Polona Hercog’s game, while she is riding the high end of a confidence cycle, can be a treat tow watch. Kuznetsova was on the receiving end of 20 winners in the first set in the quarterfinals yesterday and Sakkari’s fate today in the first set was not much different. The 48th-ranked Greek player tried to use every bit of her athletic ability to keep up with the steady onslaught of winners and drop shots flowing steadily from her opponent’s racket. She even saved a set point at 3-5, but Hercog’s form proved too much for her at the end as the 75th-ranked Slovenian wrapped the first set up 6-4. It was thanks to a sizzling start right out of the gates to go up a break, an advantage that Hercog held on to until the end of the set.
Polona Hercog – Photo: Tenis Dunyasi, @tenisdunyasi on Twitter
The only moment of concern during that set was when she led 3-2 and committed a rare couple of dismal errors – one on an easy overhead missed wide – to go down a break point. However, when you perform with confidence, those moments appear as nothing more than nuisances rather than turning points. Hercog quickly corrected course with two spectacular winners to hold serve and continue the ride. It was the first set that Sakkari lost this week, although that sentence does not accurately reflect reality since it was rather Hercog who won it.
Polona had experienced a letdown in her match yesterday after dominating the first set against Kuznetsova, therefore Sakkari needed to remain calm and keep pressing on the pedal. First few games of a set are often where shifts in balance occur in tennis matches. Maria also needed a few more first serves after serving at 44% in the first set – 27% at 4-2 down.
Losing a blank game on her serve to start the second set meant that the shift was not appearing anytime soon on the horizon for the Greek player. In fact, if anything at all, it was a repeat of the first set. Hercog held to go up 2-0 and here we were, once again, watching Sakkari trail Hercog by a break.
Hercog took it a step further by increasing her lead with a second break after a contested game at 3-1 in which Sakkari fought hard to stay within distance, ultimately falling short. Seemingly with “nothing left to lose” – I use quotation marks because that phrase is never true – at 2-5, she tried to take returns early and get to the net. It did temporarily catch Hercog off-guard and allow Sakkari to earn three break points at 0-40. It proved to be nothing more than a momentary glitch as Hercog climbed back to hold and end the match with a score of 6-4 6-2.
It was a convincing win for Hercog. She never wavered from her game plan and kept pushing Sakkari around from the beginning of the match to the end.
The desired pattern of play was the same for either player in this match. It consisted of running around the backhand whenever possible, dictating play with heavy forehands, and approaching the net if the opponent’s ball landed short. Having a high first-serve percentage plays a significant role in this type of match since getting the upper hand on your opponent early in the point allows you to impose your plan while denying your opponent the same.
Pauline Parmentier – Photo: Tenis Dunyasi, @tenisdunyasi on Twitter
Hence, the fact that neither player served well early in the match could somewhat explain the four straight breaks to start the match. After two straight holds to get to 3-3, Begu had an error-prone game on the seventh game, losing her serve again with a backhand unforced mistake into the net. Parmentier now had a chance to break free late in the set, with her serve to follow at 4-3.
Begu helped her get to break points in that game on two separate occasions, at 30-30 and deuce, by missing an easy volley on the first, and hitting wide a routine forehand inside-out winner from inside the service line on the second. Although Parmentier could not capitalize on those two chances, she eventually broke the Romanian’s serve a few points later to become the first player to lead by two games at 5-3. All credit to Parmentier in the 5-4 game as she seized the first set-point opportunity that she got, to produce a spectacular forehand winner from a difficult position behind the baseline.
Second set began much like the first, with Begu breaking in the first game on the heels of Parmentier’s fourth double fault of the match. Begu was again unable to confirm the break due to a couple of untimely errors on forehand accelerations – last one coming on break point.
Parmentier, for her part, stayed a lot more composed than her opponent on crucial points, staying within her limits. For example, she would still keep some of the topspin on her forehand swings even when she went for clean winners, instead of flattening them out for warp-speed winner attempts like Begu was attempting. It ultimately led her to the victory, winning eight out of the last points to close the curtain on her opponent with a score of 6-3 6-4.
At the end of the day, Begu simply committed few too many errors on winner attempts, mostly with her forehand, like the ones that put her down 3-5 in the first set and 3-4 in the second. It’s a frustrating way to lose a close match because it means that she played with the right game plan and earned her chances to finish points but misfired on execution shots.
Tomorrow in the finals, it will be Polona Hercog aiming for her third WTA title, her first since 2012 (Bastad) taking on Pauline Parmentier who is, for her part, aiming for her third WTA title as well, first since 2008 (Bad Gastein).
This encounter between the 48th-ranked Sakkari and the qualifier Rus turned out to be a straight-forward baseline affair, with little variety produced by either player. Points were largely decided on errors, with the Dutch player committing a few more than her opponent. There were not many points won at the net, or specialty shots like angles and drop shots. While Rus managed to strike several impressive forehands – especially down-the-line – she also sprayed a number of them deep. Interestingly, several of those deep errors came on shots aimed to the middle of the court.
She had a couple of chances to break Sakkari’s serve in the beginning of the match but could not capitalize on them. As happens so often in these cases, the player who just squandered break-point chances, loses her own serve in the very next game. Sakkari carried that early-break advantage all the way to the end of the set, taking it 6-3.
Maria Sakkari – Photo: Tenis Dunyasi, @tenisdunyasi
Rus was able to go up a break early twice, thanks to a few forehands missed by Sakkari, but could neither hold at 2-0, nor at 4-2, to confirm those breaks. Nevertheless, she stayed a step ahead throughout the second set. Sakkari, for her part, could not get her first serve going in the second set, registering a dismal 29% midway through. But Rus could not take advantage of her leads enough to force Sakkari to modify her game plan. Sakkari continued to feed her opponent a steady stream of cross-court shots and waited for her errors.
Second set came down to a tiebreaker. Rus did hit a couple of forehand down-the-line winners (by far, her most potent weapon in this match) to get ahead. She went up 6-4 on a double fault by Sakkari, thus earning two chances to send the match to a final set.
However, Rus committed costly errors to lose the next four points and the match. It was a fitting microcosm for how the match went for Rus on important points. On her second set point at 6-5, she had a forehand sitter inside the baseline that she failed to put away, missing the next forehand deep. Then at 6-7, down a match point, she missed a backhand wide. Just like that, the match was over 6-3 7-6 in Sakkari’s favor.
This is the Greek player’s second career semifinal appearance in a WTA Event and she will need to get past Polona Hercog to reach her first final.
Sometimes there are sets where one player clicks on all cylinders and there is not much that her opponent can do about it, like in the first set of this match. Hercog came out firing winners and managed to make Sveta, one of the best defensive players in the WTA Tour, look helpless on several occasions. She struck 20 winners (to three for Sveta) and only made six unforced errors on the way to pocketing the set 6-1.
As the second set commenced, there was only one question that mattered. Would Hercog be able to maintain her form? We did not have to wait long for the answer as Hercog began the second set with a series of errors to go down a break. Sveta who, for her part, remained calm and collected, although still not completely free of errors.
The match took a 180-degree turn and Kuznetsova cruised to a 6-1 victory in the second set. The shocking number, even with such a blatant reversal, was Hercog hitting only one winner in the second set, after having recorded twenty of them in the first. Kuznetsova won it without really playing well.
With the first two sets having been decided by the early games, it only made sense that the next ten minutes would play a crucial role in the outcome of the match. Both players knew it because you could sense the tension in their game. At 30-30, Hercog gagged a shoulder-level forehand volley in the net! Sveta returned the favor in the ensuing break point with a forehand mishit that landed deep. She added credit to that favor with another forehand missed wide on her second break-point opportunity. You could tell the relief in Hercog’s body language as she walked to her chair, up 1-0, after Sveta erred on a third forehand on game point.
Both players began to hold their serves as some sense of order seemed to settle in the match. Or so everyone thought.
It all went haywire again after the seventh game. Following an exchange of breaks at 3-3, Hercog played a shockingly bad game on her serve at 4-4. She chucked her racket to the ground in disgust after the last point. Sveta, serving at 5-4, outperformed Hercog yet again by losing four points in a row, three of them on routine errors.
At 5-5, we finally had our first “quality” game of the final set, at least for Hercog. She hit a fine drop-shot winner and followed it with a forehand winner on the next point – from the same spot she misfired on two of them back in the 4-4 game.
That hold to go up 6-5 turned out to be the crucial “break” for Hercog, Sveta simply could not put a stop to the string of unforced errors that she was committing on her service games. Fittingly, in the last two points of the match, she missed a backhand wide and a forehand inside-out wide again before walking up to the net to congratulate her opponent for the win.
Kuznetsova fans are probably concerned, for valid reasons. Ranked 28 in the WTA, Sveta’s form is nowhere near the level needed for a possible run in the French Open. I am not sure if the three matches she got under her belt in Istanbul have helped the cause. Furthermore – and this is a shocker in my opinion – Sveta has not won a title on clay courts since 2009, when she lifted the trophy at Roland Garros, one of her two Major titles.
Polona Hercog will take on Maria Sakkari in the semifinals on Saturday.
Before I get to the “why” and “how” of Wozniacki’s retirement, let me start from the beginning.
Parmentier is a very solid clay-court player. Her forehand is probably one of the most intimidating weapons on clay because of the amount of spin that she generates on it. She usually prefers to park on the baseline and dictate the point, seeking to eventually wear her opponent down under the heavy weight of her aggressive forehands. On the downside, she happens to have the type of game that Wozniacki can easily dismantle.
Caroline will run all those hard-to-reach balls and put them back in play, eventually pushing the likes of Parmentier to take bigger risks and commit error after error. She will operate with a high first-serve percentage, not allowing opponents to start the point aggressively. She will mix in a drop shot or two for good measure, in order to bring them in and get them out of their comfort zone.
A combination of the above took place during the first set. For example, at 1-1, Wozniacki got her first break by winning a point during which she covered, twice, the court from one corner to the other and got three balls back in the court that Parmentier may have recorded as winners against many others. Parmentier, desperate to put the ball away, eventually overfired on a forehand that landed deep. Riding that break, Wozniacki would eventually climb to a 4-1 lead.
Parmentier recovered impressively and got back to 4-4. At the 30-30 point on Wozniacki’s serve, the Danish player worked Parmentier’s backhand during a long rally. It finally ended when Pauline cracked and hit a backhand in the net. It was a key point, one from which Parmentier would not recover. She committed five more errors in the next few minutes and Wozniacki pocketed the first set 6-4.
It was a close set, but it was undoubtedly played on Wozniacki’s terms.
Then, things turned sour for the Australian Open winner. Parmentier, a remarkable fighter herself, had a terrific start to go up an early break. Wozniacki needed a medical time-out at 0-3, notably having problems with her abdominal area and stretching her back. When play resumed, you could see that she was not moving at her best when she had to run forward to pick up low balls on a couple of slice shots by Parmentier. She also seemed to hold back a bit on her serve.
She did not give up on the set, even managing to break Parmentier’s serve at 2-5. Parmentier answered the challenge with a very solid return game and won the second set 6-3.
Wozniacki asked the trainer to come on the court and had a brief conversation with her. She pointed to her abdominal area and showed certain movements with her arm which made her feel pain. She then approached the chair umpire, told her she was retiring, and headed over to Parmentier to explain.
In a matter of two hours, the top two seeds, Kuznetsova and Wozniacki, were no longer in the tournament. Any hope that tournament organizers had of filling the already empty stands inside the otherwise impressive Center Court at Koza WOS probably evaporated away around that time.
Irina-Camelia Begu def. Donna Vekic
Begu did not particularly play a bad first set, but still felt helpless at times – see her chat with her coach at 2-5 down – as Vekic played an all-around solid set, overpowering her opponent for the most part. It is not easy to do against Begu who is a skilled player that possesses the ability to change the pace of the game during rallies. It’s just that she could rarely get her feet set to do so.
Irina Begu – Photo: Tenis Dunyasi, @tenisdunyasi
The same pattern more or less held through the first part of the second set. Vekic got the break to take a commanding lead at 6-3 3-1.
Two games later, down 2-4, Begu played two spectacular points in a row, finishing both with forehand errors to go up 0-30. She was patient and waited for the right opportunity to unleash her forehand. Vekic committed two backhand errors in the next three points and there was the break Begu desperately needed.
At 4-4 and Begu serving, Vekic had a golden chance to break at 30-40. She had an easy passing shot opportunity with Begu 5 meters in front of her at the net and she missed the backhand wide. She covered her head with her hands in disbelief. But she did not lose her nerves – at least, not at that point. She won the next two points, the second one on a remarkable forehand angle, and went up again to serve for the match at 5-4.
But for someone who kept her resolve so well in that particular sequence, the rest of the match turned into an utter disaster.
She double-faulted twice and made two unforced error to hand the break right back. But no worries, Begu did pretty much the same – minus one double fault – and Vekic found herself serving for the match again at 6-5. On match point at 40-30, she double-faulted! It all went downhill after that moment. Two point later, down a break point this time, she had a high sitter on top of the net that she could have easily guided to the open court for a winner. She smacked it right at where Begu was standing. The Romanian passed her.
Break, 6-6, tiebreaker!
It continued to go from bad to worse for Vekic. She threw in another double fault (her sixth of the set) at 1-1 in the tiebreaker and added five more unforced errors in succession to lose it 7-1. Just like that, a third set appeared on the horizon.
That horizon did not offer any light to Vekic.
No need to recount the final set in detail other than to say that it became agonizing to watch as she committed error after error, falling completely apart. Every tennis player goes through this type of downfall at some point(s) in their career. It never gets any easier though, neither for the player, nor for her team. She did calm down a bit later in the final set and tried to climb back in the match but, by then, Begu had built a substantial lead and was not planning on looking back.
Begu won the match 3-6 7-6 6-1, a little over half an hour after she had faced a match point against her. She will take on Pauline Parmentier in the semifinals on Saturday.
There is no need for a “warning: spoilers” notice for this review. If you are a tennis fan, you know the two names in the title. You have seen, or heard of, their exhilarating encounter in the finals of Wimbledon in 1980 that included a tiebreaker for all ages. If you are not, and you don’t know much about it or the two players, a short trip through the internet should prepare you for an enjoyable hour and 40 minutes of viewing.
In fact, never mind if you do not know any details of Wimbledon 1980. Because, at the end of the day, the film is so much more than that.
Borg vs McEnroe skillfully veers the attention away from the question of “who won it” and directs it toward the personalities of Björn and John. The spotlight is clearly on the “how” and “why” of the “who.”
The story takes place during the summer of 1980 and centers on the events that led up to that historical Wimbledon final. There are no mysteries per se. The plot-related portion of the movie builds toward the climax that reproduces the five-set final that ended with Borg taking home his fifth trophy in a row on the grass courts at SW19.
The narrative’s pace only serves as a tool to complement the core of what director Janus Mets and writer Ronnie Sandahl intend to deliver, which is an in-depth look at the portrait of two legendary figures, how the summer of 1980 defined their rivalry, and in a larger sense, the so-called first “golden era” of men’s tennis.
Toronto Film Festival Promo
I will confess that I am not a fan of tennis-based films. I have not liked any of them in the past. Perhaps it is because I find cinematic drama and tennis incompatible or because I get too nit-picky with the actual tennis shown on screen, which is probably the same thing that real-life detectives – or criminals – do when they watch an episode of CSI or Blue Bloods on TV. I roll my eyes. I get annoyed. I snicker at how unrealistic the actual tennis being shown appears and at how the comportments of tennis players turn loony in the name of creating dramatic effect. With tennis-related films, I am like those gate-keeping Star Trek fans who choose to ignore 50+ years of visual-tech improvements in filming when they see the visually updated version of the Enterprise in the current Star Trek: Discovery series, and throw tantrums because it is not identical to the version of the Enterprise of Kirk and Spock concocted with the technique available in the 1960s.
Having said that, there is a first time for everything. I rarely felt that way during Borg vs McEnroe. Mets and Sandahl, with the assistance of some gripping performances by the cast and a terrific score by the composers, succeed in putting forth a compelling behind-the-curtains story of two champions vying for the top spot in the sport, without ever letting the on-screen drama choke the story-related one.
There is slightly more focus on Borg than on McEnroe. Whether it was intentionally done that way, or not, does not matter because it works in the film’s favor, thanks to the tour-de force performance delivered by Sverrir Gudnason as Björn. I am not exaggerating when I say that during some of the off-court scenes involving Borg, I truly felt like I was looking at the legend himself. And I cannot begin praise enough how well Gudnason acted during the on-court scenes considering that he never played tennis in his life and had six months to prepare for the role. Wow!
He had Borg’s backhand and footwork down to perfection and was pretty close with his serve and forehand – the elbow on the latter’s backswing being slightly off. He even managed to make some of the errors and winners he hit correspond closely to the actual errors and winners by Borg, especially on key moments such as the points that deiced the set and the match.
As noted above, I nit-pick when it comes to tennis-related films, so I would be lying if I said that there were no inaccuracies. Few points in the epic fourth-set tiebreaker were out of order in terms of who is serving, and others ended differently than portrayed in the film. Centre Court looked slightly different in details than it did in 1980 (ex: no standing-room crowd) for understandable reasons. Gudnason sometimes showed, probably by design, just a tiny bit too much intensity in his facial expressions on the court between points than the ice-like Borg did.
There is one major inaccuracy that I will mention at the end but the ones above are completely acceptable considering how much the film gets right! It would be unfair to praise Gudnason’s acting without doing the same for Stellan Skarsgård playing Björn’s disciplinary mentor-coach Lennart Bergelin, Tuva Novotny playing his faithful companion and soon-to-be wife Mariana Simionescu (they got married shortly after the events in the film – divorced four years later), Scott Arthur playing John’s long-time friend and doubles partner Peter Fleming, and Robert Emms playing Vitas Gerulaitis, the flamboyant tennis star and party-time friend of Björn and John.
There is a reason why the film’s most compelling stretch takes place in a four-scene sequence that begins around the 26-minute mark. The actors mentioned above nail the sequence to perfection and it deserves a closer look.
It starts with the most meaningful conversation of the movie from Borg’s perspective. Mariana notices Björn solemnly staring at London from the balcony of the hotel, but she knows better. His mind is in turmoil – and Novotny’s two-second-long look makes that clear to viewers. She joins him and Björn asks, “Can you picture me doing anything else? Besides tennis?” Mariana answers “yes” and throws the question back at him, “Can you?” Björn remains silent, leaves the question unanswered. It’s an intimate moment that anticipates much larger implications – not explored in the movie – if you are familiar Borg’s post-tennis life.
The music slightly takes a haunting tone and we next see Bergelin and Borg walk through the tunnel at Wimbledon on the way to a first-round match against Ismail El-Shafei. Remember when I said above that there were times when I felt like I was looking at Borg and not at Gudnason? This 23-second-long scene is it. I am watching Gudnason and Skarsgård, but I am seeing Borg and Bergelin.
Speaking of El-Shafei, here is a good example of how much the film gets right. Most tennis fans have probably never heard of him, let alone seen him play. I have, and I can tell you that in those brief shots of the match, the player who acted as El-Shafei got every stroke right, beginning with the awkward swing on his lefty two-handed backhand.
The next scene picks up McEnroe watching Borg’s match in his hotel room as Fleming comes to visit. They converse briefly about the draw that McEnroe painstakingly chalked up on the wall of his hotel room and banter about their potential match in the quarterfinals. Vitas meets them in the lobby next. He brought along a few women – as only Gerulaitis would do – and takes them, along with John, to a bar. The scene takes a new dimension when Vitas begins describing to John – while smoking, drinking, and being fondled by the women – Borg’s obsessions with keeping the same routine every time he is at Wimbledon.
It is further enhanced with the montage of Borg and his entourage of two, Mariana and Lennart, doing the exact things that Vitas is describing to John. Mariana arranges his bag in the same way, Lennart and Borg check his rackets, Borg measures his pulse while resting (which would astonishingly reach as low as 40 beats per minute for those that may not know), takes two towels to the court, etc. Borg’s routine is “like a fucking religion,” Vitas says to John. “Same meticulous order, what is that?” he asks. It’s a rhetorical question. The point is well made. In a creative scene, led by a Emms’s great delivery of lines as Vitas, we learn about Borg’s compulsive fixation to details.
If this seven-minute-long, four-scene sequence does not make you believe that you are watching a quality film, I don’t know what will. Is it a biopic? A psychological thriller as Mets himself says? A sports movie? The genre is hard to define, but it works.
Shia LaBeouf also does well with the script provided. It is obvious that he is directed to underline the irascible side of McEnroe, but I am not sure if he was supposed to make McEnroe look as insecure as he did in certain scenes. In any case, he manages to get most of McEnroe’s game down, although not as good as Gudnason gets Borg’s. And this is where some masterful camera work takes care of anomalies. There are just enough split-second cuts to show McEnroe serving, or hitting a shot, to make it believable. John’s dad is also portrayed well by the accomplished Ian Blackman.
There is a scene at the end when Borg and McEnroe meet briefly at the airport. It probably never took place in real life, at least not in the way depicted in the film. This is where we must not forget that we are watching a movie and not a documentary. The two protagonists act as if this is the first conversation they are having, and you can sense that they earned each other’s respect. It’s wonderfully played by LaBeouf and Gudnason and whether it took place or not in real life is irrelevant. We know that the two admired each other, we know that their 1980 Wimbledon encounter helped define their friendship in the later years. That is the purpose of that scene, nothing more, nothing less.
Borg and McEnroe at the 2017 Laver Cup (Photo: Julian Finney – Getty Images)
Few seconds later, we get to read a few sentences enlightening us on what happened since Wimbledon 1980 in the lives of Borg and McEnroe, and this is where the one major inaccuracy appears. And it is a shame. Because this was the perfect opportunity to set the record straight on the long-term misconception that many people have with regard to the reasons behind Borg’s retirement. He did not walk away from tennis in 1981 as the film. Many McEnroe fans would like you to believe that, because it feeds the false narrative that Borg retired because he “understood he could not beat McEnroe again.” I should also mention that McEnroe does not go out of his way to debunk this myth although he knows better.
McEnroe has made an art form out of writing history in his favor and not touch misconceptions that favor him. He said in his 2002 autobiography You Cannot be Serious that he led Lendl by two sets and a break, which is not true, and did nothing to correct it when it became the narrative for years to come, just like he never made an effort to debunk the above myth. Ironic isn’t it, that he is the one to complain about the movie’s portrayal of himself while Borg, who suffers the one injustice, has nothing negative to say about it.
The truth is Borg did not want to play the full schedule required by the ITF in 1982. The ITF, in return, was going to force him to play qualifying in the Majors. Thus, Borg decided not to play them in 1982, but kept on practicing hard and played a considerable schedule of events outside the confines of the ITF. Retirement was far from his mind and he was planning to find a way to resolve the disaccord with the ITF and return to the circuit in 1983. In fact, he played McEnroe a number of times in other tournaments – non-sanctioned events were taken seriously by top players as long as there was good prize-money involved – and beat him more than once. The latest was in November of 1982, a four-set victory for Borg, in the 1982 AKAI Gold Challenge tournament in which he also defeated Ivan Lendl handily in straight sets.
The Swede officially retired in the beginning of 1983, once he realized that the issue with the rules was not going to get resolved. He simply refused to play the number of tournaments required. He chose the 1983 Monte-Carlo tournament as his retirement outing.
This is the only sore spot, as far as I am concerned, of Borg vs McEnroe and I am not even sure how much importance it carries for most tennis fans. It is a thoroughly enjoyable film otherwise and very deserving of the accolades that it has received so far. My appeal to future directors of tennis-based films would be to learn the necessary lessons from this film’s success and avoid the pitfalls of others preceding it.
Notes:
– Leo Borg, Björn’s son and a tennis player himself, plays the younger Borg.
– Flashbacks are frequently used to tell the childhood stories of the two stars.
– Studio 54 scene with Borg observing people’s behaviors is brilliant.
– Did they go overboard with some of the disciplinary methods employed by Bergelin? I think so.
– Of Borg, Gerulaitis says, “They say he is an iceberg, and really, he is a volcano keeping it all in, until Boom!” Haunting line indeed, considering the post-retirement troubles of Borg.
– They showed McEnroe’s tumble on the ground on his set point at 8-7 in the tiebreaker. It would have been even better if they showed Borg do the same two points before on his match point at 7-6. It would have better depicted the truth even more accurately. Both players indeed put 100% of their bodies and minds on the line to win.
Coming into today’s Miami Open final between two in-form players, the fifth-ranked German Alexander “Sascha” Zverev and the 17th-ranked American John Isner, one could not help but wonder what kind of impact each player’s preferred style of play would have on the other.
In the two previous rounds, Zverev won in straight sets against two solid baseliners, Borna Coric and Pablo Carreno-Busta, accelerating efficiently in rallies and overpowering his opponents with accelerations. Isner, for his part, demolished the rising star Hyeon Chung in two routine sets and put a stop to Juan Martin Del Potro’s fifteen-match winning streak. He relied for the most part on his bazooka serves and forehands, and never allowed either of them to settle into their favorite patterns.
This championship match also offered a fascinating background story. On the one hand, Isner had never won an ATP 1000 title but did have a history of performing well on American soil regardless of whether the crowd got behind him or not (see his match from two days ago vs Del Potro). On the other hand, Zverev had never lost in the finals of an ATP 1000, having won both of his previous appearances.
Nevertheless, all that would matter less once the fuzzy ball would get tossed in the air for the first serve of the match. The players’ tennis outputs on the stadium court at Crandon Park would determine the outcome on this day.
Could Isner cook the same recipe that worked so well against Coric and Carreno-Busta, and hinder the German’s well-oiled production of steady, high-paced ground strokes? Could he return big against Sascha, like he did against his previous opponents? In any case, his game plan seemed crystal clear: serve big, return big, nail forehand, and apply pressure.
Photo: Matthew Stockman – Getty Images
The answer to how Zverev would respond was a little blurrier. Could Zverev put forth enough power of his own to stop the American from getting the upper hand in the first two shots of each point? Could he stay in the point long enough to exploit Isner’s weaknesses, such as his backhand and footwork? Tennis fans awaited those answers as the players stepped on the court.
The first two sets were decided on a few key points at different times. The third set was, by contrast, the product of an overarching trend that worked against Zverev throughout the match and ultimately doomed him in the late stages of the match.
Unlike what many expected, break chances came early, all in favor of Isner. The way Zverev saved the first two break points (0-1, 15-40) was, on the other hand, very predictable. He hit a wide (and big) first serve to get to 30-40. Then, he engaged Isner in a deliberately paced backhand cross-court rally, the important term being “deliberately” (more on this later). Isner missed his fifth backhand and Sascha got back to deuce.
Isner would get another break-point opportunity two points later, one that he probably regretted for the rest of the set. He set the point up perfectly, approaching the net behind a forehand, but floated a very makeable forehand volley deep. Zverev held with a couple of big first serves.
In the first set, Zverev executed his game plan well. For starters, he stuck with the right pattern in baseline rallies. As noted above, he pinned Isner to the ad corner, making him hit backhands. He knew that Isner would want to run around the backhand and nail forehands, exactly like the American did against Chung and Del Potro. Thus, Zverev was not holding back on his backhand cross-courts, and therefore, not allowing Isner enough time to move outside the court (again, more on this later).
Secondly, Sascha’s first serves were clutch. Whenever he faced a break point, or a 30-30 point, he came up with an ace or an unreturnable serve, shutting the door quickly on Isner. He saved three of the five break points in the first set with big serves and won numerous other free points on important points.
Zverev was also making Isner hit the first volley low. It was not enough for Isner to simply hit his forehand hard and win the point without having to play the next shot. Isner had to showcase his volleying skills to put the ball away. Muscling serves and forehand were not going to be enough. It worked for Zverev. Isner missed some of those volleys, or at least, had to resort to just placing the volley, giving Zverev a second look at a passing shot.
A glaring example of this occurred when Isner got in trouble for the first time on his serve at 2-2. On game point, he hit a big kick serve wide to the ad side (one of his “money” shots) and followed it to the net. Zverev got the backhand return right down to Isner’s feet. Although Zverev was way outside the court when he returned, he was able to recover and chase the next ball down because Isner had to hit the low volley upward. Zverev ran it down and passed Isner cross-court with his forehand. Although Isner ended up holding serve, he knew he had to stay on his toes, even behind good serves and approaches. That is the type of pressure that, if applied consistently, works on you and makes a difference on an important point later in the match.
It did, in the tiebreaker…
The quality of tennis significantly dropped in the tiebreaker, for one reason or another. Both players committed uncharacteristic errors and lost awkward points on patterns that should have otherwise favored them. Until Zverev led 3-2, nothing looked out of the ordinary. The German won his two serving points on big first serves and he earned the mini break on yet another low volley that he forced Isner to hit. That was the pay-off (see above) for Zverev repeatedly making Isner hit low first volleys.
Zverev lost his mini-break advantage though, and more, when he committed two unforced backhand errors in a row to go down 4-3. Then Isner missed a forehand and double-faulted to return the favor. Remember, I did use the adjectives “awkward” and “uncharacteristic” earlier to describe what happened in this tiebreaker, so you were warned.
The last two points showcased again the winning formula(s) that Zverev adopted throughout the set. Another clutch first serve put him up 6-4. On set point, Zverev once again engaged Isner in a rally, making the American hit several backhands until he missed.
So, what went wrong for Zverev – or right for Isner – after the first set? Not much actually, except in two specific games, one in each set, and the overarching trend on which I touched at the beginning and kept putting off by saying “more on this later.” That is all it took for the American to grab the biggest title of career.
Until 4-4 in the second set, players held serves without difficulty. Then suddenly, on his serve, Zverev played by far the worst game of the match thus far. Out of nowhere, leading 30-15, Zverev squeezed in two unforced errors (one of them, a forehand framed to the sky) and a double fault to give Isner his first break-point opportunity of the set, the only one he needed.
And this is where I finally get to the overarching trend that doomed Sascha.
On that break point, Sascha had a mid-court backhand, similar to the ones he had all along the first set and a half, one that he has been taking early at shoulder level and drilling cross-court. That pattern, until then, regularly pushed Isner to the backhand corner and allowed Zverev to settle into the favorable cross-court-backhand pattern. Instead, and inexplicably, Zverev held back and hit a mid-pace backhand on which Isner was able to run around his backhand and pound a forehand. Zverev responded with another defensive, and shorter, backhand. This time Isner stepped inside the court and unleashed his forehand for a winner, grabbing the first break of the match.
Isner won the second set on his serve in the next game, although he had to save a couple of break points. More importantly for him, the trend from Sascha freely hitting his backhands cross-court and out-rallying him to Sascha hitting his backhands tentatively and giving him a shot at running around to unload his forehands was now in full progress.
Zverev’s success with his first serves still continued. He saved break points early in the third set with big serves. Plus, he was still making Isner hit low volleys when the American ventured to the net. Those two factors remained in his favor. However, extended rallies were no longer a write-in for Zverev like they were in the first 90 minutes of the match.
And you could tell that Isner was smelling blood because, you see, when a player shows apprehensiveness, it is not just the previously working pattern that loses traction for him. His loss of confidence, and Zverev’s body language tends to show this, motivates the opponent to gain mental momentum. Hence, Isner began staying in rallies longer because he now believed that Zverev, due to his tentative baseline play, would eventually hold back on one shot somewhere and give him a chance to take charge in the rally.
Photo: Michael Reaves – Getty Images
At 4-4 in the final set, Zverev’s increasing malaise on his ground strokes had spread to the rest of his game. Even his reliable first serve disappeared. He began with a double fault. Then, Isner, full of confidence, hit a thunder return on a first serve, and followed it with a forehand winner to go up 0-30. One point later, at 15-30, he had to serve a second serve and get in a rally. If there were a rally to show how much Zverev had regressed – the overarching trend – in the deliberate nature of his ground strokes, this would be the one.
He had a sitter on his backhand inside the baseline, in the middle of the court, on a ball by Isner that bounced inside the service line. Instead of accelerating to the backhand corner of Isner, like he has done numerous times throughout the first set and a half (and the tournament), Zverev simply half-looped the backhand back to the middle of the court heck, (he might have even slightly mishit it). Isner moved up and hit a forehand back to Sascha’s backhand. It was deeper but nothing that Sascha could not handle. The German missed the routine backhand deep by over a meter at least.
The miss, and his body language after the miss, pointed to one thing: he had lost his mental edge. The ensuing break point confirmed it. Another rally, another set of baseline shots underplayed by Zverev, ending with an easy forehand sitter slammed in the net. He smashed his racket to the ground, twice, and broke it. It seemed that the match had ended there.
Isner served up the formalities, literally, with three aces to earn his first ATP 1000 title.
The match was more of a mental battle than anything else. The quality of tennis was higher in the first half of the encounter, minus the tiebreaker. The tactical adjustments made by both players, on the other hand, were remarkable. The battle of IQs had no clear winner, both players proved potent there, but the one with the higher resolve stood tall, no pun intended, at the end.
