The right matchup between clay-courters

That's the kind of poster you normally see during the Golden Swing! But given how these two clay-courters are progressing on clay, it actually makes sense to see them here.

Darderi is young, he doesn’t have much experience on fast surfaces but he learns quickly; his natural power already helps him cope pretty well even if he has his limits. Baez is different; okay, he’s still young (25) but he’s an experienced player, and he’s changed small things in his game to allow himself to do better on hard courts, and the least we can say is that it’s working! He’s been excellent since the start of the year and only lost to Mensik while having three set points; it takes something serious to knock him out. His R1 was honestly good, he scared himself after having led by a lot, but aside from that there’s nothing to complain about, he’s in great shape. 3h19 of match time, not sure that’s hugely important, especially as it was against Mpetshi so it wasn’t long rallies every point (and yet the Frenchman cramped). Darderi played almost 3 hours in just 3 sets and it was more intense, no real advantage either way, even if in a fifth set Baez should be the fresher one!

We’ve got quite a few meetings between them to sink our teeth into, and Baez leads 5–3. The matches are tight, they often go to 3 sets, and almost all of them are played on clay each time. Their most recent meeting: a 6–0 6–2 win for Darderi in Bastad, but the Italian was absolutely on fire, and I also think that on clay he almost has the edge over Baez because his forehand is just too hard to contain. That’s what really struck me in Darderi’s first round: in Auckland his forehand was really kicking through and it was tough to contain, and that wasn’t at all the case against Garin. The bounce isn’t high here and it’s not that fast (we still need to check the schedule though, which isn’t out yet). I saw his limits on hard against Garin, the Chilean gave him big problems and the Italian had to force it again and again to really make inroads. Given Baez’s form and a match-up that’s going to be close to what we’ve already seen, I have a little idea…