Who injures themselves sitting on a chair? ...

Dorky Rafa ... obviously.

Rafa came on court today with his right knee bandaged and the commies unsure of what was going on. Nothing new there. *giggle* Anyhow to the tennis first, well, I had breakfast with Rafa and watched from the very end of the second set and the whole of the third. It seemed relatively easy for him and he finished his 3 sets in 1 hour and 46 minutes ... including all the time he takes in between points - wowzers! Thankfully his opponent - Alex Kuznetsov - didn't turn out to be a tricky unknown customer and Rafa's stats for the match are pretty good. 42 winners, 14 unforced errors, 6 out of 10 break points converted, and he served 9 aces. Rafa will face Tommy Haas in the next round.

But the story of the day - no it wasn't the Rafa-Feds seismic shift, seriously - but how Rafa inexplicably almost withdrew from the competition due to a totally bizarre occurrence in the hotel. Here is what Rafa said from his presser ...

"But yesterday afternoon happened the more strange thing ever happen to me. I was sitting on a chair in the hotel. I felt like a crack on the knee, but is nothing really strange. Happens lot of time with articulation, movement, articulation. Nothing strange.

I stand up. I felt the knee a little bit strange. I moved the leg like this two times to try to find the feeling. After the second time, the knee stays with an unbelievable pain completely straight. I really couldn't move the knee like this (indicating just a little bit). I have no movement on the knee.

I have a hard afternoon. I did all the tests. Came here for ultrasound. Went to hospital for MRI. I just can say thank you very much to the tournament for all the facilities give to me on a Sunday. Not easy to find places, and they make fantastic work for me. So I just can say thanks to them.

And, seriously, yesterday during the evening I wasn't hundred percent sure I would have chance to play, because with the movement of that knee I felt that I will not be able to play.

I did a lot of treatment. The MRI was positive. Nothing wrong shows the MRI. So that's always a lot of calm. But still the knee, you know, with the pain.

Finally what happened is with the movement, articulation, probably pinch maybe the tendon little bit or something that put the tendon completely straight.

That's why yesterday we did a lot of work during the evening. At the end of the night with a lot of pain, but I finally really had the full movement of the knee. I wake up today morning with a little bit better feeling. I did all the treatment. I was all the day doing the treatment.

I started the match with a little bit of scare at the beginning, and nervous because I was really disappointed yesterday. But, you know, after the first 10 games that was scare, I started to play with normal conditions.

The best thing is I felt the knee very well. So is something that I really don't understand why happened everything, but I am really happy that today I was ready to play and I played a fantastic match."

What is he like? From burning his fingers on a hot plate to chairs fighting back. All I can say is that is was probably a 20th Century design classic just getting its own back due to the standard tennis player abuse ;)

Here's hoping that Maymo can work his magic and that Rafa sees some improvement in the next round.