!: Australian Open 2008 - Are We Playing Fair With The Draws?

Let us take the men's draw top half as an example. As much as I want to accept the rules, I just can't. Of course I understand that the 1st seeded player should play the weaker players, but how weak can a whole quarter of the draw be? Or rather how lopsided can a quarter of the draw be?

The opposition Roger Federer will have to "feather" in his quarter of the draw is just a cake walk, compared to the quarter just below him where Novack Djokovic, Dimitri Tursunov, Marata Safin, Marcos Baghdatis, Leyton Hewitt, David Nalbandian (Federers slayer twice in 2008), Juan Carlos Ferrero, David Ferrer will be playing gargantuan matches. This list of players opposing each other in the same quarter looks more like the list of 'who is who' that won most of the tournaments in 2007 not to mention the most Grand Slam winners together in one quarter! While Roger Federer, in his quarter of the draw, comparatively, will be playing "no names"!!

What does this mean? The above-mentioned high calibre players, who are worthy to be finalists at the highest level of play, will bludgeon each other to death and by the time they get to the end of their quarter and into the semi-final, whoever is left and whatever is left of them, the lucky one surviving the onslaught will be purely a shadow of himself and a sacrificial lamb for Roger Federer to give him the final coup-de-grace in style.

This is somewhat similar to the spanish Bull-fights. Once the poor bull is depleted of blood by the "picador", the "matador's" final coup is kids stuff, Olé! Nevertheless, a big song and dance is created around it and the bullfighter gets the ears, the tail and is carried by the "fans" around the arena and everyone claps! But the question remains, was the bull fit? Was it a fair fight? Are the players below Roger Federers quarter going to be bled to death before they face Roger? It looks like, YES! Is it a fair fight? NO!

What is in it for tennis fans and tennis lovers? A mockery of us and a travesty of a tournament! As I once said this is no different then the 1930s where the previous winner was automatically put in the final. Today it is the same with a few practice matches in between!! Now, look for yourselves, this is a copy of the Australian Open 2008 top half of the Mens' Draw at the present stage (2nd Round Top half):

ROGER FEDERERS QUARTER:

Roger Federer SUI (1) v Fabrice Santoro FRA

Janko Tipsarevic SRB v Fernando Verdasco ESP (25)

Juan Monaco ARG (21) v Amer Delic USA

Oscar Hernandez ESP v Tomas Berdych CZE (13)

James Blake USA (12) v Michael Russell USA

Sebastien Grosjean FRA v Robin Haase NED

Marin Cilic CRO v Jurgen Melzer AUT

Hyung-Taik Lee KOR v Fernando Gonzalez CHI (7)

HERE STARTS THE QUARTER BELOW ROGER FEDERERS:

Novak Djokovic SRB (3) v Simone Bolelli ITA

Sam Querrey USA v Dmitry Tursunov RUS (32)