On quarterfinal day in Lyon, top seed Felix Auger-Aliassime will take on French wild card Arthur Fils. Americans Tommy Paul and Brandon Nakashima will also be in action in an all-seeded showdown on Thursday.
(1) Felix Auger-Aliassime vs. (WC) Arthur Fils
Felix Auger-Aliassime took a wild card into Lyon, owing to the fact that the world No. 10 has been positively diabolical on clay this season. So poorly has the 22 year-old played that coming into this week he had won zero matches on the dirt. Yes, zero. He won a match this week over qualifier Pablo Llamas Ruiz in the second round, but one match win doesn’t really qualify as good match preparation for Roland Garros.
Arthur Fils had an eventful path to the quarterfinals. The Frenchman, ranked 112th in the world, was the other half of a wild second-round match with Mikael Ymer. Fils was up 6-5 on the Swede when Ymer completely lost his head at chair umpire Rogerio Santos, who declined to check a mark for Ymer the game prior to his tirade. Ymer bashed his racket on Santos’ chair and was promptly defaulted from the match.
Ordinarily this would be the sort of tournament one could expect early losses for top seeds. With the French Open starting in just a few days, few top players would risk fatigue. But since Auger-Aliassime has played almost no matches in the past month, expect the Canadian to show up for this one.
Cheryl pick: Auger-Aliassime in 2
Ricky pick: Fils in 3
(3) Tommy Paul vs. (8) Brandon Nakashima
The last (and only) time Tommy Paul and Brandon Nakashima met in an ATP-level match, the result was an epic three-tiebreak victory for Nakashima. They met on the grass courts of s’Hertogenbosch last year. But that was then; Tommy Paul sits at a career high 17th in the world. He has produced mixed results on the dirt, but of note is his run to a Challenger final in Aix-en-Provence at the beginning of the month — when he lost to Andy Murray.
Brandon Nakashima has endured a terrible start to 2023. His two wins this week mark his best result of the season so far and his match record was an anemic 3-6 going into Lyon. The young American is still looking to find the form that saw him to the round of 16 at Wimbledon last summer followed by a title in San Diego. Still, it’s hard to imagine his 2023 breakthrough coming on least successful surface.
Cheryl pick: Paul in 2
Ricky pick: Paul in 2
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It’s a shame how bad Felix has been. I thought he could have a good year, but he has regressed as a player.
Felix in 2;….Naka in a tough 3