previous surgery and his next match against 26^th seed Feliciano Lopez of Spain on Saturday Murray is still in to win.

After the champ said: “I wanted to win the match. I’m glad I finished it there, because it was very, very hard conditions. Even in the evening it was so humid.

“I just was glad to get off. I’m still pouring with sweat now.”

The heat is a serious opponent for all of the players at Melbourne Park. Lightening struck during the second round match between Spaniard Fernando Verdasco and Tevmuraz Gabashvili of Russia. Beads of sweat could be seen across Caroline Wozniacki during her match against Christina McHale. Croatian Ivan Dodig feared he “could maybe even die” after he withdrew from his match with Damir Dzumhur in Melbourne two hours and 22 minutes in.

Temperatures are set to reach highs of 41 tomorrow before cooling down on Saturday to a humid 22 degrees.

2013 US Open champion Serena Williams also admitted the heat affected her game and said: “I just wanted to stay hydrated. The last thing I want to do is to cramp in this weather. It can happen so easily.”

But King of Clay Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic who extended his winning streak to 26 matches after beating Leonardo Mayer 6-0 6-4 6-4 are both overcoming the heat.

Murray maybe already surpassing critic’s expectations but they are greater challenges ahead. Whether its safe or not these conditions have already pushed players to the edge or to an early exit. As Djokovic, Nadal and the heat are easily defeating their opponents who knows who will soar through to the finals.

But is the Australian heatwave enough to whisk Lollipop away from the bitter Mancunian weather?

Definitely.

Lollipop’s blog of the year

Cycling, tennis, football, Jay-Z. Lollipop covered it all in 2013. But what was our blog of the year?

For us watching Olympic athletes race on the streets of Manchester last May was definitely a sporting highlight.

Long Jump Champion Greg Rutherford and US gold medallist Allyson Felix took part in the Great City Games and were cheered on by a raucous Manchester Crowd.

The weather was scorching and the athletes were on fire as Felix ran a City Games record of 16.36 in the Women’s 150m.

The event reminded Lollipop of London 2012 and the sensational wins from Paralympics Gold Medallist Jonnie Peacock  who also ran in the Manchester event and 15,000m champion Mo Farah.

For such inspirational events to happen in our home town shows the sporting talent across Manchester and what we have to look forward to in 2014.

It was a tough year for squash as the sports governing body fought hard to add the game into the Olympics last September. To Lollipop’s dismay the International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted to reinstate wrestling rather then add squash or baseball to the bill. However the sport has enjoyed huge financial support in Manchester as the community and club programmes are nearly at capacity with children and adults from across the city. There has been a complete new refurbishment to all three courts at Moss side Leisure facility. The National Squash Centre is also home to England Squash and Manchester Squash.  From the 10-16th February the National Squash Championships will take place in the Manchester centre proving to the IOC that squash has what it takes to become an Olympic sport.

Cycling also made the news in the Summer of 2013 but this time for all the right reasons as Chris Froome became only the second British man to win the Tour De France. The 28-year-old took the title by more than four minutes last year. Now as the cycling capital – Manchester will be one of the three cities to host The Sainsbury’s Sports Cycle relief on Sunday 23^rd March. The charity event heralded by Olympic Gold Medallist Sir Chris Hoy will also take place in Glasgow and London at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The gruelling 25 and 50-mile routes will start and finish at Old Trafford football stadium, where the 3-mile Family Cycle will take place.

Rugby was huge in 2013 as the British and Irish Lions pulled off a historic 41-16 win over Australia at the ANZ Stadium in Sydney. It was the teams first test series victory against Australia since 1989 and to top it off the boys won Sports Personality Team of the year in December. Manchester will also be taking part the sport’s success by hosting the Superleague magic weekend at Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium on 25-26^th May. All 14 Super League Clubs will return to the Etihad Stadium to battle it out once more in front of fans and reporters.

So the line up is set. No doubt Lollipop will find more events throughout 2014 to blog about. But for now lets sit back and look forward to sport in 2014.