Previewing the 2014 AO Men's Final: Who Stan should call before playing Nadal

If I were Stan Wawrinka…

I would celebrate with a very small amount of fine champagne for the epic win over Djokovic in the quarters, overturning a 14 match losing streak against the Serb, and I would be pretty happy with my win over Berdych, as I’ve now made it the finals of a major for the first time in my career.

While congratulations are in order for Stan the Man for his commendable run to the final, he faces a brutally difficult task in facing Nadal. He has never beaten Nadal. Actually, he hasn't taken a set off him. 

But consider this--Nadal and Wawrinka last met last November in the London Tour Finals. Nadal won by the slimmest of margins: 7-6(5), 7-6(6).  Based on the match statistics, Stan actually should have won this match. 

He actually won more points than Nadal (83 to 80), and while they each broke serve twice, Stan won more points on Nadal's serve than Nadal did on Stan's serve. Stan won 36% of points on Nadal's service games and reached break point seven times, while Nadal won 31% and reached five break points. 

It is fairly rare--though not unheard of--to win when your opponent does more damage to your serve than you to do to his or hers. For example--of Nadal's 75 wins in 2013, he won only 4 matches when his opponent won more return points on his serve than he did on his opponent's serve. In the other three matches he was pushed to three sets, once by Dimitrov and twice by Gulbis. Similarly, of Stan's 51 victories, only three times did he win when his opponent won more return points.

But seriously, this is what I would do:

Get on the phone with these three people:

1.     Nikolay Davkdenko. I suspect some of you won’t believe me until you check the link, but before you read the next sentence, take a guess at this: Davydenko and Nadal have played on hard courts 7 times—what do you think the head-to-head record is? 6-1. In favor of Davydenko.  Nadal’s only victory was their first meeting in 2006, winning a round robin match in 3 sets at the year end finals, and Davydenko has beaten Nadal the past six times they have played on hard courts in matches that have ranged from 2008 to 2011. To my knowledge, Nikolay is actually the only active player with a winning overall head-to-head record against Nadal (6-5) when all surfaces are considered. However, unlike Stan, Davydenko plays with a two-handed backhand. My impression of Davydenko is that his game might be considered comparable to Agassi’s—not the biggest guy—but a baseliner with a very good return game, and a solid backhand. 

2  2.  James Blake. Blake has a quite respectable 3-4 record against Nadal on hard courts. Blake won the first three meetings in 2005 and 2006, and Nadal won the remaining four, though Nadal never managed to beat Blake in straight sets on a hard court. Furthermore, he’s about the same size as Stan and has one-handed backhand as well.

3   3. Mikhail Youzhny. Youzhny also has a pretty decent record against Nadal on hard courts,  winning four out of their nine hard court meetings. The only time they met in the Australian Open was in 2005, where Mischa pushed Nadal to 5 sets.

I find it pretty likely that Stan will consult with Federer as they are compatriots and friends, bringing Olympic gold to Switzerland by winning the men's doubles together in 2008. And as I wrote in my previous post, prior to his relatively poor season in 2013, Federer led Nadal 6-5 on hard courts. 

Others who might be of interest: Robin Soderling, the only man to have ever beaten Nadal at the French Open (and Soderling had lost to Nadal 6-1, 6-0 just a few weeks before in Rome) and Juan Martin Del Potro, who has split his 8 meetings with Nadal on hard courts. Both men certainly have a good understanding of tactics and strategy, but I think part of their strategy is simply being a huge guy and crushing the ball with flat groundstrokes at nearly unfathomable speeds. Stan can certainly hit some powerful groundstrokes, but he doesn't have the height advantage that guys like Soderling and Del Potro have on dealing with shots that bounce up to a height that is problematic for most. Still, it might be useful to revisit footage of Soderling's famous win and Del Potro's 6-2,6-2,6-2 rout of Nadal at the 2009 US Open--probably Nadal's most lopsided defeat at a major in his career.

If I were Stan or Magnus Norman (Stan’s coach), I really would be getting the footage of how Blake and Youznhy won their matches, since they are the most similar to Stan in size and the fact that they have one-handed backhands, which is generally considered a liability against Nadal. Evidently being a righty with a one-hander is not a death sentence when facing Nadal.

It is evident that guys like Del Potro and Soderling can overpower Nadal, with flat, powerful strokes that do not allow Nadal enough time to recover though Stan will need to likely find a somewhat different strategy to finish off points against Nadal.

Stan, you and Magnus need to break out the video footage, have a conference call with Youzhny, Davydenko, and Blake, and maybe Dimitrov too (he never has beaten Nadal but has given him close matches, always getting a set off of Nadal).

Belief: That other part of the game

And aside from the technical aspect of the game, Stan will have to focus on the match and believe with every last ounce of his spirit that he can win this match. I’m inclined to believe that his victory over Djokovic suggests that Stan has developed the mental toughness necessary for the biggest stages. I hope Magnus is drilling into Stan's mind, over and over, the fact that he absolutely has the talent and ability to win this match--that he is actually talented enough to beat anyone if he plays his best. Is he the underdog? Of course. But is it possible for him to win? Absolutely. 

He will need to play his best and play without fear. Go ahead and give Lukas Rosol and Steve Darcis a call too. They might know a little something about winning when everyone says it’s just not going to happen. 

A very brief history of Federer vs. Nadal on hard courts

Identifying The Most Important Factors when Federer plays Nadal

***Corrected and Updated version***

Nadal fans frequently argue that his strong head to head record against Federer, considered by many to be the greatest tennis player, is evidence that Rafa is instead the greatest of all time. Nadal does enjoy a substantial lead, leading 22-10. However, it should be pointed out that many of those matches occurred on clay, where Nadal is the undisputed king of clay, winning an astounding 293 matches and losing only 21 on the dirt at the ATP level. What's even more astounding is that 12 of those losses occurred while Nadal was 18 or younger. Only 3 people have ever beaten Nadal more than once on clay: Gauston Gaudio beat him three times, though all of those victories were while Nadal was 18 at the oldest; Federer has beaten him twice on clay, and Djokovic has beaten him three times. But I digress--this isn't about the greatest of all time argument or Rafa's dominance on the clay. 

In a few hours, Federer and Nadal will do battle for the 33rd time in their careers. What's more relevant here is the head to head on hard courts. Currently Nadal leads 8-6 on hard courts, though prior to Federer's lackluster 2013 season in which he lost to Nadal three times on hard courts, Federer led the head-to-head record 6-5. 

This will be their fifteenth battle on hard courts, and to try to get a sense of what matters most (note: among variables in the data that was easily available to me!) in their match-ups on hard courts. Most definitely there are some factors here that are not being accounted for. Court speed is a factor, and some hard courts are known to play faster or slower than others. 

But for now...

I calculated some very simple correlations: The larger the absolute value, the stronger the effect, or in other words, the more influence it has on the outcome of the match. These were calculated as variables influencing whether Federer wins or loses against Nadal on hard courts. These numbers considered only hard court matches--clay and grass were excluded.

Variable Corrrelation Rank 1stReturnWon 0.79 1 BP Faced/Set -0.77 2 1stserveWon 0.64 3 Aces 0.41 4 Break Chances/Set 0.42 5 2ndserveWon 0.35 6 2ndReturnWon 0.29 7

Note: 0 means zero relationship to the outcome of the match, and the closer a value is to 1, the stronger the influence on Federer's chance of winning. Negative values indicate that the variable is associated with Federer losing to Nadal. 

1. The most important factor (in this very, very simple analysis based on a very, very small sample):The percentage of point Federer wins on Nadal's first serve. If Federer has a good read on the serve and can prevent Nadal from getting easy points on the first serve and win some of those points, it will certainly improve his chances.  In his losses to Nadal, he never won more than 34%, and in half of his losses to Nadal he won less than 26% when returning first serves.  In all of Federer's victories he won at least 35% of points on Nadal's first serve.  At the risk of sounding too much like IBM's keys to the match: If Nadal is winning 65% or more on first serves, his chances are probably pretty good. If Federer's return game is on, or Nadal doesn't serve well and Fed can make a bigger dent on return games (grabbing at least 35%, but probably more like 40%), Federer's chances are better.

2. The second most important variable (for practical purposes, just as important as the first): How often Federer faces break point in a set. The more times he gets himself down a break point to Nadal, the more likely Nadal will win. Federer has to stay ahead on serve to have a good chance. Interestingly, the size of this effect is almost twice the size of the effect of how often Federer has a chance to break Nadal, so the data suggests that Federer having a strong service performance is more critical. 

In most (6 out of 8) of Nadal's wins, Federer faced at least 3 break points per set; In Federer's hard court victories he never faced more than two break points per set--the most trouble Fed has faced on serve and still managing to beat Nadal was 1.8 break points per set in the 2005 Miami final. Only in two victories did Federer face more than one break point per set. 

So Federer's going to have to stay ahead on serve and not give Nadal too many leads. Nadal is too good of a returner to be able to hold serve if he has very many chances to break, so if Federer can serve as well as he did against Tsonga in round 4 (facing only a single break point), he has a good chance at beating Nadal.

The third strongest correlation--or for our purposes, third most important variable influencing the match outcome is Federer's percentages on winning first serve points.Of course, the better he does on first serve, the better his odds of winning. Interestingly, the points on first serve seem to have a relatively larger influence on the outcome compared to the second serve. In four of six of Federer's victories over Nadal, his winning percentage on 1st serve was at least 80%, and in the other two Roger returned well and managed to break serve often. 

So I'd say for Federer to win, he needs to put up these kinds of numbers:
1. Limit the percentage of Nadal's points won on first serve to the low 60s--he should minimally win 35% of Nadal's first serves.

2. Keep break point chances to a minimum--if he can keep it to only one break point per set, he has a good chance, but if he offers Nadal two or three, or more--chances to break, Federer can probably count on dropping serve and he'll have to play very well on the return game to compensate and break back often.

3. Federer needs to either win at least 80% on first serves if he has a mediocre day returning. He can perhaps afford to win 75% if he makes up for it with a strong return performance. 

It's a tough call--many of Federer's wins over Nadal were on indoor hard courts, but Federer's numbers thus far suggest that he might be able to perform at a high enough level to beat Nadal. Perhaps it will all come down to the weather--if it rains on Melbourne and the roof is closed, the conditions may favor Federer and give him the edge.

I'm reluctant to make a prediction for this one, but I think Federer is playing well enough to beat Nadal. Nadal's performance thus far does not suggest that he unstoppable--Dimitrov very nearly had two sets on Nadal. I think if Dimitrov can push Nadal, an in-form Federer firing on all cylinders will beat Nadal playing at a level that is not his absolute best.

I'm going with Federer in 4 sets.

Stan finally beats Nole, and analyzing Murray vs. Federer

Big Victory for Stan and Murray vs. Federer

Stan Wawinka finally turned the tables on Djovokic and won 9-7 in the fifth set. Stan's shot-making ability is just about as good as anyone in the game. I don't think I have ever seen anyone else with a one-handed backhand that is such an incredible weapon. I've seen some pretty astounding backhand passing shots from vintage Federer, and Gasquet (Justin Henin too) also has a great one-hander, but I think Wawrinka may have the best one-handed backhand on the tour. 

Check out the highlights and take a look at the long rally that ends around the 57 second mark--Stan's backhand is a both a thing of beauty and an amazing weapon. 

I didn't realize that Djokovic was on a winning streak comparable to Serena's, last having lost in August at the US Open. That being said, despite the 15-2 head to head in favor of Djokovic going into the match, this upset is far less improbable and shocking than Serena's loss to Ivanovic, in my opinion. Ana had never taken a set from Serena, while Stan arguably could have won the previous two epics against Djokovic--he was very close.

Comparing Murray and Federer's previous matches

I calculated a few simple averages and ratios from the available stats on Murray and Federer's previous meetings.  Murray leads overall, 11-9. If you exclude the two grass court meetings in 2012 (the pair has never met on clay), Murray leads on hard courts 10-8, winning their most recent match in the semis of last year's Australian Open in 5 sets. 

Federer's Wins over Murray:

Here are some quick stats on Federer's 8 hard court wins over Murray:

Federer had a first serve percentage of 57.3% and won 80.5% of 1st serve points.

He won 59.3% of 2nd serve points, and he saved 63% of break points faced on serve.

Federer faced, on average, 1.25 break points per set. (In two victories, he never faced a break point.)

When returning, he won 32.5% of  Murray's 1st serves and 50.2% of 2nd serves. 

In his victories over Murray, Federer had an average of 3.6 break point opportunities per set, converting 47% of them, for an average of 1.5 breaks per set.

Federer's Losses to Murray:

In his 10 hard court losses to Murray:

Federer had a 1st serve percentage of 61.5% (surprisingly higher than in his victories) and won 66.1% of 1st serve points; he won 45% of his 2nd serves in his defeats to Murray.

Federer faced an average of 3.9 break points per set in his losses to Murray and saved 53%.

When returning, Federer averaged 2 break point opportunities per set and converted 42%, for an average of about 0.8 breaks per set. 

Comparing Federer's Stats in Victories and Defeats Against Murray:

It was unexpected to find that Fed actually had a lower first serve percentage in his victories than his defeats, (57.3% in wins vs. 61.5% in losses) though common sense and intuition suggest Federer would be more likely to win with a higher percentage of 1st serves, but given Murray's skill in returning, perhaps this isn't as important as with other opponents.

However, once the first serve is in play is where the differences seem to arise: Fed won an average of 4 out 5 first serve points in victories and 2 out of 3 in defeats. This approximate 15 percentage point difference may be key--if Murray manages to get good returns on Federer's serve, the Swiss could be in trouble.

The same is true for second serves--Federer averaged 66% on second serve points in victories and less than half--45%--in defeats to Murray.

When facing Murray, a major difference in victories and defeats is the number of break points faced per set--he faced an average of only 1.25 break points on his serve when he won, and he faced nearly 4 break points per set in his defeats. Murray's return game is too strong to allow him very many chances to break to have a good chance at beating him, even with a serve as good as Federer's. In his victories, Federer saved 63% of break points faced and 53% in his defeats. However, even if Federer saves 60% of break points, if he faces 3 or 4 in a set, it is probable that Murray will break him. 

So the key may be in Federer's ability to stay out of trouble on his serve and not allow Murray to get a lead on his serve.

On the return game, Federer's break point conversion rates were similar in victory and defeat (47% for wins, and 41% for losses)  but the major difference is how many opportunities he gets--he averaged 3.6 chances per set to break the Murray serve when he won, and 2 chances per set in losses (Murray only had one victory over Federer in which he never faced a break point--their 2008 meeting in Dubai).

If Murray has a few loose services games and faces more than a handful of breakpoints per set, Federer will definitely have the edge.

Of course, this is all common sense to an extent--just serve well and don't drop your serve, and get a few break points to win a service game or two and you'll win.

But let's look at how they are performing as of late to see what we might expect:

Since Federer seems to win pretty close to half of Murray's second serves whether he wins or losses, Murray's percentage of points won on 1st serve appears to be more crucial: he averaged 78% when defeating Federer, and 67.5% in losses.

Murray has won 80.5% of first serve points in his first four matches, though he dipped to 76% in his most recent match against Stephane Robert. He faced six break points (losing one) over 4 sets in round 4, lost the only break point he faced in his straight sets victory against Feliciano Lopez, surprisingly lost 3 of the four break points faced in his round 2 win over #266 Vincent Millot, and didn't face a single break point in his 1st round rout of Go Soeda.

While Federer is not considered as great of a returner as Djokovic or Nadal (or Murray either), it's safe to say he can put more pressure on Murray's serve than any of the opponents in Murray's path to the quarterfinals. The match in which Murray faced the fewest break points when losing to Federer was in the 2012 World Tour Finals, where Federer converted all three break points.

Now to examine Federer's serving stats--he saved the only break point he faced against Tsonga, winning 88% of his first serves and 69% of second serves; he broke the Frenchman three times in seven opportunities.  In his 3rd round win over Gabashvili, he won 87% of first serves and 57% of second serves--the Russian did have 5 break chances but Federer saved all five. In round 2 against Blaz Kavcic, he won 78% on the first serve and 50% on 2nd serves--he did face two break points, with Kavcic winning one, but Federer more than compensated for the loss of serve by breaking the Kavcic serve six times. And finally, in his opener against James Duckworth, Federer was dominant on first serves, winning 89% ( and a solid 58% on second serves).  Federer never dropped serve in the 1st round encounter and faced only one break point, while getting 4 breaks on the Duckworth serve (though his conversion rate was low--he had 17 break chances).

Combining the numbers in my previous post about Federer's high winners per game and winners per unforced error ratio with the fact that he has dropped serve once in twelve sets of tennis and his high winning percentage on first serves, it looks like Federer is in the form necessary to beat Murray. Certainly if he plays as solidly as he did against Tsonga, I would heavily favor Federer's chances. Murray is winning a good percentage of first serves, but not as solid as Fed, and he has dropped serve 5 times in his route to the quarterfinals. 

I'm sticking with my previous prediction--especially since Murray's back may present an issue--I think Federer beats Murray in 4 sets.

Analyzing the 2014 AO Men's Draw - The Last 8

Analyzing the 2014 AO Men's Draw - The Last 8

Federer fans must be encouraged by yesterday's result against Tsonga--I expected a tough 5 set match, but Federer needed only 3 sets to take out Tsonga, and he hasn't dropped a set in the first four rounds. The match against Tsonga was Federer's first real test, and he passed with flying colors, hitting 43 winners and 21 unforced errors--more than twice as many winners as unforced errors. He also saved the single break point he faced, while getting to break point on Tsonga's serve seven times, breaking him three times. Not bad against a dangerous top 10 opponent who knows something about playing well in Australia, given his run to the finals in 2008. It seems that Federer's racquet change is proving to yield much better results than his previous experiment with a different racquet last summer, and it probably doesn't hurt to have Stefan Edberg in your corner either.

Murray, much to my surprise, needed 4 sets to beat #119 Stephane Robert, who made an improbable run to the second week after failing to qualify and getting into the main draw as a lucky loser. This makes me wonder whether Murray's back is becoming an issue. It wasn't that long as ago that he had back surgery, and he lost to Florian Mayer in Doha in the 2nd round of Doha in his first tournament of the year.

An in-form Murray would be a difficult task for Federer, but I'm starting to like Fed's chances against Murray a bit more after the these results.

Nadal's victory was over Nishikori was also in straight sets, but was a much closer contest compared to Federer's victory over Tsonga. Nadal broke Nishikori 5 times, and Nishikori broke Rafa 4 times. The one break advantage proved to be the difference--Nadal won the second set 7-5, and the other two sets went to a tiebreak, but Nadal won them both.

Dimitrov ended Roberto Bautista Agut's Australian Open run in 4 sets. I suspected that Bautista Agut's hot streak had to eventually come to an end, and judging from the numbers, his level of play was not as strong as previous matches--he hit 27 winners but committed 45 unforced errors, and he broke Dimitrov once but dropped his own serve four times. 

Now that the quarterfinals are set, let's take a look at some performance metrics for the last eight. 

These measures were discussed in slightly more detail in my previous post, so I won't elaborate on the ratios here. 

Putting the winner to unforced error ratio in context

Before we examine the ratios--let's provide a bit of context on the winner to unforced ratio by looking at the stats for a very high level match. The 2008 Wimbledon final between Federer and Nadal has been billed by some as the greatest match of all time.

Federer struck 89 winners and committed 52 unforced errors, for a winner to UFE ratio of 1.71. Nadal hit 60 winners and committed 27 errors, for a winner to UFE ratio of 2.22.  As I previously mentioned, a commentator (I don't recall whom) suggested that a ratio of greater than 1 is good tennis. I think it's safe to say ratios of 1.5 and above are quite good,  and anything nearing  or exceeding 1.75 is very high level tennis.

So now let's take a look at the winners to unforced errors ratio for each match at the 2014 AO for the remaining players. Wawrinka had a free pass in round 3 after Vasek Pospisil withdrew, so there's no data for round 3 for Stan.

Winners to Unforced Errors

	R1	R2	R3	R4	Overall
Nadal	2.60	2.05	1.17	1.29	1.56
Dimitrov	3.50	1.03	3.77	1.12	1.59
Murray	2.46	0.81	0.97	1.02	1.11
Federer	1.76	1.49	1.94	2.05	1.76
Berdych	2.06	2.23	1.23	2.24	1.84
Ferrer	1.10	0.67	0.92	1.49	1.04
Wawrinka	2.09	1.33	N/A	1.54	1.50
Djokovic	1.33	2.73	1.35	1.57	1.58

Dimitrov has fallen from the top spot in this category after his four round match produced less than stellar results, especially compared to his 1st and 3rd round matches (I'm wondering if all of the data was collected for those matches, as 3.5 and 3.77 seem pretty extreme.)

Berdych leads with 1.84 for the overall ratio for the first four matches, and Federer has moved up to 2nd place with his excellent performance in round 4 against Tsonga, hitting more than two winners per UFE. Berdych put up even stronger numbers in round 4, hitting 2.24 winners per UFE.  It's good news for the Federer camp that his best numbers (for this ratio) came against his toughest opponent. 

Murray's numbers are not so great, excluding a solid 1st round ratio of 2.46. He actually hit more errors than winners in rounds 2 and 3, and just barely hit more winners than errors against Stephane Robert in round 4. 

David Ferrer's numbers aren't looking so great--particularly in rounds 2 and 3, although his round 4 performance is more solid.  Given Berdych's consistently high winner to UFE ratios in the tournament, I feel more confident about my pick for him to beat Ferrer. 

Wawrinka and Djokovic had similar ratios in round four and are also fairly close in the overall ratio for the first week, with Novak having a small edge. I'm keeping my hopes up that this will translate into another epic showdown that rivals their great matches at the AO and US Open last year.

Nadal and Dimitrov are also evenly matched in the overall ratios for the week, but I'm less hopeful that their quarterfinal will be quite as competitive. However, a commentator on AO Radio just mentioned that a blister on Nadal's hand might be a cause for concern. 

Now let's take a look at the winners per game ratio...

Winners per Game

	R1	R2	R3	R4	Overall
Nadal	1.30	1.50	0.88	0.95	1.11
Dimitrov	0.33	1.16	1.20	1.06	0.91
Murray	1.39	0.89	0.94	1.33	1.14
Federer	1.07	1.86	1.40	1.39	1.43
Berdych	1.25	1.12	1.23	1.52	1.28
Ferrer	1.14	0.80	0.76	1.60	1.09
Wawrinka	1.53	1.49	N/A	1.63	1.55
Djokovic	1.38	1.15	1.03	1.43	1.24

Nadal and Dimitrov lag behind  the rest of the field in the winners per game ratio. Wawrinka and Federer are still #1 and #2, with Stan, Ferrer, and Berdych putting up the best numbers in round 4.

Finally, let's look at the unforced errors per game ratio...

Unforced Errors per Game

	R1	R2	R3	R4	Overall
Nadal	0.50	0.73	0.75	0.74	0.71
Dimitrov	0.10	1.13	0.32	0.94	0.57
Murray	0.57	1.11	0.97	1.31	1.03
Federer	0.61	1.25	0.72	0.68	0.81
Berdych	0.61	0.50	1.00	0.68	0.70
Ferrer	1.03	1.20	0.83	1.08	1.05
Wawrinka	0.73	1.12	N/A	1.06	1.03
Djokovic	1.03	0.42	0.77	0.91	0.79

Dimitrov is committing the fewest errors per game (though I have some reservations about the data on his earlier matches), but the next best are Berdych (0.7), Nadal (0.71), Djokovic (0.79). Ferrer and Wawrinka have the worst ratios, gifting their opponents a little more than one free point per game with an unforced error.

So my predictions for the QFs:

I previously was leaning slightly toward Berdych over Ferrer, but looking at these numbers makes me a bit more confident that Berdych will prevail.  I'm going with Berdych in 4. 

I would like to see Wawrinka defeat Djokovic given their tremendous battles last year, but I just don't foresee Djokovic going out. Wawrinka may very well finally find what it takes to defeat Novak, and I think he will once again make it a great contest, but I'm going with Djokovic in 5. 

At the beginning of the tournament, I'm not sure that I would pick Federer to beat Murray, especially since his draw went through Tsonga territory, but with Federer's strong performance and Murray's questionable form, I'm picking Federer to win in 4 sets.

And finally, Nadal and Dimitrov--I think Grigor will be the first to take a set off of Rafa, but I think Rafa wins in 4--unless Nadal's hand proves to be a problem. Making the quarters is already a good result for Dimitrov, and I would be very surprised if he could best Nadal in a best of 5 contest unless Rafa is substantially hampered by the blistered hand.

The big names--minus Del Potro--have made it to the last eight...now it's time to see who is going to the semifinals!