Cobolli Topples Tiafoe in Acapulco, Medvedev Duplicates Dubai Trophy | Monday Match Analysis

Welcome everyone to Monday Match Analysis.

I'm Gil Gross and Daniel Medvedev is two time Dubai champion.

He has duplicated a trophy for the first time in his career.

One of the quirky stats in tennis, it is title number 23 for Medvedev.

And it was unfortunately also a quirky way to do it, as Talon Greach's poor could not

play the final due to a hamstring injury that will also see him miss the sunshine double.

It seems we'll talk about Dubai and how things went down, how Greach's poor was able

to beat roublev on one leg and my overall thoughts on Medvedev for the week.

That will be at the end of the show.

I want to start however with Flavio Caboli, third title of his career, second 500, first

hard court title for the Italian, he beats Francis Tiafo in the Acapucal final in straight

sets, 7, 6, 6, 4.

So we'll get into that final in depth.

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Alright, Flavio Caboli is somebody who I've been saying for a couple of years now has

top 10 upside and that's because the movement leads the way.

He is a special tier one level mover.

The forehand is deadly, it is a heavyweight weapon.

The backhand carries its own weight, he's still got some things to sort out and those things

are the consistency and the serve issues.

The serve aspect of it is really, really interesting what happened in this match.

I want to start with it because it's the most interesting thing.

Maybe not the most consequential, but it should have been my take is that Flavio Caboli

probably should have won this match easier.

And I say that because Francis Tiafo could not make forehand returns, Tiafo's forehand

return kind of killed him.

It also kind of didn't kill him because Caboli didn't really recognize what was happening

or should I say could not change his typical pattern in order to adjust to his opponent.

His opponent who notoriously has forehand return issues.

It is a longstanding weakness for Tiafo, which at times has looked to be patched up.

He's done well to sort of improve upon the weakness that is his forehand return.

But in this match, I'll give you the numbers right off the bat.

He only made 12 out of 28 forehand returns, so 43% forehand returns came back in the court.

That includes second serve returns, although most of these would have been first serve returns

given Caboli's high fore serve percentage.

He made 84% of his backhand returns.

Now, this is Caboli just in terms of how Caboli served.

And I want to actually bring up, and I've got to pull it up because I don't,

I haven't quite loaded it up, but I want to show you kind of where Caboli was serving.

His first serve location, I'll pull it up on YouTube right now.

So he was going only 32% out wide on the do side, 65% T on the ad.

It was a little bit more balanced, 45% T 55% wide, but he is still directing the majority

of his first serves into Tiafo's backhand, which is by far Francis's better return.

Not only is it typically his better return, but in this match, the delta was even more

stark because Francis's return on the backhand side was terrific.

And he was consistently hitting sharp, clean backhand returns that were getting him to

neutral off of Caboli's first serve.

And on the forehand, we just said, you know, 43% it usually wasn't even making it.

I don't think Caboli recognized this until the last game of the match, until the last

game of the match in which he went basically every serve at Tiafo's forehand.

He got a sitter, he got two service winners, and he got an ace.

Now the reason why Caboli usually serves at the righty backhand is because he doesn't

have a slice serve.

He has a flat and he has a kick.

If you don't have a slice, it's hard to serve at righty forehands because you can't get

the ball to tail away.

And it's hard to get that angle because you're, you know, Caboli, if you're only comfortable

hitting the flat serve, it's hard to catch the right side of the ball, and it's also hard

to take away speed and depth and find a sharp angle on the due side of the service box.

So that wide serve is, it's just a tough spot to access when you aren't able to hit the

slice serve.

That's not a serve that Caboli is developed.

And it's just funny how match ups work, right, because there are going to be, there

are going to be some match ups where that's just fine.

There are going to be some match ups where it's okay if your serve is designed to more

often than not go at somebody's backhand.

There are going to be others where it's just the wrong way to serve.

And this, this was one of them where it was just the wrong way to serve.

When he went at Teofo's forehand, by the way, when he hit a first serve at Teofo's forehand,

he won 18 out of the 20 points.

But as I kind of showed you on the, on the spread, but now I'll give you a stat that

is going to work even for the audio listeners, Teofo got to hit 32 backhand first serve

returns and 24 hand.

So that almost gave him a lifeline and it made the match, I think, closer than, than

probably what it, what it could have been.

Even though Caboli was only broken one time, I just found that really interesting.

And in terms of Teofo's forehand return, I thought at one point that he figured something

out with sort of this block drive tweener that I, I was seeing him hit a couple years ago,

he wasn't necessarily chipping the ball low to high like that it wasn't a backspin

return.

It was more of a flat block, which I actually liked.

But he's kind of gotten away from that and he can't really do a pure chip return against

Caboli because chip returning against a player who generates off the first ball that well

is just not really a great option.

I thought this was a great stat from Matt Willis recently on Twitter where he kind of just

showed how rare block returns are these days at the top of the sport.

Like, Bublick blocks 32% of his returns, Musetti blocks 29% of his returns.

Those are the guys who block the most returns and they're still at 32% 29% like it's still

the minority of their returns.

And then if you look at, you know, sinners 95% drive, Alcaraz is 90% drive, demon or 91%

drive.

These are the returns that I think are obviously the most effective on the tour.

You don't want to necessarily be blocking too many returns.

It works in some matchups, Caboli would not be one of those matchups.

Tiafo also has never been comfortable just moving back and giving himself more time.

More on that in a moment.

For whatever reason, he doesn't feel like he can drop back and return from deep, which

would give him a little bit more time to sort of unwind his swing, which naturally he

struggles to be compact off of his forehand.

Again, he's tried very hard, but it's hard for him to do it.

Okay.

I know that was a weird way to start because I didn't really make an argument for why

Caboli won the match other than, I mean, obviously had Tiafo been more effective on his

forehand return.

That obviously would have helped Francis out.

I think what really was the main key for Caboli, the main advantage for Caboli, it was out

playing Tiafo off the forehand.

The forehand, a forehand exchange, Caboli was just outhitting Francis.

He was a little bit better in every area when it comes to that do side cross court, and

it was a big advantage for Flavio, whose lateral movement was better.

He's capable of hitting way bigger on the run.

And his positioning gives him a little more, a little more time, which is useful when it

comes to absorbing quality in particular.

So when the ball is coming with a lot of pace, a lot of depth, or a lot of width, Caboli

being a little bit further back, it gives him some more breathing room to try to absorb

that quality or some extra time to cover the extra court and get into that wide position.

Whereas Tiafo, he's so aggressive and he feels like he has to be because it's how he

produces offense.

Tiafo, you probably think of him as an attacking player.

But it's not because he hits the ball big.

He's actually two miles per hour under average on the forehand and two miles per hour under

average speed on the backhand.

The way he generates attack and damage is by taking the ball early and redirecting and

maneuvering the ball around the court, taking the ball early and eventually finding his

way forward and being a player who's pretty comfortable in the transition game.

That's how he's an attacking player.

Not by hitting big, but in order to execute that game, Tiafo feels like he needs to take

so much time away.

I think it really helps him on the backhand.

His backhand is a very compact weapon, very hard to rush, very good at absorbing quality

and pace.

You know, can still get tied up with a lot of depth coming in, but he's very good at taking

the ball early on his backhand and it's not a shot that needs a lot of time.

On the forehand, I think the aggressive positioning can hurt Francis sometimes because he was too

vulnerable against Kuboli who bring so much firepower in that forehand, a forehand exchange.

Francis struggled to absorb it.

He struggled to cover it, especially out wide, especially when Kuboli could introduce

a little pace and a little width, I just didn't feel like Tiafo did a great job of hanging

in. Whereas Kuboli, he's so quick moving to his right.

He's really good on the wrong.

And he's so dangerous out there.

Another thing on this, Tiafo, he doesn't play up the middle on the forehand.

He almost never does.

He's always sort of coming around the right side of the ball and hooking it cross court.

Against Kuboli, who once again, he's so comfortable moving out there, even even if you get a good angle.

He's so comfortable and so dangerous from that position.

I think against Flavio, it's actually quite effective to play up the middle

and to be a little bit weary of opening up angles for him.

So I think the better way is to go a little more central.

And then once you feel like you can actually damage him, now you can create some width.

But that's not really how Tiafo plays. Tiafo is constantly trying to create width on the forehand.

Always. And I think it plays into Kuboli's hands a little bit in this case.

It allowed him to dominate in that cross court exchange on the due side.

The other aspect was Kuboli's athleticism.

And it wreaked a little bit of havoc for Tiafo, who in some crucial points in this match actually

just struggled to finish. So we can go to the first set tie break to start.

There were three inflection points in this tie break, in my view.

You know, one was sort of a neutral ball miss from Tiafo on the back end that hit the tape.

Francis was very consistent, very buttoned up in this match.

He gets high marks for me in that area, but he missed one in the tie break.

So that was important. But the other two were, you know, a couple of balls where he hit pretty

central approach shots. Actually, still got some volley looks because Kuboli didn't hit great

passing shots. But ultimately, even the volleys for Tiafo on these occasions weren't quite

good enough. And Kuboli came up with a two shot pass at it was two, three in the breaker.

And then one that will be a little bit more memorable for most folks because it was so athletic

by Kuboli. Tiafo hit a pretty poor approach shot. Kuboli shanked the pass, though.

It ended up being just this high backhand volley for Tiafo. He put it down the line.

And Kuboli was just so athletic and so dexterous on a stretch forehand passing shot down the line.

That was pretty spectacular.

Two all in the second set, we get our first break of serve. It was a double fault for Tiafo.

And then on the other three points, he had attack forehands on the other three points.

And on one, Kuboli got back to neutral. On another, Kuboli counter attacked with a running forehand

down the line. Gorgeous. Again, that running forehand, which was a common theme. And if you

watch, you know, the most spectacular points of this match, you're going to see a lot of brilliant

Kuboli running forehands. It's it's just look, he's going to miss some times from that position

because he's quite ambitious. But he has, you know, a step over when when he hits that step

over running forehand, that crossover step running forehand, he's got massive power potential and

pretty good timing. And sometimes he is going to like you feel like you're in great position

to win a point. And you're actually watching the ball go by you on the next ball for a winner.

It's it's it's tough. But that's how explosive Kuboli is. That's what he's capable of.

Anyway, so a counter attack running forehand down the line. And then Tiafo missed an attack forehand

on break point. So the overall point that I'm making at two all Tiafo, he's got actually three

forehands to attack or three points in which he had forehands to attack. And just wasn't able to

really cash in on him. And again, that's that's a combination of the conditions very slow.

Kuboli's speed extremely fast. And Tiafo's forehand a bit underpowered.

Last one, I'll point out for all for all break point crucial break point Francis steps in on

the backhand. He's way inside the court. He tries to go down the line. Just just didn't didn't

get enough of it. And he realized as soon as as he hit it that it wasn't enough. And he actually

hit the reverse button tried to back up. But he was he was vulnerable from there. And he couldn't

get himself back in the point. So he got counter attacked again. So just from those attacking

positions, Kuboli could be a little bit more deadly. And with his athleticism, he was able to

to steal quite a few major points from Tiafo in big spots. I thought that.

Um, you know, Tiafo Tiafo. When it comes to what he did well,

I think he's more willing to run and defend this year. I see the fitness. I see the work he's put in.

I see some of the the the commitment that he has at this point in time, especially

something that can can lack at some of the smaller events throughout the year that I think

has been more consistent. Just the commitment to defend and to to run around the court without bailing

out and just, you know, valuing defense on the court. And look, the anticipation that Tiafo has

is really, really good. So when he's committed, he actually defends quite well.

And his advantage in this match, the reason it was quite close, you know, seven, six, six,

four, other than Kuboli really missing the mark on his surf strategy. The reason this was quite

close is, you know, was his steadiness, Tiafo's steadiness and consistency. Kuboli can still be

a little bit erratic and can still lose control particularly on the forehand. And Tiafo was able

to profit off of that. And I've watched Francis on his US Open runs over the years. I've watched so

much of Francis when he's been at his best at the US Open. He is stingy. You know, that's the part

of of Tiafo that probably goes a little bit underappreciated because of his inconsistency

when it comes to results. The fact that when he's at his best, he's actually extremely buttoned up

and he's very good at limiting mistakes when he's engaged and he's at his best. And it's all

about sort of the mentality and the physicality facilitating his ability to do so. And that's why I

think, you know, look, it hasn't been an amazing start to 2026, but it's been a solid one. And

I don't think that Tiafo's suddenly going to be like, I don't think that he's going to have

this 2.0 phase in his career where he's a top 10 player. But I do think that he's, I'm seeing

evidence that Francis is going to be a more consistent top 20 level player this year. I think he

has the chance to do that. Kuboli, on the other hand, he's he's starting to build quite the resume,

isn't he? In the last year, quietly sort of checking off some nice boxes. He's got two 500 titles

on a couple of different surfaces. He's got a Wimbledon quarter final. He's got a Davis Cup title.

So he's made noise on on all the surfaces. And he's now the world number 15 when the rankings come

out tomorrow or today. It's more like today. It's after midnight as I'm recording this.

Okay, I think that's everything on Acapulco. Let's talk Dubai.

Should we begin with how Greeksport beat Rubelev on one leg? I think we should begin with that. So

talent hurt his hamstring at 5 all in the first set. And then there's a long medical time out

at 5 6 with Greeksport up. So Rubelev has to out of the medical time out serve to try to force

a first set tie break. And talent does the only thing that talent can do in this spot where he

can't really move. He's going to swing for the fences on the return. And Andre gave him a chance

to do so. He hit two passive second serves. He missed a couple of spots on the first serve.

And Greeksport brutalized Rubelev surf.

You cannot brutalize somebody's serve much worse than what Greeksport did to Andre's serve in

this 5 6 game. He just destroyed four returns to break. The other thing you should know about Dubai

is that it was very server friendly conditions. So Greeksport was able to serve really well in the

second set. Little bit of adrenaline maybe helped his mobility. And he gets it to a second set

tie break. But Rubelev had two set points. He was up 6 4. He had a wide serve that Greeksport

kind of jumped on. It was a little slow. But honestly in my head, I can't really remember if the

serve was a really poor wide serve or if Greeksport just anticipated correctly. But

regardless, Greeksport destroyed it again. It was very, you know, joke of its US open against

Federer kind of slap shot cross court forehand return winner on the do side. And then Andre made

some horrible mistakes where you just felt like the situation got to him. And we know the psychology

of playing an injured opponent can be tough. Rubelev did not handle it well because

at six five, he missed a second return on the backhand. Just a just a regulation return of serve

on a Greeceport second serve. And then at six seven, he misses a plus one forehand with plenty of

time to set up. It was a run around forehand as well. It is Rubelev's best shot. And it was a pretty

wild one to miss on match point. So that's how Greeksport won the semi-final. I know a lot of people

then bring up, well, what do we do? Should there be some provision where Andre still gets to play the

final if, you know, blah, blah, blah. That does not stand up to scrutiny. In my view, at least it

hasn't up to this point. Like I have not heard a good counter when I just say, so who gets the

rankings points for making the final Greek sport or Rubelev in that case. You know, certainly

Greek sport deserves the reward for winning the semi-final, right? Like obviously you have to

reward him with the points and the prize money. So now what do we do about Rubelev? I don't want

to be wins the final. I mean, it's a total mess. So I know it might like sound good in theory

for Andre to get like, you know, for there to be some provision where if you can't play the next

round, you get some sort of mid tournament lucky loser or something. It just doesn't make any sense

in practice. Let's talk about Medvedev now. It was a pretty dominant run. It was similar to

Brisbane earlier this year, where when you look at the underlying numbers, he just destroyed

everybody. I mean, this is this is silly stuff what I'm about to tell you. His hold rate was 94%.

His break rate was 53%. Nobody got more than four games in a set. And that includes Felix,

Ojalea, Seam and the semi-finals. Medvedev is now eight and two against Felix.

He it was a god tier return performance in the semi-final in server friendly conditions against FAA.

And he completely shut down the surf, which is it's just so impressive. I mean, Felix won 64%

of his first surf points. That's a dreadful number for Ojalea Seam. And it's because Medvedev and

that deeper term position is going to just he's going to soak up that that serve and soak up that

first forehand. And if you're going to beat Daniels defense, you better get creative because you

aren't going to blast through him. And as much as Felix tried to come forward, he wasn't quite

clinical enough. He tried to serve in volley at 30 all in the first set at four five, for example.

And he hit an okay volley. He hit an okay volley. And Daniel hit an awesome backhand lob to get to

set point. And then on the next point, Medvedev just deed up and Felix squeezed the targets on

on a forehand unforced. And that was the first set six four. But you know, in general,

the suffocating nature of Felix's surf plus one, which most players are just completely overwhelmed by,

Medvedev's survival skills are just off the charts. And Felix has just been mystified by that

up to this point in the head to head. I will say one of my main takeaways from watching Medvedev

throughout the week, although I wish I was able to watch him more. He was playing a lot of early

matches. And it's a tough time zone in that respect. But you know, if more tournaments were as

quick as do buy, boy, would it help Medvedev? I'm going to give you some data oddities here.

Daniel was actually down six miles per hour on average in first serve speed. His first serve

percentage was up 10 percentage points for the tournament, 73%. So when those two things are true,

speed way down percentage way up. The implication is that Medvedev was playing safer on the first

serve, right? The problem with that is his damage numbers were actually up. His unreturned rate

was up 16 percentage points. So what we were seeing here is Medvedev got more comfortable with his

spot serving and his precision serving. He didn't need the extra pace. He was able to just kind of

go for percentage. And he was still getting the reward out of it because this court, this court

was so darn fast for him. This this court speed deemphasizes power. And while I just laid out an

analytical argument that it helped his serve, it's even more important on Medvedev's ground strokes.

We all know that to be the case. I'll give you another stat. Four matches played for Medvedev.

He hit nine volleys in total. He hit nine volleys in four matches. Yet his conversion score

was way up. Conversion score for those who don't know,

percent points won in attack. So he was able to produce offense off the ground. No problem without

coming forward, which he doesn't like to do. But that just sort of it again, it goes back to the

fact that this court is going to this court is going to give your power a handicap. And it's going

to be much more so about precision, your ability to redirect your flat shot, your flatter hitting

is going to come through the court even faster because this is like greased lightning this court.

If more courts played like this, it would be, I mean, Medvedev's had a great career despite the

state of conditions on the circuit. But this extreme fast is somewhat rare. And Medvedev just

looks so much more comfortable in it. So now he goes to Indian Wells. We'll see how it looks

there. It's going to be very different. Well, actually, also he has to get there. So, you know,

fingers crossed that everybody's able to travel safely, who's who's in Dubai right now over to

LA. That's going to be a challenge in itself, unfortunately. But for Medvedev,

trend continues to be a lot better than it was at points for last year. You know, it's two

dominant titles this year in the first two months of the season. So it's certainly something to

build on as we move forward. All right. That's all I got. We're going to do, of course, Indian Wells

preview coming up at a certain point in the next couple of days. A reminder, once again,

my live chat exclusive to my tribe community is going to be on Monday. That is March 2nd at

5 p.m. Pacific 8 p.m. Eastern time. Hope to see a lot of you there. Hope you enjoyed. Don't

forget to subscribe. I'll see you next time.