A bit of different action for tonight, with the final of the Australian Open between Serena Williams and Dinara Safina:

Australian Open Play - Serena Williams (USA) vs Dinara Safina (RUS)

We have arrived to the final of the first Grand Slam of the year and we have to say this is a surprising final, as both finalists were the underdog in their semi final matches. Still that doesn't mean both players are coming to this match in a similar spot because they aren't. At all.

Serena Williams is easily the greatest player of her generation. She is a 9 time Grand Slam winner and a former three time winner of this tournament. In fact, she has won this tournament in 2003, 2005 and 2007, so she will have today the chance of keeping this trend going and win also the 2009 edition of this tournament. It's a fact that Serena has struggled during the tournament and that she was 5-7 3-5 down against Svetlana Kuznetsova in her quarter final match. But once she defeated Kuznetsova by winning 10 of the last 11 games of the match, we all knew Serena was ready to attack the final two rounds of the tournament. We are talking about a player who is 13-2 on Grand Slam semi final matches and 9-3 on Grand Slam final matches, someone who uses the pressure of the later stages of a Grand Slam to motivate herself and raise the level of her game and that's why she is considered the mentally strongest player of the tennis world right now, men included! Just three players have defeated Serena Williams on the last two rounds of a Grand Slam during her career: Venus Williams, Justine Henin and Maria Sharapova. We are talking about three multi Grand Slam winners, three players who will be one day in the Tennis Half of Fame and curiously neither match was in the Australian Open. In fact, once Serena reaches the semi finals of this tournament, she has to be considered the most likely winner, as she has won this tournament every time she has reached the semi finals in here. This includes some ridiculously good performances, as for example her 6-1 6-2 ownage over Maria Sharapova in the final of the 2007 tournament, when Serena was struggling with weight problems and was priced at 3.22 to win the match, let alone allowing just the number one seed of the tournament to win just 3 games during the whole match! And we could have already witness the power of Serena in the final four of a Grand Slam two days ago, when she defeated Elena Dementieva, the big favorite to win the tournament and who was 15-0 this season, with a terrific performance, moving ten times better she has ever moved this season, while serving 10 aces against the best returner of the circuit. She was priced at 2.11 to win the match and once again, she proved the sportsbook wrong and won the match in straight sets by 6-3 6-4. This is the Serena who always appear in the latter stages of the Grand Slams, where she uses all her experience and fighting spirit and put tons of pressure on the shoulders of her opponents, like Elena Dementieva or... Dinara Safina.

Dinara Safina will play her second Grand Slam final, but I can't say she is ready to be competitive against the best player in the world on a Grand Slam final. Not only this is a Grand Slam final, as also the winner of this match will be the new number one of the world next Monday. Safina had probably one of the easiest draws I've ever seen to get to a Grand Slam final, as she faced players ranked 70-49-28-16-187-7 during her run into today's final. Even in the semi finals, she faced an extremely nervous Vera Zvonareva, who just wasn't able to be competitive during the whole match. It's true that Serena has also struggled in the first rounds of the tournament, but she had a very tough test in the semi final against Dementieva, while Safina was barely tested against Zvonareva. Also Serena has already stepped up a gear on her tennis, while Safina hasn't stepped it up and she has never showed that she has an extra gear for this type of matches. In fact, she has struggled in some key matches last season, even after her breakthrough win in the Tier I of Berlin. Some examples of that are the Roland Garros final, where she gave no fight to Ana Ivanovic and lost in straight sets, her loss in the Olympics final against Elena Dementieva, where she was the favorite to win and lost after being up by 6-3 5-5, her no show against... Serena Williams in the semi final of the US Open where she lost by 6-3 6-2, her no show against Venus Williams in the expected match in Stuttgart where she lost by 6-4 6-2 and her terrible performance in the Masters where she lost all her three matches and wasn't able to win a single set during the whole tournament. So, for a several number of times, Dinara Safina has showed in the recent past she can't still handle the pressure of facing the best players of the world in high caliber matches. There is always a first time to get a big win over a big player on a big match of a big tournament, but we are talking about a player who has committed 52, 36 and 42 errors of her last three matches and Safina is no Serena, when it comes to step up her game out of nowhere.

Matchup wise, this is also a tough matchup for Safina. Serena is a big hitter and not only she hits very powerfully, she hits with a lot of consistence. This is what hurts Safina the most. Players who hit as powerful as her or even more powerful than her and players who are also capable of doing that with a consistent way. This is way Dinara Safina has always struggled outside clay against players like Venus Williams (0-2), Serena Williams (0-4), Maria Sharapova (1-2), Ana Ivanovic (0-2), Nadia Petrova (1-3) or Lindsay Davenport (1-2). When Safina can't dominate the baseline rallies and she is forced to keep hitting the balls repetitively because her opponent is able to keep returning her ground strokes into the court with deep strokes, Safina sees her number of unforced errors sky rocket and this is way Safina had 41 unforced errors against Serena in the semi final of last season's US Open, even though the game had just 17 games, which gives us an average of 2.41 UE per game. Well, when you offer two and a half points per game to Serena, what can you expect but getting blown out of the court? Will such performance happen again today? I think so. Because it isn't really in Safina's hands. It's on Serena's racket. Serena will move well once again like she did against Dementieva and Safina simply isn't able to keep the ball in play for a long period of time during a point, so she will inevitably commit a lot of unforced errors. This was basically what happened with Dementieva against Serena, as the Russian player committed almost one error and a half per game during the match and Dementieva is a very consistent baseline and a great mover, unlike Safina who lacks the consistence, the movement, the footwork and the defensive game of Dementieva, so she will probably get close to double the number of unforced errors of Dementieva committed in her semi final match against Serena.

Unfortunately for WTA fans, the last time a Grand Slam final went to three sets was the 2006 edition of Wimbledon, where Amelie Mauresmo defeated Justine Henin by 2-6 6-3 6-4. This means that the last 9 Grand Slam finals had just 2 sets played and I think this is what we are going to get in here. Serena Williams is one hell of a competitor and there is no such thing as a bad performance by her on a Grand Slam final. To be competitive against her, it's necessary to not only play amazing tennis, but also be experienced and have a champion attitude, with no problems in handling pressure. Safina is a very talented player, but she has never showed a champion pedigree until now and not even when she was on the form of her life at Roland Garros last season she could be competitive against Ana Ivanovic, who is miles away from the level of Serena when it comes to big matches. Serena is a champion and she has the chance of making history today by reaching the elite group of the players who won double digits Grand Slams. Serena has 9 Grand Slams and she will use all her experience, all her fighting spirit, all the edge she possesses on her matchup, all her mental edge over an inexperienced player at this level to get a very comfortable win against a player who will end up committing a lot of unforced errors, like every time she faces a player with the power and consistence of a player like Serena Williams. The spread is too short for such an advantage of Serena in this matchup and the results of the last two matches between these two players in the last four months and on very similar surfaces: 6-3 6-2 and 6-4 6-1. Considering all of this and the trend which shows the lack of competitiveness on the Grand Slam finals in the past three season, I'm taking Serena Williams to win and to cover the spread in here. Double Dime Play on Serena Williams (-4 Games) 

Good Luck