Marat Safin

Early life and career

Safin was born in Moscow, USSR (now Russia), to an ethnic Tatar[2] [3] [4] family. His parents were former tennis players and coaches. His younger sister is a professional tennis player Dinara Safina, and not the singer Alsou Safina, contrary to public belief, although she also has a brother named Marat. Safin's father managed the local Spartak Tennis Club where Safin trained in his youth alongside several up-and-coming tennis players, including Anna Kournikova, Elena Dementieva, and Anastasia Myskina. At age fourteen he moved to Valencia, Spain, to gain access to advanced tennis training programs which were not available in Russia. Safin gained the attention of the tennis establishment in 1998 with his consecutive victories over Andre Agassi and (defending champion) Gustavo Kuerten at the French Open. Marat himself is Muslim.[5] However it has never been shown to be a factor of interference in any of his competitive matches that he must bow down and pray toward Mecca 5 times a day. It cannot be determined whether or not this Muslim requirement of faith is a factor of interference with his training regime.

World No.1 and 2000 US Open

Safin held the No. 1 ATP ranking for 9 weeks during 2000. In that year, he won his first Grand Slam tournament at the US Open, by defeating (then) 4-time US Open winner and (eventual) 14-time Grand Slam tournament winner Pete Sampras in straight sets. Tennis experts immediately hailed Safin as the new star who would dominate tennis in future years. However, Safin failed to live up to this hype. He suffered a succession of injuries which affected his game and, in 2003, resulted in his missing the majority of the season.

Grand Slam history

Safin reached the final round in three more Grand Slam tournaments, all in the Australian Open (in 2002, 2004 and 2005). He has cited nervousness as the reason for his loss in the 2002 event, and physical exhaustion for the 2004 loss. He defeated home-country favorite Lleyton Hewitt in the 2005 finals to secure his second Grand Slam in five years. En route to this final, he defeated top-ranked Roger Federer in an epic five-set semi-final match. Safin later described the match as "a brain fight". Safin's win ended Federer's 26-match winning streak over top-10 players, denting the Swiss player's aura of supposed invincibility.

He has never progressed further than the quarterfinals of Wimbledon (2001), often losing in the first or second rounds even as a Top 10 player. In 2002 he reached the semifinals of the French Open, his best performance there to date.

Masters' Series

Safin has won five ATP Tennis Masters Series titles during his career. His first was in 2000 when he won the title in Toronto, Canada. He holds a record-tying three (2000, 2002, and 2004) wins in Paris, France, and one in 2004 in Madrid, Spain.

Tennis Masters' Cup

In 2004, Safin reached the Semifinal of the Tennis Masters' Cup in Houston, but was defeated by Roger Federer, 6-3, 7-6(18). The second-set tiebreak was the third tiebreak of the score 20-18 in the Open Era. Safin also reached the semifinals in 2001.

Davis Cup

Marat Safin also helped Russia to its first Davis Cup victory in 2002, with a 3-2 tie-breaking win against France in the final round at the Palais Omnisports Paris Bercy. His Russian team included Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Mikhail Youzhny, Andrei Stoliarov, and team captain Shamil Tarpischev. The team made Davis Cup history by being the second to win the event after losing the doubles tie-breaker, and becoming the first team to win a (live-televised) five-set finals match by coming back from a two-set deficit. Safin also helped Russia to win the Davis Cup in 2006. After a straight sets defeat by David Nalbandian in his first match, his doubles victory (partnering Dmitry Tursunov) against Nalbandian and Agustin Calleri and singles victory against Jose Acasuso drove Russia to victory.

2005

After winning the 2005 Australian Open, Safin attributed his recent revival and more consistent performance to the calming presence of his new coach Peter Lundgren, saying that "I never believed in myself before at all, until I started to work with him." Lundgren had been Federer's coach, until parting ways at the end of 2003; Safin hired Lundgren the following year. All the talk about Safin finding his consistency was a false dawn, however, as he was defeated in the early rounds of each of the seven tournaments he played between the Australian Open and the French Open. In June 2005, shortly after his unsuccessful French Open campaign, Safin made a surprise finals appearance at the Wimbledon tune-up tournament in Halle on grass -- admittedly, his least-favorite playing surface. He lost the final narrowly to the defending champion, Roger Federer.

2006

Although a serious knee-injury hampered Safin's progression and rankings within the ATP (he missed the 2005 US Open and 2006 Australian Open), he has since got back on-track with appearances at the 2006 ATP Masters tournaments at Indian Wells, Miami, Monte Carlo, Rome and Hamburg.

On August 17, 2006, after a disappointing year, which saw his ranking drop as low as 104, Safin temporarily parted ways with coach Peter Lundgren. [6]

At the 2006 US Open, Safin looked like he was back on track as he defeated the then world #4 David Nalbandian in the 2nd Round in a 5th Set tiebreaker. However, his run didn't last much longer as in the 4th Round he lost to former world #2 Tommy Haas, also on a 5th set tiebreaker.

Safin's current improvement in form has continued, firstly in September, with an impressive home Davis Cup tie where Russia beat the USA 3-2 to gain a place in the finals in December 2006, and secondly with a good run at the start of the indoor season the Thailand Open where he was narrowly edged out by #7 seed, James Blake.

On October 14, 2006, Safin made it to his first final in a year-and-a-half at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow, the first all Russian final at that event, losing to Nikolay Davydenko.

On December 3, 2006, Safin defeated Jose Acasuso 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5) in the 5th rubber of the 2006 Davis Cup, winning the cup for Russia. He had previously lost 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 to David Nalbandian in his first match. In the doubles match, he teamed with Dmitry Tursunov to win the doubles match against Nalbandian and Agustin Calleri in straight sets.

2007

Safin played no warm-up tournaments in the run up to the Australian Open. As Safin was forced to miss the tournament in 2006 due to injury, 2007 was his first Australian Open since he captured the title in 2005.

Safin played the first round against Germany's Benjamin Becker, defeating him in a 5 set battle, 5-7, 7-6(7-2), 3-6, 6-3, 6-4. Safin went on to beat Israeli qualifier Dudi Sela, from two sets to one down, 6-3, 5-7, 4-6, 7-6(7-4), 6-0. Safin played sixth seed Andy Roddick in the much anticipated third round match, and lost 6-7, 6-2, 4-6, 6-7 in a grueling 3-hour match. Roddick commented after the match, "With Marat you know you are going to get an emotional roller-coaster. You just have to try and focus on yourself and I was able to do that tonight." He later added jokingly: "And it doesn't help that he's nine feet tall".

At Wimbledon, Safin reached the third round where he met Roger Federer, he lost the match 1-6, 4-6, 6-7(7-4).

Source: Wikipedia