Big Serving Counterpunchers... Uh Again

The Big Serving Counterpunchers claim another victim, Tiafoe's attempts to solve the problem, weak spots and strengths

Quick note from Matt: I’m having surgery on Wednesday this coming week (3rd Nov) so there will probably be no issues (unless I can find someone interesting to write a guest post). This unfortunately means there will be no Paris Masters analysis. I’ll update at the end of next week but will be back for the NextGen and ATP Finals.

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A very easy bit of analysis this week.

Vienna

Zverev d Tiafoe: 7-5, 6-4

A few months ago I wrote about the emergence of the ‘Big Serving Counterpuncher’ meta (damn you Zuckerberg for making that word meaningless)…

A New Playstyle Meta Approaches

The Big Serving Counterpunchers at the top of the men’s game right now, in the form of Medvedev and Zverev, possess an amalgamation of playstyles that hasn’t really existed in this way until quite recently. The TL;DR is that the playstyle centres around (aside from being tall) having a huge 1st serve, to fit in with the decade-to-decade trend of bigger and better serving, combined with unusually excellent athleticism and return game stickiness (for tall players). Both Medvedev and Zverev are threats in ways which have, historically more often than not, been inverse areas of skill for tall (6ft6+) players.

At the time I plotted the playstyle strengths like this:

Again, this is overly simplistic and the numbers can move a few points in either direction and category. But it’s broadly true.

What we saw today in the Vienna final was the Big Serving Counterpuncher playstyle dominate on hard courts yet again, in the form of Zverev taking home the title:

% of Unreturned 1st Serves:

• Zverev: 65%

• Tiafoe: 33%

1st Serve Points Won:

• Zverev: 80%

• Tiafoe: 62%

Average number of balls hit in their own service games:

• Zverev: 12

• Tiafoe: 22

Break Points Created:

• Zverev: 9

• Tiafoe: 2

Zverev’s 1st serve was too big and too good, meaning Tiafoe was rarely able to extend points or try to execute any of his rally strategy on return — hence just the average 12 balls being hit in Zverev’s service games. In stark contrast Zverev managed to get into plenty of Tiafoe’s service games with good returning (and because of the comparatively less effective Tiafoe serve), hence the nearly double amount of balls Tiafoe had to hit in his service games (22). This is as good an example of the Big Serving Counterpuncher playstyle manifesting in match statistics as you can find.

Tiafoe did try to do the right things however, both on serve/return strategy and rally strategy. The American clearly had parts of the right gameplan pre-prepared.

Tiafoe Serve Strategy

The American served to the right spots, largely to the weaker forehand wing of Zverev (although Tiafoe perhaps underused the body serve):

Tiafoe Return Strategy

Tiafoe tried everything when it came to his return positions to try to solve the near impossible problem that is the Zverev 1st serve on a hard court.

Tiafoe’s main approaches were either very deep like far left, or up on the baseline like far right. But he also took the piss with the middle panel (and got aced out wide lol).

Most of Tiafoe’s best moments on return, including the lead up to the two break points he manufactured, were impressive, up-on-the-baseline driven or blocked returns (Tiafoe sliced/blocked 35% of his returns today vs 65% topspin). But the problem for the American was that such aggressive return positioning just wasn’t sustainable when Zverev was finding his spots (which happened to be most of the time). Tiafoe therefore never found any consistent success against the Zverev 1st serve (although no one ever really does on a hard court in best of three):

Tiafoe’s aggressive returns working out (by forcing Zverev to net, where he doesn’t want to be)…

…And the downside of that aggressive return positioning the very next point (which happened to be one of Tiafoe’s rare break opportunities). Zverev finding a more accurate spot with the serve and Tiafoe not having enough time to reach the return.

In contrast, Zverev was able to use his customary deep (approx 2 metres) return position (that he, Medvedev, Nadal, Thiem, Ruud et al all use so well), which consistently allowed time to reach many of Tiafoe’s serves (apart from his slightly closer positioning on the deuce side to cut off Tiafoe’s wide, slice serve — notice the cluster of dots around 1 metre mark on right hand side below):

Tiafoe Rally Strategy

Tiafoe had some nice ideas for strategy, in this particular matchup, when rallies developed. Tiafoe had a decent amount of success, especially in the tighter 1st set, slicing into Zverev backhand. The slicing cross court into the Zverev backhand was clever because Zverev can sometimes struggle to hit particularly offensive shots off low-pace and low-height balls to that side (or even better he’s forced to hit a slice of his own, which are comparatively weak compared to his two hander), or Zverev was forced into net (another area where he’s less comfortable). These slices usually resulted in at worst, a neutral ball which Tiafoe could then attack by either running around his backhand to hit a forehand inside in down the line, or hitting that backhand down the line. Or an opportunity to pass an unenthusiastically approaching Zverev at the net:

Tiafoe’s (in red) slice cross court doing two good things here, firstly forcing Zverev to hit slices of his own (which is the much better outcome than dealing with Zverev’s double handed backhand), and secondly drawing/forcing Zverev in to the net where he’s much less comfortable than the baseline.

Neither of these slices were pretty from Tiafoe (in red), but the first forced a defensive forehand out of Zverev and the second forced more net play from Zverev. Both of those options are good news if you’re Tiafoe. Zverev again, largely because of his long arm levers, can really struggle to get his hand and arm in the right position for quick reaction volleys like this (although tbf it’s Zverev’s approach shot which gets him in the most trouble here)

This, along with some 50/50 net rushing was a nice try from Tiafoe at trying to manufacture the opportunity to be the first of the two players to hit a big strike when rallies developed. But unfortunately for Tiafoe, because most of those extended rallies happened in his own service games (where Zverev could afford to take more risk), while Zverev was landing un-ending, unreturnable bombs on his own serve, the opportunity to squeeze enough effectiveness out of these bits of rally strategy ultimately came up short.

A routine win for Zverev and, despite the loss, a great week of progress for Tiafoe (beating Tsitsipas, Schwartzman & Sinner in a row to reach the final is no joke). But the real takeaway here was yet more evidence of the Big Serving Counterpuncher playstyle currently dominating the hard courts. Medvedvev and Zverev have figured out a formula that works (at least against most non-big 3 players).

Now it’s up to everyone else to figure out solutions.

— MW

Twitter @MattRacquet

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