+3.5 sets obvious?

If you follow tennis even a little, you know that Yannick Hanfmann is in form.

Riding the momentum from his semi in Kitzbuhel, he’s playing a powerful brand of tennis that puts his opponents in a very uncomfortable position. And if they back up too much, he doesn’t hesitate—really doesn’t—to abuse the drop shot. The guys he loses to are guys who can neutralize him without backing up too far. Cobolli tried defending way behind the baseline and got destroyed. Borges after that stayed close to the baseline redirecting the ball, and it worked perfectly. You take away his ability to hurt you with the drop shot for starters, and then if you stay close to your line you can use the geometry of the court better and create angles. Which means making Yannick run, and his movement isn’t great—that’s his weak spot (on the other hand he’s very skillful in the short game). Another weak spot for the German: he gets a bit tight in the important moments.

Can Tabilo match the winning profile against Hanfmann?

In terms of form already, I find it’s a bit less good. In Washington, we were saying he was going to get back into great form given his level, but he got really cooled off in Montreal by a Hurkacz who was too solid from the baseline, then by a Jodar in Cincinnati who was just way too strong in that match-up. I’m trying to block that last match out of my head, because Tabilo was so powerless that it’s really off-putting. So on the one hand, when he’s pushed around too much by an opponent’s power (Lehecka, Jodar, Rublev, Marozsan, Félix, Halys...) he loses his shine. On the other hand, he could somewhat counter Yannick by isolating his backhand and making him move with that lefty touch. As Marcos often says, there will surely be a few Chileans around to crank up the atmosphere too...