Isner’s serve and forehand in fine form as he wins in Houston

Isner playing well on clay? It doesn’t look right, does it? But in Sunday’s Houston final against Amalgro, right is exactly how it looked.

Sunday’s final showed that the Isner game, the huge serve and the formidable forehand, can win on any surface when on. These two weapons are two of the biggest in the game and are what has gotten John into the top ten and earned him wins over the likes of Djokovic and Federer, the latter incidentally on Clay in five sets.

First, let’s look at the serve.

Coming down at you from 6ft9, this weapon can hit through any surface. And if Isner’s first serve percentage is high, then his service games are pretty much won.

Next, there is that forehand. That forehand is not to be fed to. Let’s take a look.

If Isner can set it up, then you can bet it is going to be a winner. Your only chance is to have the tall man on the run and prevent him from firing away on his favorite side but if the first serve is going in and Isner gets a weak return, then things are going to go something like this from Roland Garros in 2011,..

..which is pretty much how things went against Amalgro.

Try as Amalgro might to profit against Isner’s suspect return game and mobility, and it looked like he would as he went up 3-1 in the first set, the Spaniard, with more than 200 career wins on Clay, could not find an answer to the American’s A game.

When the Isner serve and forehand is on like it was in Sunday’s final, your only chance is that it suddenly switches off. A chance that, for Amalgro, did not come. Amalgro did not help himself either, growing increasingly annoyed by his opponent’s fiery form in the hot sun before a partisan Houston crowd. The Houston environment brings out the best in many an American non-clay specialist as the names of Roddick and Fish on the tournament trophy testify. Certainly the heat helps, speeding up the courts so those big serves and forehands hit through nicely, and the home support is worth a game or two, even a set. Isner took advantage of these factors and his fine play, breaking at 5-5 in the second to serve it out for a 6-3, 7-5 championship win.

It was a win that set tongues wagging that the man who took Nadal to five in the French Open ’11, and who incidentally participated in my favorite match of last season, a classic five set match at Roland Garros against Matthieu, might be able to provide some more thrills from his powerful attacking game in the coming Red Clay season.