With Sunday finishes in the week leading up to a Grand Slam, quarterfinal action will be contested on Thursday in Nice and Dusseldorf. At the latter event, familiar foes Andreas Seppi and Denis Istomin are renewing their rivalry.
Nice
(1) John Isner vs. (7) Federico Delbonis: Delbonis in 3. Isner is not good against lefties and even though he is quite capable on the slow stuff (especially by American standards), he would obviously much rather battle Delbonis on either a hard court or grass.
(4) Gilles Simon vs. Carlos Berlocq: Berlocq in 3. Somewhat surprisingly given that neither man consistently makes it far at events, these two have faced each other seven times–including four since the start of 2012. Simon leads 4-3, but Berlocq should have the advantage on clay.
Leonardo Mayer vs. Albert Montanes: Montanes in 3. This is the only quarterfinal of the four in Nice that pits two clay-court specialists against each other. It’s a toss-up, but Montanes has to be feeling confident as the defending champion.
(5) Dmitry Tursunov vs. (2) Ernests Gulbis: Gulbis in 2. Gulbis may be interested in sticking around for a while after recovering to beat Martin Klizan in three on Wednesday. On clay, he should always have an edge over Tursunov.
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Dusseldorf
(1) Philipp Kohlschreiber vs. (Q) Mate Delic: Kohlschreiber in 2. It has already been a dream week for Delic, who qualified for the main draw then earned the first two ATP-level match wins of his career. Playing the top seed on his home turf in Germany, however, is where the run ends.
(3) Andreas Seppi vs. Denis Istomin: Seppi in 3. This is the best rivalry you’ve never heard of. Seppi has a considerable edge at 5-2, but their last five encounters have gone the distance and each of their last four was a five-setter at a Grand Slam. Istomin won the most recent one at the 2013 U.S. Open, but clay favors Seppi.
Jiri Vesely vs. Jurgen Melzer: Melzer in 2. This is an intriguing lefty vs. lefty battle between two players at opposite ends of the career spectrum. The 32-year-old Melzer, a 2010 French Open semifinalist, is making a commendable comeback from a shoulder injury. He should have too much clay-court experience for the 20-year-old Vesely.
(7) Ivo Karlovic vs. Juan Monaco: Monaco in 3. Not too surprisingly, their only previous meeting went to a third-set tiebreaker (Karlovic won it). The 6’11” Croat won in the same fashion in this week’s first round against Tobias Kamke. Monaco, though, is coming off a 6-1, 6-2 thrashing of second seed Marcel Granollers.
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Seppi and Istomin can both hang tough in a tight match but I favour the man from Uzbek.
Istomin in 3
Simon is no slouch on clay as we saw last week. I think he will take heart from keeping the match with Nadal as close as it was.
Simon in 3
Was right to pick Istomin. Really surprised he did it in straight sets though.
Nice
(1) John Isner vs. (7) Federico Delbonis: Nadal in 2.
Stop seeing Nadal at every turn, Ricky, he’s not in Nice. If you’re not careful, you’ll be “accused” of being a Rafan, when we all know it ain’t so!
RITB: Did you watch the Pico match. He put up strong resistance but the relentless aces from Karlovic did for him. I really enjoy listening to Jean Paul Loth. His style of commentary – clear, concise, informative, enlightening etc without all the extraneous chattering is the model for how it should be done IMO.