John Isner hopes to continue his Miami run during Thursday’s quarterfinals but it gets even tougher against a red-hot Kei Nishikori. Novak Djokovic and David Ferrer are also in action.
(4) Kei Nishikori vs. (22) John Isner
Isner’s 2015 campaign got off to a disastrous start, but as usual he has heated up in the friendly confines of the United States as he heads into the Miami Open quarterfinals on Thursday. The 6’10” American’s 3-5 record through eight matches included a Davis Cup loss to Great Britain’s James Ward. Fast forward a few weeks, though, and Isner has a fourth-round performance in Indian Wells to his credit plus wins in Miami over Andrey Rublev, Grigor Dimitrov, and Milos Raonic–the latter in a third-set tiebreaker.
Nishikori has had no such competitive matches, and that is putting it mildly. In fact, the world No. 5 has not even surrendered more than two games in a single set while destroying Mikhail Youzhny (6-2, 6-1), Viktor Troicki (6-2, 6-2), and David Goffin (6-1, 6-2). Strong play in Miami is nothing out of the ordinary for Nishikori, who reached the semifinals last year before being forced to withdraw. The fourth seed is obviously not going to beat Isner by the convincing scorelines of the previous rounds, but his form does mean that the underdog must serve unbelievably well in order to have a chance. In neutral rallies from the baseline, of course, this is going to be one-way traffic.
Pick: Nishikori in 3
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(1) Novak Djokoic vs. (6) David Ferrer
Whereas Isner and Nishikori are squaring off for the first time ever, Djokovic and Ferrer will be facing each other for the 19th time in their careers on Thursday. The top-ranked Serb leads the head-to-head series 13-5, including 11-2 on hard courts and seven in a row overall. Their last meeting also came in the quarterfinals of a hard-court Masters 1000, with Djokovic dominating 6-4, 6-2 last fall in Shanghai.
Djokovic, who is attempting to accomplish the Indian Wells-Miami double, has struggled at times while trying to bounce back from a productive but long fortnight in the desert. He has dropped sets to both Martin Klizan and Alexandr Dolgopolov, even trailing the Ukrainian by a set and 3-0. Djokovic’s other win came over Steve Darcis, who served for the second set of their third-round clash. Ferrer, meanwhile, has made mincemeat out of Federico Delbonis, Lukas Rosol, and Gilles Simon. The seventh-ranked Spaniard is 22-2 on the season. Current form suggests Ferrer can make this competitive, but at some point Djokovic is going to answer one of his wake-up calls and it would not be surprising if it comes against an opponent whom he has owned of late.
Pick: Djokovic in 2
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Your prediction for the nishikori vs isner match up was absolutely ridiculous. First of all, if you saw isner play this week then you would know that he was throughout unbreakable and was returning well in all his matches. CMON MAN DON’T EMBARRASS YOURSELF. I liked your other predictions (except for thiem vs mannarino) but this was just bad logic. Then you said you would know that nishikori would win all the baseline rallies….he got pulverized all of the match. You should know that Isner hits balls hard and had in this match an average groundstroke speed of 80 mph! After playing great vs Dimitrov + Raonic and having his playing style with nishikoris clash it was clear that this week in miami where isner always plays great that isner was ready and in form. That was a very poor prediction and i hope you get your match records up because i know a lot of people come here.
Just to mention i participate on prediction-game.com every tournment and quite often win or get the most correct results.
Best regards for the future (i think it can only get better)
MR. PLEASE GET BETTER
this comment would have been appreciated BEFORE the match
hindsight is 20-20, my friend
you probably had Nishikori winning 6-1, 6-2 over Isner. It’s easy to pick Isner to win AFTER you know he already won.
Picking Isner to over achieve inn the US and underwelm everywhere else is a pretty effective strategy. However the buck stops here.
Ferrer doing a good job of saving match point and leveling things up at 5-5 but suddenly gets broken again. The problem is that djokovic is making him hit 15 shots on average to win points in ferrer’s own service games! Djokovic breaks again. Relentless !
Isner to beat Novak… Thoughts?