This is the first time I've seen Del Potro hit his forehand like that since the 2009 US Open. And honestly, for the first time that I can recall in a long while, I felt that one player's strategy (Djokovic) should have been to, quite literally, never hit to his opponent's forehand. Unless it's a legit open court put-away, just stay away from that side.
It's an impossible strategy to stick to, and really counter-intuitive (most rallies are cross court exchanges, so it's really difficult to avoid if a forehand to forehand exchange is initiated), so it's not like I fault Novak or anything, although he did seem to go to that side one too many times. Furthermore, Del Potro possesses the best running forehand on tour by a country mile, so even when you feel you have him on the ropes, it's still super risky to go to that side and he made Novak pay over and over.
What's holding Del Potro back (other than always being injured of course), is that his movement has regressed a bit -- no doubt due to the repeated injuries and never finding a constant rhythm. To his backhand side, he is noticeably slow. I felt Novak actually didn't capitalize on this enough. The other glaring issue is that the continuous wrist injuries have hampered his backhand, which used to be quite bigger back in his 2009 run. He's developed a really serviceable slice to his credit, but it's almost contrasting to the way he's supposed to be playing (hit big and bludgeon the ball). This is more damaging combined with his declining movement, as he can't run around his backhand as much as he'd like. If he could, he can be borderline unplayable on days like these, against anybody, because you are just never safe. Must be such an intimidating feeling to play against.
I wish he'd step up his returning though. For someone who hits so big, he doesn't punish serves as much as he should. If he and Nadal make the semis (long way to go), I expect Del Potro to win on this surface.
