2 things that stood out in Daniil Medvedev's SF win over Stefanos Tsitsipas at Vienna Open
Top seed and defending champion Daniil Medvedev of Russia beat fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-4 7-6 (8-6) in the semifinal of the Erste Bank Open in Vienna last Saturday, Oct. 28. Medvedev has been a bogey player for Tsitsipas in the past, and proved to be too strong once again for the 25-year-old Greek.
Medvedev will face second seed Jannik Sinner of Italy in the final on Sunday. The clash between the top two seeds should be a good one, but the 27-year-old Russian will be the slight favorite on Sunday.
Sinner has very powerful groundstrokes, but Medvedev's superior defense might see him through. On that note, let us take a look at two things that stood out in the match between Daniil Medvedev and Stefanos Tsitsipas:
#1. Tsitsipas was too dependent on his inside-in forehand:
It was known even before the match started that Tsitsipas would go around his backhand often and he did so at a reasonably high frequency. However, he was a bit predictable in his approach, hitting his inside-in forehand from the ad court to make Medvedev stretch towards his right.
At times, the Greek also hit approaches with his inside-in forehand before rushing the net to hit volley winners. However, his inability to hit winners consistently with his down-the-line backhand made things easier for the Russian.
Medvedev, meanwhile, hit a number of inside-out forehands to Tsitsipas' backhand to push the latter to a corner and then hit his forehand crosscourt or backhand down the line to the open court, depending upon the Greek’s response.
#2. Tsitsipas' return of serve was not good enough to trouble Medvedev:
Stefano Tsitsipas struggled to return well against Daniil Medvedev's powerful serve in the match. There was no dearth of short returns for the Russian to dispatch. Tsitsipas managed to have only three breakpoint opportunities in the match but failed to convert any of them.
Daniil Medvedev did not fare much better in his return games but got the decisive break of serve in the ninth game of the first set. That was, incidentally, the only break of serve for either player in the whole match.
The second set then went into a tie-break that the Russian managed to win somehow. Medvedev won 84% of the points on his first serve in the match, while Tsitsipas managed 79% on his. That was not a big difference, but significant enough to decide the outcome of the match.