Novak Djokovic needs to beat Taylor Fritz if he hopes to make the semi-final, but beating an American at the US Open is very hard.
Fritz is an exciting player capable of surprising on a grand scale and disappointing on a similar scale. The American plays a typical style for a player born and raised on US soil. He's very attacking and likes to dictate play with a powerful serve.
Djokovic generally can overcome those players, but it would be a lie to say that he never struggles with that type of player. The crowd will be on the American's side, something Djokovic is well aware of. He tends to find added inspiration in those types of matches, having battled the crowd for much of his career. Whether he can do it again remains to be seen, but let's see how the matchup went in the past.
Head-to-head:
There is no shortage of previous matches when it comes to these players. We've seen seven matches so far with the score being 7-0 for one of the players. I'm sure you know who won all of these matches as the most recent one happened just a week ago.
Djokovic smashed Fritz in the Cincinnati quarter-final, beating him 6-3 6-4. The Serbian did dominate most of these matches, but we've seen some pretty close sets between them, so it's not hard to imagine Fritz snatching one of those. He'll need three to win, and that's a bit tougher though.
Prediction:
So it's pretty clear that Djokovic has the advantage here, and it's mostly because he's far more consistent than Fritz from the baseline. You need to be incredibly precise when playing Djokovic; if you're not, you will be in trouble.
Fritz hasn't been able to do that very often, but his serve can push him to a few tiebreaks if he has it. We saw it last year in Turin, where Djokovic had to win in two tiebreaks. Perhaps Fritz can win a set with the crowd madness and everything else, but I don't see him winning the match.
Prediction: Novak Djokovic to win in four sets.
0 Comments