ROME, ITALY - MAY 16: Steve Johnson of USA reacts to a missed shot in his match against Pablo Carreno Busta of Spain during day 4 of the Internazionali BNL d'Italia 2018 tennis at Foro Italico on May 16, 2018 in Rome, Italy. (Photo by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images)

Ramkumar Ramanathan has made a surprising run to the final at the Hall of Fame Championships in Newport. Losing just 1 set on his way to the final, Ramanathan beat Tim Smyczek in straight sets to book his clash with 3rd seed Steve Johnson.

Steve Johnson, in retrospect, has had an even better tournament. He’s not dropped a set the entire tournament and has not lost more than 3 games in a set. The American 3rd seed will be looking to win his second grass court title, while Ramkumar Ramanathan has reached his first ever ATP final and is the 3rd lowest ranked player to do so this year.

Prior to Newport, Ramkumar had never gone past the quarterfinals of an ATP tournament.

A shot at history?

Ramkumar has become the first Indian player since 2011 to make the finals of an ATP tournament, the last player being Somdev Devvarman. No Indian player has won a title since 1998 when Leander Paes won the same tournament. He’ll be one of the lowest ranked Indian players to have won a title. But the asking seems high, doesn’t it? After all, Johnson is in great form, he’s more experienced and will definitely have the upper hand.

Kinks in their games?

Both players have relatively weak backhands, and both will be looking to exploit that. Both have solid serves and forehands, while Ramkumar is more willing to come to the net than Johnson, which could pay its dividends since this is a grass court tournament.

Otherwise, there are other kinks in Ramkumar’s game as well, like the fact that his aggressive net play can easily be taken care of with a strong forehand shot to his backhand side. Even otherwise, his positioning at the net is average at best, and Johnson can fully exploit this by hitting angled and topspin heavy shots, something the American is capable of.

Conclusion

Both Ramanathan and Johnson have been playing fairly well, so it’ll be interesting to see how the match will progress.

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If Ramanathan plays a good balance of aggressiveness and smart play, he could go on to clinch his first title.