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Taylor Fritz of the United States (Team World) beat Andrey Rublev of Russia (Team Europe) 6-2, 7-6 at the Laver Cup in Vancouver on Saturday, September 23, to give his team a 6-0 lead.
Casper Ruud beat Tommy Paul later in the day to reduce the deficit to 2-6 for Team Europe. In the third fixture on Day 2, Frances Tiafoe defeated Hubert Hurkacz to extend Team World's lead to 8-2.
Team World are now the favorites to lift the trophy for the second consecutive year. On that note, let us take a look at two things that stood out in the match between Fritz and Rublev:
#1. Fritz put pressure on Rublev's backhand:
The match between Fritz and Rublev was also a battle between two of the best forehands in the business. However, the slowness of the surface neutralized the venom in their shots to a large extent.
Hence, Fritz played his crosscourt backhand with a sharp angle repeatedly to force the Russian to use his own backhand. Rublev came up with slices off his backhand in response, and the American then pounced on the ball with his inside-out forehand before going to the net to finish points with volleys.
That tactic worked in the first set for Fritz, as he was able to break Rublev twice to win the set quite comfortably and thereby draw first blood.
#2. Rublev bounced back in the second set temporarily, but Fritz did enough to win:
Rublev started the second set well, breaking the American in the second game to take a 3-0 lead. The Russian tried to direct traffic towards Fritz's forehand in order to prevent him from using his crosscourt backhand.
The American was not comfortable hitting the down-the-line forehands from the deuce court initially, as it was a high-risk shot. However, as the second set progressed, he started playing that shot more often and the results came immediately. Fritz also played his crosscourt forehand at times to push Rublev to his forehand corner and then pulled the trigger by playing the down-the-line forehand.
As a result, the American was able to break back and take the set into a tie-break, where he finished the match off comfortably. Fritz won 76% and 65% of the points on his first and second serves, respectively, while Rublev only managed 61% and 48%, respectively.
