Day 5 of the U.S. Open.

Day 5 was a break from the oppressive heat that was a major factor in the first few days of the tournament.  There wasn't anyone doing face plants during sprints, or any monumental upsets.  It was just a solid day of tennis with quite a few matches going the distance.

Lets start with the men first:

My upset special of Marco Chiudinelli fell short.  He pushed the 18th seed John Isner to his limits, but couldn't overcome the big serve of Isner to break when he needed to.  "Chode"inelli was able to take the match to 4 close sets though.  Isner's whole game is his serve.  His ground strokes, movement, and conditioning are below average, or maybe average.  I know, many you think: "What about Wimbledon, his conditioning has to be good to go for 11 some odd hours."  Well if you watched that match, Isner and Mahut were mere clones of eachother.  Both had excellent serves, but were lame in the other areas.  Neither could come close to breaking.  That is what happens when you are a one dimentional player.  Isner will soon begin to break down like he always does.  His U.S. Open is nearing an end.

A fun thing to watch was the "choke job" Ryan Harrison pulled.  The young American was facing Sergiy Stakhovsky, who won the tournament last week in New Haven, Connecticut.  The match went to the farthest limit it could go, a 5th set tiebreak.  Now comes the best part:  Harrison had 3 match points up 6-3 in the tiebreaker.  Then he just folded and lost the next 5 points and the match.  The announcers were rooting for Harrison, the whole New York crowd cheered every mistake made by Stakhovsky.  All the while ESPN was ready to declare Harrison the winner, and break down his future matches.  Then for him to do a nose dive was awesome.  I loved every second of it.

Tommy Robredo who has been struggling most of the year, surprisingly has gotten into the 3rd round.  He got the victory when Julien Benneteau retired in the 2nd set.  Benneteau puked up a lung in his first round match, he clearly wasn't fit for this tournament.  Time to climb some stairs Julien... Michael Llodra continues to play good tennis.  He backed up his first round upset of Tomas Berdych, to win again and now faces Tommy Robredo in the 3rd round.

David Ferrer kicked Benjamin Becker's ass, just like I had called...Fernando Verdasco "schooled" Adrian Mannarino 6-1, 6-2, 6-2...#20 Sam Querrey advanced, as did #31 David Nalbandian, #14 Nicolas Almagro, and #1 Rafael Nadal

Gilles Simon pulled a mild upset of 29th seed Philipp Kohlschreiber in 5 sets...Oh yeah, Andy Murray beat the hell out of some Jamaican dude.

Nothing really out of the ordinary on the side of the women.  Kim Clijsters crushed Petra Kvitova, and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova smoked Gisela Dulko in lopsided matches.

Elena Dementieva and Samantha Stosur both won in straight sets and will now face eachother in what will be an interesting 4th round match

Venus Williams won in her night match against Mandy Minella, and will face Shahar Peer in the 4th round.  Peer earned her way to the next round with a tough win over Flavia Pennetta.

Predictions for Saturday:

Arthur Ashe Matches-
#4 Jelena Jankovic will be pushed hard against #31 Kaia Kanepi, but will squeak by with another tough 3 set win.
Beatrice Capra's "cinderella" run will end with a titanic ass whooping at the hands of #14 Maria Sharapova.  This will be brutal and ugly. 
#2 Roger Federer over Paul-Henri Mathieu in straight sets.  Too easy for "The Rog".
In the first night match on Ashe,#3 Novak Djokovic will beat James Blake, but I would not be surprised if Blake takes a set off Djokovic.
And the last match of the day will be between #11 Svetlana Kuznetsova and #23 Maria Kirilenko.  This will be a good one, but I think Kuznetsova will come through with a tight 3-set win.

Louis Armstrong Matches-
#5 Robin Soderling will not have much trouble with Thiemo De Bakker.
#1 Caroline Wozniacki  rolls over Yung-Jan Chan.
#19 Mardy Fish will struggle to beat Arnaud Clement, but will do so in 4 hard fought sets.
#7 Vera Zvonareva will edge #25 Alexandra Dulgheru in 2 close sets.

Grandstand Matches-
UPSET SPECIAL***  Janko Tipsarevic will defeat #17 Gael "monchichi" Monfils in 5 sets.
#15 Yanina Wickmayer will cruise past Patty Schnyder.
#13 Jurgen Melzer will win a dog fight of a match with #22 Juan Carlos Ferrero.  This will probably be the best match of the day.

Court 11 Matches-
ANOTHER UPSET SPECIAL*** Kei Nishikori over the 21 seeded clay court specialist Albert Montanes.
Richard Gasquet has too much firepower for Kevin Anderson.  He'll win in straight sets.
Andrea Petkovic gets the win over Shuai Peng.
Dominika Cibulkova edges Loudes Dominguez Lino in 3 sets.

Should be another great day of tennis on Saturday.  and don't forget ESPN STILL BLOWS!!