TENNIS in DEPTH.

First up is No. 3 seed Novak Djokovic squaring off against No. 6 Tomas Berdych. The two met in a high-profile match in the Wimbledon semi-finals on July 2 with Berdych winning in straight sets. But Djokovic holds the overall head-to-head lead, 3-1. And since that loss on the grass courts of London, Djokovic has compiled an impressive 26-6 record on the ATP World Tour while Berdych has gone 8-12 since then, including a loss to Djokovic in Davis Cup semi-finals. Berdych is the only player in the Top 10 not to win an ATP World Tour title this season. In fact, the other nine have won at least two titles. This is Djokovic’s fourth appearance at this event (winning it in 2008 but falling in round robin play twice); Berdych is making his tournament debut.

 Next up is World No. 1 Rafael Nadal against No. 8 seed Andy Roddick. Nadal has the Australian Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon, the US Open and an Olympic gold medal in singles, all of the greatest titles in tennis on his resume. But this is the biggest one to elude him so far. He has made the semi-finals twice (2006-07), falling in straight sets both times to Roger Federer, and in his third year-end finale appearance here last year, he didn’t win a set in the round robin stage (0-6). But Nadal is hungry as ever this year, and although Roddick did win their most recent meeting at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami in April, the American has reached the semi-finals three times at this event (2003-04 and ’07).

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