Daily Bagel: Roger Federer comparisons not easy for Grigor Dimitrov
The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.
• In the above video, Roger Federer impresses the crowd with a tweener off Alexander Kudryavtsev's missed first serve during their first-round match at the Australian Open on Monday. Click here for our review of Day 1.
• Sometimes it stinks being compared to Federer all the time. Just ask Grigor Dimitrov. "At one stage I was sort of getting burned out. I was like, 'Come on people, the guy is the greatest player of all time and I was 180 in the world when they first said that,'" the 20-year-old Dimitrov, now ranked 78th, said in an interview with Simon Cambers at The Tennis Space. (By the way, Dimitrov came back to beat Jeremy Chardy 4-6, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 on Monday.)
• In an interview with Doug Robson for USA Today, Serena Williams talks about mourning the loss of a mentor, and why her comments about not loving tennis were overblown. "I love holding up trophies and I love titles and I love saying, 'Oh, I don't really know how many I've won.' I love that feeling," Williams said.
• Steve Tignor on Bernard Tomic, who rallied past Fernando Verdasco on Day 1: "The first four times he was asked how he had won today, Tomic looked down, shook his head, and said, 'I don't know how I did it.' I guess if Tomic has given up figuring out how he wins, if he’s confounded even himself, we should stop trying to figure it out ourselves."
• The Bryan brothers', father, Wayne, shares some interesting thoughts on how to grow and develop tennis in the United States. "Champions are not created by million dollar slick ad campaigns!" he writes in a letter to a USTA executive. "Tennis will never grow from Madison Avenue! It grows from Main Street. Local parents. Local groups of kids getting going. Local parks. Local schools. Local clubs. Local coaches. Tennis grows from solid and fun and dynamic programming and charismatic parents and coaches and club pros.
"Ad campaigns are overrated for sports or entertainment. People go to the U.S. Open not because of flyers or posters or ads, they go to see that dazzling tennis at that majestic facility. People might buy Crest rather than Colgate because of an ad campaign. They might drink Coors rather than Bud because of an ad campaign. They might fly Southwest rather than American because of an ad campaign. They will not go see the Dodgers or the Angels or Lakers or Jets or Giants or Mets or Yankees because of an ad campaign."
• Nice gallery of the evolution of tennis fashion by Australian Vogue.
