Generali Open Kitzbühel: Dominic Thiem - "I've never seen a blow like this before"
Dominic Thiem will play Albert Ramos-Vinolas for his first title in Austria on Saturday (from 3 p.m., live on ServusTV and in our live ticker).
by Jens Huiber
last edit: Aug 03, 2019, 07:20 am
By Jens Huiber from Kitzbühel
Dominic Thiem, as his longtime coach Günter Bresnik has repeatedly emphasized, is a man who, in his mind, has basically recorded, categorized and saved any ball ever played in a competition. Nevertheless, before his final today at the Generali Open 2019 (from 3 p.m. in our live ticker and on ServusTV), Thiem will surf the world wide web again, looking for a few pictures from 2017. Back then, he did in Rio de Janeiro Albert Ramos-Vinolas, his final opponent in Kitzbühel, comfortably defeated 6-1 and 6-4.
The fact that the Spaniard won the previous match with exactly the same result is irrelevant in this specific case. Because if something on Dominic Thiem's hard drive is in danger of being deleted, it is the results of the annual Asia tour. the internet of course forgets nothing, Ramos-Vinolas won in Chengdu in 2016.
Sonego plays serve volley
In addition to the many memorized strokes, there was one on Friday evening: first match ball for Dominic Thiem, the Lower Austrian claims to play after the best return of the whole game, but Lorenzo Sonego takes the ball quite far behind and rather cheekily as a half volley, puts the ball to 6: 6 on the line. "I have rarely seen such a stroke in my life", that occurred to the tournament favorite for the tenth deflected match ball of the Italian in the course of the Kitzbühel tournament.
A point later Thiem asked the audience for emotions, the answer came promptly. And also the last stroke of the match, a backhand from Sonego that landed behind the baseline. "It would not have been good if the match had started all over again," said Thiem, referring to a possible lost tie break. Sonego had chosen the serve volley variant several times, at the point for 4: 5, the mini rebreak for Thiem, this was his doom.
Thiem especially nervous about Ofner
Dominic Thiem will have played four matches in Kitzbühel on Saturday evening, all in front of a sold out house. The nervousness was greatest at the start against Sebastian Ofner, said Thiem even after his third match. Not only the Austrian knows that he will be able to count on almost 5,600 people in his camp again in the final. Immediately after his success against Casper Ruud, Albert Ramos-Vinolas had no illusions about the distribution of sympathy on Saturday.
How good the tennis memory of the Spaniard, who won his second career title last Sunday in Gstaad, can only be speculated. But one thing can be predicted with great certainty: neither Albert Ramos-Vinolas nor Dominic Thiem will ever forget the final Saturday in Kitzbühel 2019.
Especially since the Lower Austrian had a chance to win a title in his home country: Thiem had a brilliant start in the Kitzbühel final in 2014, but then had to admit defeat to an increasingly strong David Goffin.