Dominic Thiem's defense—and a slow backhand—led to a fast win v. Cilic If the US Open champion was a question mark before his first-round match, his performance in it was an exclamation point.

Dominic Thiem recently spoke at length about the one-handed backhand, revealing that he didn't always have that shot. Thiem also insisted that the two-hander is better suited to today's game.

Dominic Thiem’s backhand — a thing of beauty. (Julian Finney / Getty Images) We start with the scene of Thiem’s greatest triumph, his defeat of Alexander Zverev in the 2020 U.S. Open final.

And last season, 22-year-old Dominic Thiem rode his into the Top 10. Granted, 14 of the ATP’s current Top 20 use two-handed backhands, but the one-hander isn’t taking the slow road to ...

Getting Armed Thiem’s journey cannot be fully captured by quantitative data alone. Let’s begin with his distinctive shot. In a time when most players use a two-handed backhand, Thiem’s one ...

On the very first point, which lasted 24 strokes, Thiem landed a backhand passing shot in the net and shook his head. On the next, he tried a drop shot that floated wide. Not really close at all.

"I practised that shot (backhand down-the-line) so much before the season started again," the 27-year-old said. Thiem's clean and heavy groundstrokes from both wings caused Nadal all sorts of ...

It all used to come so easily for Dominic Thiem on a tennis court — his powerful forehand, his elegant backhand, his hit-which-shot-when calculations, all fine-tuned to the point of a title at ...