Power games
Well, the title is completely misleading. Its not about the games people play with power, but the games power plays on people. Power, is a highly elusive commodity in India. And sometime back, it used to be far more elusive in places like Delhi, though things seem better. Anyhow, this story goes back to 1995. Power cuts of a few hours each day was very common in Delhi those days and as school guys, we used to get pretty pissed off but we had no option but to stay put.
Anyhow, this was about a pleasant Friday evening. Me and friends were watching Wimbledon Men's SF and Pete Sampras had coasted through Goran Ivanisevic. Now, Becker was playing Agassi, who hadn't been broken, hadn't lost a set in his way to Semi Finals and hadn't been defated by Becker in 8 outings before this match. He was also World #1 and also top seed, though Sampras, winner of two previous editions was a strong favorite.
Agassi coasted through first round and was finishing Becker off in the second set with two breaks and was 4-1 up in the second set. At that point, Becker decided to up his game and notch and with Agassi having couple of unforced erros, he was having 2 break points and the Power decided to play it's game and it went off. Kaboom!! Blackout!!
So, here were me and Amit Ahuja, meeting in the lawn of our apartments in the dark and hoping that something exciting would happen in that match and somebody would challenge Agassi. But we had nothing to do except waiting and praying for the blackout to end. As we spent the next 20 minutes nervously walking around the neighborhood park, I can recall clearly the hot discussions on what Becker should do to pull things back.
When power was restored, Agassi had been broken back twice and the set finally went to Tie Break where Becker overpowered Agassi completely. Becker had finished a bunch of games at love, finding his great serve and almost completely throttling Agassi.
The rest of match went Becker's way and he finished Agassi off in 4 sets to set up a final against Pete Sampras. History was witness to a great match that night and as Power played its game with us, game played out at the Center Court was a classic piece in Tennis.
For those, who missed out the match: here are the Youtube links to that match, N'joy:
Anyhow, this was about a pleasant Friday evening. Me and friends were watching Wimbledon Men's SF and Pete Sampras had coasted through Goran Ivanisevic. Now, Becker was playing Agassi, who hadn't been broken, hadn't lost a set in his way to Semi Finals and hadn't been defated by Becker in 8 outings before this match. He was also World #1 and also top seed, though Sampras, winner of two previous editions was a strong favorite.
Agassi coasted through first round and was finishing Becker off in the second set with two breaks and was 4-1 up in the second set. At that point, Becker decided to up his game and notch and with Agassi having couple of unforced erros, he was having 2 break points and the Power decided to play it's game and it went off. Kaboom!! Blackout!!
So, here were me and Amit Ahuja, meeting in the lawn of our apartments in the dark and hoping that something exciting would happen in that match and somebody would challenge Agassi. But we had nothing to do except waiting and praying for the blackout to end. As we spent the next 20 minutes nervously walking around the neighborhood park, I can recall clearly the hot discussions on what Becker should do to pull things back.
When power was restored, Agassi had been broken back twice and the set finally went to Tie Break where Becker overpowered Agassi completely. Becker had finished a bunch of games at love, finding his great serve and almost completely throttling Agassi.
The rest of match went Becker's way and he finished Agassi off in 4 sets to set up a final against Pete Sampras. History was witness to a great match that night and as Power played its game with us, game played out at the Center Court was a classic piece in Tennis.
For those, who missed out the match: here are the Youtube links to that match, N'joy:
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 1
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 2
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 3
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 4
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 5 (end of first set)
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 6 (AA goes to 4-1 and starts serving the key game at 3:37 in this video)
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 7
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 8
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 9
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 10
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 11
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 12
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 13
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 14
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 15
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 16
- Agassi vs Becker, Wimbledon SF'95 Part 17
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