WATCH: Daniil Medvedev delivers ‘smart’ underarm serve against Alexander Zverev at ATP Finals

It was an unplanned tactic, but the underarm serve paid off for Daniil Medvedev during his ATP Finals win over Alexander Zverev.
Leading their opening rubber 6-3, 4-3, the world No 4 decided to mix things up at 30-30 as he surprised Zverev with an underarm serve.
The strategy worked as he won the point before going on to win the match 6-3, 6-4 in one hour and 29 minutes.
An underarm serve?
At the #NittoATPFinals?You LOVE to see it, @DaniilMedwed 😆 pic.twitter.com/DvVzaRt6x2
— Tennis TV (@TennisTV) November 16, 2020
Asked about the serve after the match, Medvedev replied: “I didn’t want to disrespect him in any way. That is why I did it at 30-30 [and] not at 40-0,” he said.
“Before the serve, my wide serve was not working as well as I would have liked it to today and he was returning good. So I was like, ‘I’m going to go for the T, probably.’ Then I saw that he was like five metres behind the baseline and I had the ball close to my racquet. So I am like, ‘Okay, go for it.’ That was the move, just to win the point.
“It actually worked, he made a good ball back, because he could have missed it. It could have even been an ace, but I am happy that it worked because that is also smart.”
He added: “No, [I was] not planning it at all. I can do it sometimes, let’s say, once a week, twice, once in two weeks in practice, just maybe a first serve to start, to laugh with my opponent or something like this. I did it once on clay at Roland Garros, because on clay it’s tougher to serve aces… Guys are far back, and it worked.”
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