Match Stats/Report - Agassi vs Roddick, Houston final, 2003

[Waspsting]

Andre Agassi beat Andy Roddick 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the Houston final, 2003 on clay

It was #1 ranked Agassi’s first title at the event. Roddick had won the previous 2 editions and would go onto finish the year ranked #1 for only time

Agassi won 84 points, Roddick 77

(Note: I’m missing 1 point, a Roddick service point that he won
Missing point - Set 2, Game 4, Point 1)

Serve Stats
Agassi...
- 1st serve percentage (57/77) 74%
- 1st serve points won (39/57) 68%
- 2nd serve points won (13/20) 65%
- Aces 6 (1 second serve, 1 possibley not clean)
- Unreturned Serve Percentage (28/77) 36%

Roddick...
- 1st serve percentage (46/83) 55%
- 1st serve points won (31/46) 67%
- 2nd serve points won (20/37) 54%
- ?? serve points won (1/1)
- Aces 13 (2 second serves, 1 not clean), Service Winners 1
- Double Faults 2
- Unreturned Serve Percentage (31/83) 37%

Serve Patterns
Agassi served...
- to FH 40%
- to BH 60%

Roddick served...
- to FH 32%
- to BH 67%
- to Body 1%

Return Stats
Agassi made...
- 50 (12 FH, 38 BH)
- 1 Winner (1 BH)
- 17 Errors, comprising...
- 10 Unforced (6 FH, 4 BH), including 1 runaround FH
- 7 Forced (3 FH, 4 BH)
- Return Rate (50/81) 62%

Roddick made...
- 49 (22 FH, 27 BH), including 2 runaround FHs
- 3 Winners (2 FH, 1 BH)
- 22 Errors, comprising...
- 14 Unforced (4 FH, 10 BH), including 1 return-approach attempt
- 8 Forced (2 FH, 6 BH)
- Return Rate (49/77) 64%

Break Points
Agassi 3/3
Roddick 2/5 (3 games)

Winners (excluding serves, including returns)
Agassi 19 (7 FH, 10 BH, 1 BHV, 1 OH)
Roddick 12 (6 FH, 3 BH, 3 OH)

Agassi's FHs - 1 cc/inside-in, 1 dtl, 2 inside-out, 1 longline, 2 lobs
- BHs - 1 cc pass, 4 dtl (1 pass), 1 longline pass at net, 3 drop shots, 1 net chord dribbler return

Roddick's FHs - 3 cc (2 returns), 1 dtl/inside-out, 2 inside-out
- BHs - 2 dtl (1 return), 1 lob

- 1 OH was on the bounce

Errors (excluding serves and returns)
Agassi 33
- 26 Unforced (14 FH, 12 BH)
- 7 Forced (5 FH, 2 BH)
- Unforced Error Forcefulness Index 44.6

Roddick 35
- 18 Unforced (8 FH, 10 BH)... with 1 BH at net
- 17 Forced (11 FH, 4 BH, 2 FHV)
- Unforced Error Forcefulness Index 47.8

(Note 1: all half-volleys refer to such shots played at net. Half -volleys played from other parts of the court are included within relevant groundstroke counts)

(Note 2: the Unforced Error Forcefulness Index is an indicator of how aggressive the average UE was. The numbers presented are keyed on 4 categories - 20 defensive, 40 neutral, 50 attacking and 60 winner attempt)

Net Points & Serve-Volley
Agassi was 7/8 (88%) at net

Roddick was...
- 4/12 (33%) at net, including...
- 0/1 serve-volleying, a 1st serve

Match Report
Two-part baseline match - roughly 2/5ths first part, 3/5ths second

Agassi is terrible in the first part and can’t keep the ball in play. Roddick is decent or average, with anything better than ‘terrible’ being good enough to come out on top
Agassi is solidly strong in second part, and better than a more or less unchanged Roddick

Overall, there’s more bad and ugly in the match than good. Pretty bad returning from both players, somewhat due to unusual, aggressive approaches to the shot (somewhat, not all or even majority). Bad movement from both players, augmented by slow reactions for Roddick. Iffy defence from him too. Lots of sloppiness from Agassi when he’s off
Agassi in solidly strong phase is good showing. Court is normal

Two-part nature of match makes full match stats of limited use. Both have come out with pretty good numbers, both winning majority of second serve points. All the sets are 1 break differentials and match long, break points read Agassi 3/3, Rod 2/5 (3 games)

71 points into the match, Roddick leads 6-3, 2-0 and has 0-40, 3 break points
At that stage -
- unreturned serves - Agassi 34%, Rod 44% and…
Agassi 4 winners, 5 errors forced, 19 UEs (8 FH, 11 BH)
Rod 5 winners, 2 errors forced, 6 UEs (6 BH)

4 winners, 19 UEs from Agassi. Short-medium length rallies. Sloppy off both wings
Rod with 5 winners, 6 UEs. Not many winners, but he’s coasting on 44% freebies
And he’s hell of a lot steadier than very poor opponent, which is all that matters

0 FH UEs for Rod. His FH is very funny shot in match… steady, but he’s slow to move there. Even in just this phase, he’s got 4 FEs on the FH (3 in baseline rallies), most drawn by wider FH cc’s that with better movement, reaction and defence, would expect good player to handle


90 points later, Agassi wins the match. During that phase -
- unreturned serves - Agassi 38%, Rod 32% and…
Agassi 15 winners, 12 errors forced, 7 UEs (6 FH, 1 BH)
Rod 7 winners, 5 errors forced, 12 UEs (8 FH, 4 BH)

Those are first class number from Agassi - all 3 of them

The UE contest shifting from 19-6 to 7-12 for him. Due to him being more solid, so the errors now coming from Rod, not Rod getting looser or sloppy
High winners and high errors forced too. Most of it in baseline rallies

Rod’s level of play doesn’t change much, so its Agassi’s that’s the game-changer. Almost anything would be an improvement for how poor Agassi had been early on, but his standard does reach a commendably high one

Freebies going down from 44% to 32% hurts Rod. Still, 32% isn’t small, so he isn’t swept away or anything as dramatic as that. In count dropping 62% to 50% is main reason

Rod FH making a UE or two or 8. They’re almost all aggressive shots and it remains defensively weak. He has 7 FEs too - 5 of them in baseline rallies and again, mostly drawn by FH cc’s

Noteworthy is Agassi’s freebies not changing match across parts and being higher than one would expect from him. Match long, he’s just 1% shy of Rod. With double faults thrown in (he has 0, Rod 2), he’s actually won higher percentage of points via freebies and handovers, with respect to points served than much, much bigger serving opponent

Gist - Agassi playing garbage for first part (sloppy off the ground), and well in second (steady and strong) and results following accordingly

Serve & Return
Strong serve from Rod. His returning is interestingly aggressive, and while not good, understandable at least
Average serving from Agassi and he’s not too good on the return either, albeit against strong opposition

Nature of serve-return contests don’t vary much across match

First serve in - Agassi 74%, Rod 55%
First serve ace/service winner rate - Agassi 9%, Rod 26%
Unreturned serves - Agassi 36%, Rod 37%

Rod has a couple doubles, Agassi none. Rod has 2 second serve aces, Agassi 1, which he delivers on match point

For Agassi, a great in count. Rod’s not so good and as mentioned earlier, divided 62% and 50% across 2 parts of match

Ace rates pretty good indicator of how the two serves stack up in quality. Rod’s much better
Unreturned serves being virtually equal in that light is criminal, from Rod’s point of view, even accounting for pretty aggressive returning

Unreturned serves breakdown (from returner’s point of view)
- Aced/Service Winner’d - Agassi 14, Rod 6
- Return FEs - Agassi 7, Rod 8
- Return UEs - Agassi 10, Rod 14

Both players vary return position. Rod often looks to return aggressively (he’s got 3 return winners, Agassi’s sole one is a net chord dribbler)

3 return winners + a handful of error forcing returns and a sprinkle of mildly putting Agassi on back foot (or at least, not letting him start on front one). That’s Rod’s bounty for aggressive returning
He’s also slow to react, move and makes hash of all kinds of routine or near enough to it returns. Not just when he’s trying to be aggressive and not just when he’s taking return from baseline. He makes slightly wide returns as if they were corner cases

Balancing it all - Agassi’s high in count, with average quality serve and Rod’s proportion of aggressive returning, its success rate and his tendency to miss routines he goes at normally - Rod’s returning is on the negative side of normal, at best. It’s only the aggressive success, which is relatively small - that keeps it from being terrible. Aesthetically, it’s the opposite of ‘makes returning look easy’ and objectively, Agassi’s serve is not hard to return. Put a good clay courter up against it, would get return rate of about 80%, cozily done (Rod returns at 64%)

For Agassi, being aced/SW’d 14 times while having 10 return UEs isn’t too unusual, though it would be for most players. Generally, he’s one of the easiest players to ace there is. He looks to firmly thump returns (not block), in his typical way. Success is limited to not giving up easy attacking third balls for Rod, but he does negligible real damage with the return shot. And misses good lot. 10 UEs isn’t low

Not hard to ace. Not hard to force a return error from (that is, better serves don’t come back). Misses fair few routines. Not too damaging
Even when dominating phase 2, he gives up 30% freebies, to Rod serving at 50%. Which, if not criminal, has a lot of room for improvement

Some big second serves from Rod too, and he has 2 aces with it. Agassi’s sole second serve ace is anomaly, and his second serve is normal enough. With all the negative qualites of Rod’s returning making it look better than it is

Gist - both players serving pretty well, in their own ways (Agassi for high in count, Rod for quality of serves). Near blackmark territory for both returners too - Agassi perhaps shy of the line, Rod beyond it. Enough routine return misses from Agassi for that to be so, and Rod is pretty sloppy on the return, while making it look a lot harder than it is. He does get a small few damaging returns off too - more than Agassi does

 

[Waspsting]

Statistical gist - virtually even freebies and those being high (Agassi 36%, Rod 37%, with Agassi having no doubles, Rod 2 closing gap even more). Would think that’s a relative win for Agassi, but that’s based on expectations for upcoming rallies, where

Play - Baseline (& Net)
Meat & potatoes, dual winged, firm hitting baseline stuff. With an important side of sub-par movement

Phase 1
- Winners - Agassi 4, Rod 5
- Errors forced - Agassi 5, Rod 2
- UEs - Agassi 19, Rod 6

Agassi with 19 UEs. Everything else by both players put together amounting to 22 points.
Just what it looks like; a bunch of crap from Agassi, who can’t keep groundies in play. Rallies are short-medium of length

UEs by shot -
- Rod BH 6
- Agassi FH 8
- Agassi BH 11

… and UE types -
- Neutral - Agassi 14, Rod 6
- Attacking - Agassi 2
- Winner attempts - Agassi 3

Rod’s FH has 0 UEs, but 4 FEs (3 of them in baseline rallies). 0 UEs is 0 UEs - all credit to him for it. But he’s slow to move to that side and prone to give up error to anything not-easy, let alone difficult. Agassi of course, a lot worse in missing routine balls - whether he tries to hit them with edgy width or just a stock shot in this early phase

Rallies are even of hitting, not one player leading, other reacting disproportionately. With lower freebies (in this part of match, Rod leads 44% to 34%), Agassi would be leading the dance more often than otherwise, but not to important extent

Perfect attacking efficiency from Rod, who has 0 aggressive UEs for the 5 winners and 2 errors forced he has
Neutral UEs by far the bulk of Agassi’s generosity. Won’t find too many worse showings from Agassi than what he puts out in this part of match

Phase 2 -
Winners - Agassi 15, Rod 7
Errors forced - Agassi 12, Rod 5
UEs - Agassi 7, Rod 12

What a turnaround. Starting basics (basics made up almost everything in phase 1, more specifically, failure in basics), Agassi shaving the UEs. Rallies last longer and Agassi moves beyond neutral rallying to bossing and dictating.

Ground UEs -
- FHs - Agassi 6, Rod 8
- BHs - Agassi 1, Rod 3 (Rod also has a net shot)

And UE types -
- Neutral - Agassi 5, Rod 3
- Attacking - Rod 4
- Winner attempts - Agassi 2, Rod 5

Neutral UEs low. Rod staying steady, but getting pushed back to reactive more. Especially on BH, where he slices more. 1 lousy BH UE Agassi, while gaining ground in cc rallies is excellent starting point for him, and not a bad job by Rod hanging in either

Ground-to-ground, Agassi has 11 winners (5 FH, 6 BH), Rod 4 (2 FH, 2 BH)
Errors forced in same situations, Agassi forces 8 errors (5 FHs), Rod 4

On the BH, Agassi with 3 dtl winners (Rod has 1, excluding a return), and 3 drop shots. Nice finishing off that side

Normal chances to finish off FH for both players. Agassi doing better

Rod’s FH, as mentioned earlier, might be the most interesting shot of the match
Still gets forced into wide FH FEs by Agassi’s bulkier, slightly wider cc shots, still demoing not-good movement and defensive resistance on that side. He’s getting a bit more out hit in stock FH-FH rallies too - and unlike before, chooses to lash out some

Rod’s FH UEs remarkably comprise 5 winner attempt and 3 attacking UEs. He doesn’t have a single neutral UE in the whole match off that side.

So that’s baseline. Agassi pushing Rod back on the BH, Rod falling back to slicing some to stay in the rally. Agassi, after pushing opponent back, able to get on the attack and finish off either wing.

1 UE, 6 winners in baseline rallies from Agassi’s BH. + getting on front foot to attack off the other wing. Rod outdone of steadiness, which is about all his BH can muster because Agassi virtually perfect in that area and not threatening with the shot. 1 winner dtl (he has another return), 3 UEs - solid enough, but Agassi supreme

On the FH, Agassi again pushing Rod back, and Rod very vulnerable to just-so wide FH cc. Eventaully, Rod lashing out a little to gain aggressive counter-play, and largely failing
Agassi with 6 winners, 6 UEs on the FH and forcing most of 8 errors he does with it
Rod with 2 winners, 8 UEs - all of them aggressive shots (majority full winner attempts)

Net play is minor part of action. Match long, Agassi’s 7/8 at net, Rod 4/11 (+ 0/1 serve-volleying)
Some lovely passes by Agassi - he has 5 winners, just 1 FE.
On the ‘volley’ all 3 of Rod’s winners are OHs (1 on bounce), and he’s got a couple of FEs

Difficult for Rod to get to net - and a hot reception waiting for him when he does
Not much need for Agassi to come in, though he’s highly successfully when he does. He’s doing dandily having his way from the back, so why come in?

Match Progression
Effectiveness of serve shot keeps first set competitive, both players scoring lots of freebies
Rod’s big serving is just too good, and Agassi doesn’t help by missing routine returns on top of that. Rod himself makes a hash of routine returns - about half of it due to trying to be pointedly aggressive, the rest just plain inconsistent and he moves badly for the second shot

Agassi gets looser and looser off the ground as set goes on and is pretty bad by the end

After Rod opens with game filled with aces and service winners, he takes Agassi to deuce at once. Agassi giving up the ground errors, but Rod missing routine returns - and Agassi holds

Rod has back-to-back deuce holds in middle of set that he’s not in much trouble in, and aces and other big serves keeps him ahead of the trouble curve as he holds for 4-3

Breaks to love for 5-3. FH cc return winner to start, winning runaround FH inside-out return to end and Agassi plopping up routine ground UEs in between. Something he’s been doing quite regularly
Rod serves out to 30

4 BH UEs of varying types gets Agassi broken to start second set
Next go around, 3 more ground UEs (2 FHs, 1 BH) get him down 0-40

That’s earlier mentioned phase 1 - Agassi terrible of the ground and Rod with good in count, scoring freely with big serves

Phase 2 starts with Agassi aggressively winning next 5 points to hold - lovely third ball BH drop shot winner (coming after a spate of BH UEs of all types), a winning BH dtl, serve setting up easy enough approach, third ball FH inside-out winner and a good enough serve to force an error from the slightly slow Rod

Its all Agassi from thereon

Breaks back for 3-3, with Rod missing 2 FH winner attempts - they’re his first FH UEs of the match and come on the the 87-88th points of it. He gets to deuce, but Agassi wraps up from there with 1-2 passing combo ending with winner and a winning FH inside-out return off his own

Breaks next go around to love even more commandingly. Drop shotting Agassi doesn’t end well for Rod, approaching net ends same way and a final deep return to seal the break
Agassi serves out to love

Just the 1 break in the third and Rod’s not too troubled to hold otherwise, though he can get nowhere on return. Agassi continues to play top class

Breaks makes score 3-2. Game starts with Agassi BH dtl passing Rod after drawing him in to net, ends with a perfect, surprise BH drop shot winner. In between, top notch, heavily spun FH lob winner by Agassi and Rod again missing a couple of aggressive FHs (1 third ball, 1 pressured)

No more competitive thrills, but solidly good tennis, with Agassi better
In time, he serves out to love, finishing with 2 aces - the last one, a second serve

Summing up, unusual match for clay, with substantial ugliness to it. The movement of both players - especially Roddick on the return and wide for the FH - is not good. And when Agassi’s off, he’s really, really off - terrible in missing routine groundies off both wings

Agassi gets it together just in nick of time, a step away from being down a set and 2 breaks and plays strongly solid from there, bossing a not bad Roddick about thoroughly off both wings and coming away with well earned win

Proneness to missing routine returns and sluggy court coverage from both players though. They don’t look like they’d do well against quality clay courters who return like clockwork and are at home hustling about on the dirt

 

[Gizo]

Agassi said that he was so happy after his SF win vs. Melzer, ensuring that he would reclaim the world no. 1 ranking, that he didn’t really care about whether or not he won this final. That ultimately helped him loosen up and win it.

Clearly the sequence of 5 consecutive excellent points from Agassi to hold from 0-40 down, to avoid going a double break behind in the 2nd set after losing the 1st, was pivotal and the turning point.

 

[FD3S]

Ah, Houston clay; the only kind Roddick liked unless he was playing Robredo on the red stuff. That said, it still boggles my mind how he managed to tag Coria the previous year - you'd have to imagine the latter being the overwhelming favorite over A-Rod on clay no matter the type.

 

[Waspsting]

Ah, Houston clay; the only kind Roddick liked unless he was playing Robredo on the red stuff.

Do you know where that lovely, Roddick loved Houston clay came from?

Paris. Exact same stuff as they have at Roland Garros, per commentary from both this match and matches from previous year
Rod doesn't seem to like it there much. Maybe its the food or the tiles they have for lines in Houston that makes the difference

 

[FD3S]

Do you know where that lovely, Roddick loved Houston clay came from?

Paris. Exact same stuff as they have at Roland Garros, per commentary from both this match and matches from previous year
Rod doesn't seem to like it there much. Maybe its the food or the tiles they have for lines in Houston that makes the difference

I'd forgotten it wasn't Har-Tru back then! Bizarre. Absolutely bizarre.

 

[BauerAlmeida]

Ah, Houston clay; the only kind Roddick liked unless he was playing Robredo on the red stuff. That said, it still boggles my mind how he managed to tag Coria the previous year - you'd have to imagine the latter being the overwhelming favorite over A-Rod on clay no matter the type.

Roddick was terrible on clay but he managed to make FIVE straight finals at Houston.

Looks the conditions really suited him for whatever reason.

 

[EvonneFedererBorgster]

Was that Andre’s last win over Andy?

 

[Gizo]

Was that Andre’s last win over Andy?

Their last match was the 2004 Cincinnati semi-final, a thrilling and entertaining contest, which Agassi won through a final set tiebreak before then beating Hewitt in the final.

 

[NatF]

Roddick was terrible on clay but he managed to make FIVE straight finals at Houston.

Looks the conditions really suited him for whatever reason.

I think he was very motivated as well.