We all remember this image. Djokovic smacking a return cross court for a winner at 40-15 on Federer's serve as Roger was trying to close the match. The return winner allowed Nole to stay in the match which he later won propelling him into the US Open final against Rafa. The game has changed in so many categories. The one that has flipped the switch and has created this "Golden" era of tennis has been the return of serve. Remember names like Sampras, Krajicek, Ivanisevic? All Grand Slam winners who won because of their rocket serves. Now let's stop reminiscing and come back to today. Chew on these names, Federer, Nadal, Djokovic, Murray, Ferrer, Tsonga. All these players are great return of servers. Look at the rankings and you'll see I just named the top 6 players on the ATP tour. Interesting!
The #s 2012
We are early in the 2012 season with one major under our belts and only a handful of tournaments played. Even though most top players have played less than a dozen matches let's look at the 2012 stats.
| Pos | Player | % | Matches |
Right away we see Djoko, the number 1 player in the world breaking at 41% of the time with Murray and Ferrer following. Rafa Nadal is right out of the top 10 at 11 and Federer is number 27. Here are the Top 5 players in the world and they are all within the top 30 in a very early 2012 season.
| Pos | Player | No. | Matches |
In the 2012 season we have seen only 1 of the top 5 players in the world in the top 10 for Aces, Federer with 131 through 18 matches. To give you an idea Milos Raonic has hit 278 through 17 matches, more than double in one fewer match. The rest of the characters go in this order:
-Murray #14
-Djokovic #29
-Ferrer #42
-Nadal #52
Most of the players, with the exception of Nadal, were top 50 in the ace category but all below the top 10. Quite the contrast compared with return of serve games won as all of them were in the top 10 besides Federer and Rafa who was at 11. To give a better glimpse of this concept at a larger scale, all top 4 players in the world were ranked in the top 10 in most return categories while only Roger Federer was in the top 10 in most serving ones.
How did it happen?
The game is always evolving as players have to look at new ways to keep up. The new age of players who are all very good servers understood that the serve has reached a ceiling and the way to win more matches is to break more often. The importance of the return of serve was now understood. Agassi can be seen as a pioneer in this concept. A consistent top 5 player with 8 Grand Slams because of his canny return of serve ability. He was the one player we could look back during the Sampras days to be a great returner. Now we have a storm of great returners. Federer starting chipping the return low to the backhand of players midcourt making the opposition to hit the ball up and he can then set up the point as he wished. Rafa's deep, penetrating returns allowed the point to start more at a 50-50 rate. Now we see Djokovic flipping the switch from the get go on returns starting the point with the percentage of him winning on his side. This continuous evolution has produced the longer rallies we see in today's game and the excitement on every point.
So what does all of this mean?
Players are now neutralizing the serve to better give them the chance to break. This is a reason why Djokovic is at the top of the games broken list for the past two years producing 4 Grand Slams. The serve is still a huge weapon but it is now neutralized by these awesome returners allowing points to start with a winning percentage on their side. We still see players practice and attempt to master their serve but we now see a lot more returns on the practice courts as players are looking to master the most important shot in tennis.
Great article!!! One of my favs
ReplyDeleteThanks for the feedback and glad you enjoyed it!
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