Italian Open

[jimlosaltos]

Fils just takes the 3rd set, imposed his will. Tsitsipas seemed to capitulate a bit, particularly his backhand. Fils hits such a huge forehand, the spin/speed combo is top tier. Tsitsipas had some issue with Fils at post match handshake, but Fils is not one to back down.https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZRoxFAFbNATvmKSJA

Yes, Arthur Fils is 4-0 vs Stef. Interesting match up. Stef's attempts to tweak his serve aren't, yet anyway, paying dividends.

Next up, Fils vs Zverev is always entertaining - 3:2 for the German but Fils won the most recent, Miami.

Other R16 matches of interest, Musetti vs Medvedev on "dirt, dirt, dirt" , Draper vs Moutet for clash of styles.

While we're on H2Hs, Elise Mertens a decent singles player but an excellent doubles partner, extends her H2H over Jessie Pegula to 4-1.

[stroke]

https://www.thetennisgazette.com/new...nos-tsitsipas/

I certainly agree with Roddick on this.

[stroke]

Musetti and his beautiful game takes out Med in 2 sets. Musetti's one hander to me the best out there now that Fed, Gasquet, and Stan are pretty much gone. His backhand gets a lot of press, but his forehand is per "shot quality" numbers the 5th best on Tour. Speaking of forehands, Cerundolo is Shot Quality number 2, now on court vs Sinner. Sinner of course has not played enough matches this year to be included in the forehand Shot Quality rankings.

[neilchok]

Musetti and his beautiful game takes out Med in 2 sets. Musetti's one hander to me the best out there now that Fed, Gasquet, and Stan are pretty much gone. His backhand gets a lot of press, but his forehand is per "shot quality" numbers the 5th best on Tour. Speaking of forehands, Cerundolo is Shot Quality number 2, now on court vs Sinner. Sinner of course has not played enough matches this year to be included in the forehand Shot Quality rankings.

I agree on musetti backhand! I feel Stan is the only one where I felt it was an actual advantage, except on the return. I thought for most other players, they can keep the one hander in and use it as a shield, but they have to really compensate by having a huge forehand, and use their athleticism. I think Shapo also has a really strong one hander.

[neilchok]

I also wonder what you guys think of the importance of fitness? Do you think the person who is the more fit generally wins, and do you think there are large discrepancies between fitness level of say the 50 players. There is below article on Pat Ethcheberry.

image.png

[jimlosaltos]

Musetti and his beautiful game takes out Med in 2 sets. Musetti's one hander to me the best out there now that Fed, Gasquet, and Stan are pretty much gone. His backhand gets a lot of press, but his forehand is per "shot quality" numbers the 5th best on Tour. Speaking of forehands, Cerundolo is Shot Quality number 2, now on court vs Sinner. Sinner of course has not played enough matches this year to be included in the forehand Shot Quality rankings.

Only got to drop in and out of Musett--Medy. Playing in a downpour for a while, then stopped play on match point for over two hours, forcing Musetti to return to close it out.
Let's see if this highlight vid embeds

https://www.atptour.com/en/news/muse...0ZXngd_default

[jimlosaltos]

I need to look this one up to at least watch highlights . Quite the serve fest with 36 aces on egregiously slow Rome clay -- in the rain?

By several metrics the 19 yo Mensik out served Hubi, which is never easy.
Hubi has 2 more but Mensik had the higher serve rating, fastest by half a smidge ( 228 kph to 227 kph), higher ave first serve at 131 MPH.
And, Mensik was never broken, but lost two ties presumably to veteran play.

Mensik's second serve again showed a huge drop off in velocity, but I can't find any spin data to check Scotty's point of whether he hit huge kick instead.

filedata/fetch?id=107183&d=1747163690&type=thumb

#

[stroke]

Sinner takes out Cerundolo in 2, and he had to work for it. Cerundolo is one of the top 4 clay courters in the world. Sinner has Fed like video game tennis, which is mesmerizing.

[jimlosaltos]

Sinner takes out Cerundolo in 2, and he had to work for it. Cerundolo is one of the top 4 clay courters in the world. Sinner has Fed like video game tennis, which is mesmerizing.

Duel of two of the very best forehands on the ATP.

[jimlosaltos]

Some matches tomorrow that I really want to see:

Carlos Alcaraz will face Jack Draper { Remember Jack winning their semifinal in Indian Wells} and second seed Alexander Zverev will play eighth seed Lorenzo Musetti { Great clash of styles, although both like to play back }

[stroke]

Some matches tomorrow that I really want to see:

Carlos Alcaraz will face Jack Draper { Remember Jack winning their semifinal in Indian Wells} and second seed Alexander Zverev will play eighth seed Lorenzo Musetti { Great clash of styles, although both like to play back }

Alcaraz and Draper are of course the favorites. Stroke does not bet, but i really like Musetti.

[don_budge]

Sinner takes out Cerundolo in 2, and he had to work for it. Cerundolo is one of the top 4 clay courters in the world. Sinner has Fed like video game tennis, which is mesmerizing.

I watched five points in the first game then calmly hit the off switch. As boring as it gets. Mesmerizing? How about BORING? I had always said that Novak Djokovic was the most one dimensional (boring) number one player in the world of all time. MODNOPOAT. Sinner has him outgunned in this department by light years. This is the post-Roger Federer tennis world. As I predicted all along. Tennis outsmarted itself. The engineering has made the game unrecognisable. The human element completely and surgically removed. Tennis metaphoring life once again.

[stroke]

Zverev seems to have fallen into the Musetti trap. He lost the 1st set in a tiebreaker, as the match has turned into a more old school clay court type match with both players battling war of attrition behind the baseline. Zverev lack of drop shot hand skills a real negative vs Musetti.

[jimlosaltos]

Zverev seems to have fallen into the Musetti trap. He lost the 1st set in a tiebreaker, as the match has turned into a more old school clay court type match with both players battling war of attrition behind the baseline. Zverev lack of drop shot hand skills a real negative vs Musetti.

Entertaining match. High intensity, both players showing extraordinary stress on their faces at the end. But once the ball was in play, it only showed in Zverev's game, not Musetti's
Musetti seems to be putting his game together this year. It seemed as if Musetti was almost never rushed, as if the game was slow for him even though he was playing one of the biggest, all around hitters in tennis.

His touch is remarkable. Won 15 of 20 points on drop shots. Completely neutralized Zverev's huge serve. And, against one of the best backhands in tennis, Musetti's one hander did just fine, thank you.

[jimlosaltos]

For amusement, Zheng aces Saby by bouncing a serve OVER her. I mean literally, over her head, by maybe 10 feet?

YT Short

https://youtube.com/shorts/PZ5QWiaDsvk?si=DRmpdQcVxnGm0CIP