Ash Barty wins the Cincinnati Masters: The Undisputed World #1
An analysis of Barty's toughest win this week against Angelique Kerber and a wee bit on the consolidation of her place atop the rankings.
Have you been keeping up with the tennis?
That’s the Cincinnati Masters, the Canadian Masters and the Olympic Games all crammed into the space of four weeks.
Oh, and the US Open starts next week.
Never fear! I’m (just about) keeping up with it all and have another timely(ish) article for y’all on Ash Barty’s win in Cincinnati.
The article is split into two sections.
Barty’s toughest win during her Cincinnati run against Angelique Kerber.
Barty’s consolidation of her #1 ranking.
Don’t worry, I’ve spelt Cincinnati right this time…
Enjoy!
Cincinnati Masters Semifinal: Ash Barty defeats Angelique Kerber 6-2 7-5
For the second time this year, Ash Barty and Angelique Kerber squared off in the semifinals of a tournament (here’s the analysis of their Wimbledon semifinal if you wanna do some pre-reading).
For the second time this year, despite Kerber enjoying a renaissance of sorts1, Barty came through in straight sets.
It wasn’t as easy as it looks, however2 - walking away with such a flattering scoreline is testament to Barty’s ability to keep potentially complicated matches under control.
Here’s how the world #1 kept Kerber at bay.
Kerber 2.0: Stronger in extended rallies
One of the most interesting things about this match is that, in a rally, Kerber arguably played at better than her match at Wimbledon whilst Barty almost definitely played worse - yet Barty got a relatively comfortable win.
The facets of the game that worked well for Kerber at Wimbledon were working better in Cincinnati.
Slice: Barty’s slice was a weapon throughout her Wimbledon run, yet Kerber had won 60% of the points that included a Barty slice. As I said in that article, Kerber’s ability to get super-low in the court allows her to deal with Barty’s slice backhand fairly easily.
So on the courts of Cincinnati, where the balls don’t stay as low, Kerber had the advantage winning a massive 70% of the points that included a Barty slice.
Barty still has a lot of room for improvement on her drive backhand and therefore used it infrequently throughout the match. When the pressure was on, Barty’s topspin backhand failed her.
Long rallies and backhand: Barty’s slice and Kerber’s success in longer rallies tie into each other a bit - the slice tends to show up in longer rallies, naturally giving Kerber the edge. Couple this with Kerber’s ability to get consistent depth on the ball (better than most players) and she was the favourite to win the point the longer the rally went on.
Kerber’s backhand was used effectively, just as it well as it had been at Wimbledon, outshining Barty’s once more:
Kerber backhand forced errors or winners, Wimbledon/Cincinnati: 15-13
Barty backhand forced errors or winners, Wimbledon/Cincinnati: 5-5
It all added up to a 24-17 point advantage in Kerber’s favour in rallies 5+ shots, Kerber more easily able to graft an advantage from a neutral rally ball (at Wimbledon, it had been 29-27, Barty able to keep it so close due to playing exceptionally from the baseline on the day).
This isn’t all about Kerber, I swear - I just wanted to stress how difficult an opponent she is from the baseline.
Here’s how Barty was able to overcome these advantages.
Barty 2.0: Leaning on the Serve
Just as Kerber took the things that worked for her at Wimbledon and improved on them, Barty followed suit.
I called it a first serve masterclass at Wimbledon so I suppose in Cincinnati it was a work of art?
With Barty expecting a tough battle from the baseline, she went into the match looking to lean heavily on the serve, more so than she had at Wimbledon.
Barty’s first serve improved a little - though her first serve points won dropped by from 87.8% at Wimbledon to 75.0% in Cincinnati, due to Kerber playing better from the baseline throughout, Barty won more cheap points from her serves going unreturned in Cincinnati than she did at Wimbledon.
The credit, however, should really go to the second serve.
Firstly, the accuracy.
The body serve isn’t a particularly effective tactic against Kerber, who is quick on her feet and isn’t easily vulnerable to getting jammed up. Barty won only 8/15 of her body serve points at Wimbledon - not bad, but certainly a serve she’d like to avoid.
Barty hit her spots more often than she had at Wimbledon, cutting out body serves completely on first serve and almost completely on second serves.
Secondly, the tactics.
Barty’s first serve direction remained the same as it had at Wimbledon. On her second serve, however, she aimed for the Kerber backhand primarily and very occasionally went big towards the forehand to get a free point (at Wimbledon, it was more or less an even split between forehand, body and backhand).
These two factors added up to her second serve points won percentage improving from 45.5% at Wimbledon to 50.0% in Cincinnati. It might not sound like much but it’s quite a big deal - despite winning a lower percentage of points in extended rallies, Barty was still able to improve her second serve win percentage, solely influenced by the quality of her second serve delivery.
I’ll boil it down as my point might be getting a bit convoluted.
Kerber raised her level from the baseline (or at least maintained it whilst Barty’s level dropped somewhat), able to take the slice on easily on a higher bouncing court and using both wings effectively to build points.
Despite this being the case, Barty came away with another straight sets win - and it’s (mostly3) all thanks to the serve:
The first serve was arguably even better than it had been at Wimbledon, more serves going unreturned and less serves directed towards the body. Her ace count was unsurprisingly through the roof this week in all her matches4.
The second serve was the backbone of her game - she recognised the improvements that had to be made from her match at Wimbledon against the German and as a result, the precision and tactical awareness on this serve earned her cheap points where she’d struggled to do the same in their last match-up.
It doesn’t matter what you throw at Barty at the moment. She honestly might be thinking she had a bit of an off day against Kerber but it didn’t matter - her serve is just too solid (did I mention she only double faulted once?) and puts her miles ahead of the rest of the pack.
Which brings me on to my next point…
The Undisputed World #1
Barty’s win against Jil Teichmann in the Cincinnati Masters’ final earned her her fifth title of the year, right after the Yarra Valley Classic, the Miami Masters, the Stuttgart Open and Wimbledon.
She improves to 14-1 against top-20 opponents this year (only loss was to Aryna Sabalenka in Madrid) and 40-7 against all opponents.
All this success has increased the gap between Barty and the world #2, Sabalenka, to 3175 points. This is the largest gap in Barty’s 83 weeks as world #1 - for reference, on the men’s side, there are only 3298 points between Novak Djokovic at world #1 and Rafael Nadal at world #5.
Barty is only 12 weeks away from becoming 5th on the all-time list for most consecutive weeks at #1 and, at this rate, seems poised to make it.
The stats don’t lie - though the tour has seemed a little unruly this year, Ash Barty has been a beacon of dominance throughout. As we saw in Cincinnati, even in matches where Barty is being outplayed from the baseline, she has an extra gear to her serve that most can’t handle.
Going into the US Open, it’s hard to side with anyone but the Aussie. Okay, the slice will be tempered in the heavier conditions of New York and if she rematched Kerber, or played a hard-hitter like Sabalenka5, she might struggle to come out on top in most rallies.
After this week, however, she showed that playing below her average level, she is the favourite in most matches… and at her best (a la Azarenka, Krejcikova and Teichmann), well, she is downright terrifying.
A healthy world #1 at Flushing Meadows will be very difficult to stop.
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Kerber defeated her first top 10 opponent in over two years against Svitolina, beat Slam-champions Kvitova and Ostapenko and dispatched Sakkari 6-2 6-2, all earlier that week. She was in mightily dangerous form.
All credit to Heather Watson who technically got the most games off of Ash this week. It wasn’t as polished a performance from Barty, however, and the head-to-head between Barty and Kerber merits a deeper analysis and (I guess) gives me the right to call it a tougher match!
A little exaggerative - honourable mention to her forehand down the line which kept the rally count from tipping exponentially in Kerber’s favour.
Her matches vs Kerber and Teichmann were in the top 10 best matches of her career in terms of ace count at 18.8% and 18.6%, respectively. Her other three matches against Azarenka, Krejcikova and Watson were also in the top 50 at 11.8%, 14.6% and 12.0%, respectively.
Edit on this: the draw came out moments after publishing this article - Barty could only play either of these players in the final.