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  • Duel of the muscovites for a place in the 4th round

    8/31/08 3:18 PM | David Cox
    - With Youzhny's withdrawal and Safin's disappointing round 2 showing, it's up to Davydenko, Tursunov and Andreev to fly the flag for Russian tennis. However 3 are guaranteed to become 2 before day 7 is over

    It'll be Davydenko's 5th match with Tursunov and the 5th seed really does “own” his compatriot on a tennis court having won all their 4 matches. Two wins have come on the fast indoor carpet of Paris and Davydenko made it 4/4 in Doha earlier this year (7-5, 6-3).

    A naturalised American (you'd never guess from his accent that he was born in Moscow) Tursunov comes into his own on the cement at this time of the year. He made the Indianapolis final yet again and beat Safin and Gasquet in Cincinnati lfting him once more into the top 30.

    While he's a threat to most players on the North American hard courts most pundits can't see Tursunov making the top 20 and higher unless he adds a little more cerebral power to his game. Tursunov happily describes himself as a ball-basher and has admitted that his tactics at times amount to “hit it hard and if that doesn't work, hit it harder” while is where he falls down against Davydenko who's happy to sit back and soak up pace all day long

    Davydenko has been quietly impressive so far at this US Open and looks likely to at least make the quarters where he'll probably face Federer. Tursunov has surprisingly struggled against Schwank and Hanescu, requiring 4 sets to get past both

    Verdict: Davydenko to remain frugal with sets dropped, he'll reach round 4 in 3

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