If there’s one type of match that makes me want to pick up a shotgun and blow my brains out, it’s when two servers on the ATP tour meet and we have to watch as they combine to hit 957 aces, with three tiebreak sets finishing in about 20 minutes.
That was almost exactly what we got in yesterday’s Memphis final between Andy Roddick and Milos Raonic, but I’m still live and kicking. Why? Because I actually enjoyed it.
What I loved is that though regular play was decided almost exclusively by aces and unreturned serve, the two tiebreaks we witnessed became, ironically, absolutely nothing about their serves. As nerves came into play, both began to miss their first serves and we were quickly watching some actual rallies. Don’t get me wrong, these rallies weren’t jam packed with incredible tennis, but in a similar way that some of the low-quality WTA epics draw you in, it was gripping stuff.
In those rallies, it was clear that Andy was largely looking to draw an error, slicing and keeping the ball low. Which would’ve been a genius plan against a 1.96m player if he didn’t insist on slicing to Raonic’s forehand. On the other side, Raonic was looking to be aggressive, but he refused to change the direction of the ball which led to a load of rallies exclusively featuring Andy’s sliced backhand and Raonic’s inside out forehand. Which again was weird and completely random, but ultimately nailbitingly tense.
