Analysis for Davydenko-Gulbis (ATP Beijing)

Head-to-head record 1:0

What an interesting match-up the first Olympic round brings. Latvian Gulbis will face experienced Russian Davydenko for the second time this year. Latvian young gun has improved a lot recently and we were really impressed by his latest performances. Gulbis primarily employs an offensive baseline playing style, although is fairly comfortable playing from all court positions. Gulbis' most consistent shot is his forehand, which has been likened to that of American James Blake's for its rapid pace and relatively flat execution. His forehand is taken with a medium swing and with high levels of wrist action, which attributes to the explosive nature of the shot. His arsenal of forehand shots is nearly complete, and thus can be extremely disruptive and turn a defensive position into an offensive position. His running forehand has a slice action, but consistently lands extremely deep in the court, allowing for adequate recoil time to regain court position. Gulbis also has a particularly excellent array of finesse shots, including the high lob and drop shot, both of which he can strike from any position. Gulbis' primary weakness is his backhand, which while remaining adequately deep tends to lack variety, unless a particularly advantageous situation presents itself. Gulbis' foot speed and serve are also only moderate (but have improved significantly), although his return of serve is extremely varied and dangerous, particularly on second serves and, due to his height and kick serves. Despite having prodigious talent for his age, Gulbis can be prone to nervousness when down in a set or match, which can cause tight matches to be more mentally straining on him. Similarly to Marat Safin, Gulbis' playing style is extremely tactical and aggressive, and relies more on making winners than drawing errors, which can sometimes lead to a very high unforced error count. Nikolay Davydenko prefers slower surfaces although he is capable of playing an all-surface game. His main strengths are his groundstrokes, foot speed, balance and return game. He is best known in the tennis world for his running shots which he takes early and often turns into winners. Davydenko's weaknesses are serve, volleys and variation which are important skills to have on fast surfaces. He hasn´t been too impressive over the last months and we think it will be all about Gulbis´ nerves but if he stays calm and concentrated, he should be able to keep the match close. They already met once this year and Davydenko won with luck 3:6, 7:6, 7:6. This shows that Gulbis has no fear from his opponent and we will support him at this price.