Most surprising HTH records

[Shaolin]

It’s surprising because Ferrer was still decent. Federer is also ‘literally better’ at every aspect of the game than someone like Stakhovsky or Donskoy, but they still beat him, right?

Ferrer has wins over Nadal on clay, yet couldn’t beat Federer, not even on clay. It’s surprising don’t you think?

I think Ferrer is good enough that Fed comes focused every time against him, plus it helps when you've played him so many times. Fed might have been surprised by Stack or Donskoy playing way above their normal level. Stack did play a very aggressive style that Ferrer isn't capable of. If I remember right Fed wasn't really all there against Donskoy, looked like he gave about 60% effort.

 

[quirotkicks]

You are only focusing on the ATP but here are some WTA ones:

Martinez vs Coetzer- 17-3 for Martinez. While Martinez was generally ranked higher and had a much more successful career you wouldn't think someone without much power or weapons would be so successful vs someone who runs down every ball and never misses. Baffling record.

Seles vs Venus- 9-1 for Venus. This is surprisingly one sided in Venus's favor. Would figure it would be closer.

Henin vs Venus- 7-2 for Venus. Again another one surprisingly one sided in Venus's favor. She really brought it vs the big guns except for Serena.

Jo Durie vs Graf- 4-3 for Durie. This head to head is just funny. I know most of the matches were very young Graf but still.

Austin vs Evert- 9-8 for Austin. Even with Austin having about 3 matches at 14/15, and another 2 when she washed up by injuries and semi retired post 81, she still leads peak Evert. Amazing.

Spirlea vs Seles- I believe it is something like 5-5.

Serena vs Cornet- Cornet leads 3-0 or something.

 

[fezer]

By far the most surprising H2H for me is Becker-Edberg 25-10. They played 16 matches on carpet and Becker was one of the greatest ever on that surface.

Endless debate. Edberg was a great indoor carpet player in his own right. There was only a very short phase in their professional carreer when Edberg really dominated Becker in the courtand that was the 2nd half of 87.

 

[fezer]

Santoro had a tricky hame. He had some pretty good H2Hs against some Major winners:

4-1 against Bruguera​

3-1 against Moya​

4-3 against Muster​

4-3 against Korda​

3-3 against Agassi​

3-4 against Sampras (Santoro lost their last match 7-5 in the 3rd set at Indian Wells)​

3-5 against Ivanisevic​

2-3 against Hewitt​

2-2 against Chang​

1-2 against Courier​

1-1 against Djokovic​

1-1 against Rafter​

1-1 against Kuerten​

1-1 against Becker​

So, I'm not too surprised he mostly got the better of Safin, who could be easily frustrated.

Kafelnikov was also easy to Frustrate! Look Up the H2H vs Santoro!

 

[Martin J]

Mecir - Wilander (7-4) deserves to be mentioned.
Miloslav had a good record on clay (2-2), Mats' best surface, and both victories came in 1985 (Hamburg, Rome) when Wilander won the FO. He also had a winning record in Majors and went 2-0 against him in 1988 (both wins in BO5 matches), Wilander's best year.
Miloslav was really a touch match-up for Mats.

 

[Mainad]

Mecir - Wilander (7-4) deserves to be mentioned.
Miloslav had a good record on clay (2-2), Mats' best surface, and both victories came in 1985 (Hamburg, Rome) when Wilander won the FO. He also had a winning record in Majors and went 2-0 against him in 1988 (both wins in BO5 matches), Wilander's best year.
Miloslav was really a touch match-up for Mats.

Mats has admitted that Mecir was the player he feared to play the most. He said he could never get a handle on his game.

 

[mike danny]

But the point is you can make this exact same argument for other players who have managed to score a win against Federer, for instance Albert Ramos Vinolas.
Can you honestly say that any of his strokes are better than Ferrer's?
My point was not that it's shocking for Federer to have scored 17 wins against Ferrer, but that Ferrer has never managed to score a single win against Federer.

FO 2013 would have been Ferrer's chance to score that win against a sub-par Fed, but Fed was Roger the Dodger.

 

[mike danny]

Berdych-Anderson, 14-0 for Berdych. Quite unusual for someone like Berdych who is not a Big 3 player to comprehensively own someone like Anderson. Especially since even Donald Young has scored a win over Tomas.

 

[mike danny]

ARV has a bit more firepower than Ferrer though. Ferrer with his lack of weapons cant hope to just get hot and hit through people. He has to grind and that isn't gonna make an impression on Fed. Same with Kohlschreiber, isn't he about 15-0 against the German? Kohl just doesnt have the weaponry despite being a solid and smart tour vet.

But Ferrer also has victories over Nadal and Djokovic, but was unable to touch Fed.

 

[mike danny]

Ferrer beat young Djodal a couple times, obviously couldn't have done so against Fred since Ferrer is younger and a later bloomer, plus he got to beat them injured in 2011 (Nadal AO, Djokovic YEC). He does have two inpressive wins over Nadal (2013 Paris, 2014 MC), but none against Djokovic since Noel fully matured at last, besides the obvious injury tank.

Ferrer had a pretty good win over Djokovic at 2009 Davis Cup on clay, the same year Djokovic gave Nadal hard battles at MC and Madrid.

 

[mike danny]

Point is that Ferrer got to play Djodal in subpar form a couple times, but didn't get to play a subpar Federer. I reckon he could've beaten Fed in 2013, especially on clay. He proved just as helpless against a decent Djokovic (one set won against a non-compromised Novak on HC in a dozen matches), though more competitive against Nadal.

Montreal 2017?

 

[AnOctorokForDinner]

Ferrer had a pretty good win over Djokovic at 2009 Davis Cup on clay, the same year Djokovic gave Nadal hard battles at MC and Madrid.

The fact that it was in straight sets, in BO5, kinda renders it irrelevant, Djokovic had to be pretty bad. (He lost in straights to Kohlschreiber at RG too, kohligoat?)

 

[AnOctorokForDinner]

[QUOTE="mike danny, post: 14028364, member: 427497"Montreal 2017?
[/QUOTE]

Too bad Ferrer himself was on the wane by then.
His best match against Fedr was actually 2009 Cincy (up a set and fought to the end, won only two less points total), funny how things work out.

 

[duaneeo]

Davydenko over Nadal 6-5. In this case, Nadal had the higher ranking in every single match. As a matter of fact, Davydenko was 4-0 vs Nadal on hard courts after Nadal had already become world #1 and after Nadal's first hard court title.

6-1 on hard, 3-0 in finals, wins at 4 big tournaments (WTFs, Paris, Shanghai, Miami).

 

[Sport]

Why do people vote for Thiem-Federer? Thiem is a good player. And, as some Federer fans remind us ad nauseam, Federer is old in tennis terms. So there is nothing surprising about it.

I think most people voting the "Thiem-Federer" option are Federer fans who happen to dislike Thiem because he loses to Nadal at Roland-Garros.

 

[ibbi]

Dominik Hrbaty's 6-3 record against Federer, Nadal, Djokovic, and Murray

 

[Bender]

I clicked into this thread just to mention the 7-2 H2H between Santoro and Safin (I just assumed it wasn't going to be mentioned).

But the Thiem v Federer H2H probably takes the cake if only because it's Federer.

Context matters of course but a H2H on its own can't convey that, so at first glance that's probably the H2H that will look most surprising.

 

[GuyForget]

Candidates:

Davydenko over Nadal 6-5. In this case, Nadal had the higher ranking in every single match. As a matter of fact, Davydenko was 4-0 vs Nadal on hard courts after Nadal had already become world #1 and after Nadal's first hard court title.

Blake over Davydenko 7-1. This one is shocking to me. Blake's career wasn't as good as Davydenko's. But he completely owned him in the HTH matchup.

Thiem over Federer 5-2. Federer outranked Thiem in nearly every match. But Thiem holds the advantage here

Krajicek over Sampras 6-4. Every one of these matches was played in a year that Sampras won a slam title. During the years Pete finished world #1, Krajicek was 5-2 vs Sampras. And none of their matches were on clay.

Stich over Sampras 5-4. Similarly, Stich was 3-2 against Pete during years he finished world #1. This is little less surprising, since 3 of their 9 matches were on clay(3-0 Stich).

And lastly, Santoro went 7-2 vs Safin. This one is a shocker to me.

Which one is the most surprising to you?

Edberg Lendl

 

[GuyForget]

By far the most surprising H2H for me is Becker-Edberg 25-10. They played 16 matches on carpet and Becker was one of the greatest ever on that surface.

but it's 3-1 Edberg in slams. i still rate Becker higher tho, Edberg wasnt able to live with the nextgen from 93 onwards (Courier, Sampras, Agassi, Ivanisevic) but Becker could when we has on because he had more artillery. Edberg was a more consistent number 1-2 though from Autumn 90 to AO93