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First things first. When there’s a No. 3 or No. 4 seed who has every possibility of winning the whole thing, the first big question in a draw is this: what side is he going to fall on?
The man is defending champion Carlos Alcaraz, the No. 3 seed.
Would he end up in the top half, with No. 1 seed Jannik Sinner?
Or the bottom half, with No. 2 seed Novak Djokovic?
The answer is the former. So the two top young stars of the men’s came could meet in the semifinals. While on the bottom, the question mark that is Djokovic has No. 4 seed Alexander Zverev in his half.
But that’s getting far ahead of ourselves. Three weeks out from arthroscopic surgery on his knee, Djokovic has decided to give it a go. But how much of a go it will be is still to be determined.
His first opponent is a relatively friendly one: Czech qualifier Vit Kopriva.
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Murray v Machac rematch?
Andy Murray has also decided to give it a try, so soon after having surgery on his back to reportedly remove a spinal cyst that caused him great pain and concern at Queen’s Club last week.
Will he make it to the start line on Tuesday? (As tradition has it that the gentlemen’s champion opens play on Monday, and Alcaraz is in the other half). He has said that it will be a last-minute decision, depending on how his continued recovery from the surgery goes.
He’s more likely to play just the doubles, with his brother Jamie. And it won’t help that he’s drawn Tomas Machac of Czechia.
Machac not only is a fine young player, he was also on the other side of the net when Murray’s previous physical disaster occurred in Miami. Murray rolled his ankle badly during a match with Machac and while he made a recovery in record time, it was just another strike against his already battered body.
The Canadian Challenge
It would have been great had Milos Raonic received a wild card into the main draw. Because after dropping 47 aces in a three-set match – an ATP Tour record – at Queen’s Club 10 days ago, no one would want to face him.
Alas, that didn’t occur. And the two players in the qualifying, Gabriel Diallo and Alexis Galarneau, didn’t make it past the second round.
So that leaves No. 17 sed Félix Auger-Aliassime, and unseeded Denis Shapovalov, who is in on his protected ranking.
Auger-Aliassime gets a tough one from the start in Aussie Thanasi Kokkinakis.
His third-round opponent could be No. 9 seed Alex de Minaur, which would be a rematch of sports of their quarterfinal clash in the juniors, all the way back in 2016.
That match will be played on Tuesday.
As for Shapovalov, he didn’t have great luck. He drew No. 19 seed Nicolas Jarry.
The 2016 junior champion has better grass-court gravitas than the tall Chilean. But that serve is going to be a challenge.
If he can get past that one, there’s a potentially flashy clash with No. 14 seed Ben Shelton looming in the third round.
But both have to get there.
Cana-Chilean Alejandro Tabilo, the No. 24 seed, gets Brit Dan Evans – who normally would be pretty tough ask, but may be far from 100 per cent after a fall at Queen’s Club that forced him to retire.
Intriguing first-round matches
Look for the following first-round matches to have their fair share of intrigue.
[22] Adrian Mannarino (FRA) v Gaël Monfils (FRA)
It’s Mannarino, who’s in a terrible slump, who is the seeded player while Monfils is in good form, still alive in the semifinals of the tournament in Mallorca.
Their head-to-head is 5-2 in Monfils’s favour, with Monfils winnint the last four. Interestingly, their first three career meetings were all on grass – including at Wimbledon in 2015 and 2017. Their third-round clash in 2017 went to Mannarino in five sets.
[23] Alexander Bublik (KAZ) vs. Jakub Mensik (CZE)
We know that Bublik can be as good as he can be awful, but he’s been a pretty solid performer at Wimbledon the last few years – until he loses.
He made the third round in both 2021 and 2022, but went down rather routinely to Hubert Hurkacz and Frances Tiafoe. Last year, with a pretty sweet draw, he got to the fourth round and battled hard before losing in five sets to Andrey Rublev.
Mensik, still just 18, is making his Wimbledon debut and is straight into the main draw after having to qualify in his two previous Grand Slam appearances at the US Open and in Australia last January.
He impressed in Mallorca on the grass this week.
Other notes
–Kei Nishikori, who returned from injury at Roland Garros, only to retire in his second round match, is in the draw.
But he’s as much of a health question mark as Djokovic or Murray.
Nishikori was to return at Eastbourne this week, but withdrew. He’s planning to play the Olympics, but it’s proving challenging to get there.
His first-round opponent, big-serving Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech, would prove another challenge.
– Chris Eubanks, who made a huge breakthrough at Wimbledon last year, relatively late in his career, has had trouble winning matches in 2024 and is defending a big chunk of points.
Unseeded, the American could have ended up in a worse situation. He gets qualifier Quentin Halys in the first round and then, possibly, No. 21 seed Karen Khachanov.
– Jannik Sinner, in his first Grand Slam tournament as the top seed, gets a friendly opener in Germany’s Yannick Hanfmann. But looming in the second round might be a player no one wanted to see early in their draw: former Wimbledon finalist Matteo Berrettini.
– Look out for Grigor Dimitrov, the No. 10 seed. He had a friendly third round seed in No. 22 Mannarino (although that could turn into Monfils). And his potential fourth round pool includes No. 5 seed Daniil Medvedev and No. 32 Zhang Zhizhen. Doable.
Fourth-round brackets
On paper, here’s what the round of 16 could look like (spoilers in parentheses).
[1] Jannik Sinner vs [14] Ben Shelton (Berrettini, Shapovalov)
[5] Daniil Medvedev vs [10] Grigor Dimitrov (Monfils, Wawrinka)
[3] Carlos Alcaraz vs. [16] Ugo Humbert (Tiafoe)
[12] Tommy Paul vs. [8] Casper Ruud (Bublik)
[6] Andrey Rublev vs. [11] Stefanos Tsitsipas (Musetti, Korda, Davidovich Fokina)
[13] Taylor Fritz vs. [4] Alexander Zverev (Draper)
[7] Hubert Hurkacz vs. [9] Alex de Minaur (Auger-Aliassime, Machac)
[15] Holger Rne vs. [2] Novak Djokovic (Eubanks, Popyrin)
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