Andy Murray will contest his first quarterfinal of the year when he goes up against Dominic Thiem on Friday in Beijing. In Tokyo, meanwhile, quarterfinal action includes a showdown between Novak Djokovic and Lucas Pouille.
China Open: (1) Dominic Thiem vs. (WC) Andy Murray
Thiem and Murray will be squaring off for the fourth time in their careers when they battle for a semifinal spot in Beijing on Friday. Murray leads the head-to-head series 2-1, but he last prevailed in 2015 and they have not faced each other since 2017–when Thiem got the job done 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 on the red clay of Barcelona. Obviously a lot has changed since then, with Thiem emerging as a staple of the top five while Murray all but fell off the tennis map for a brief time. The 32-year-old Scot is back following February hip surgery and his comeback has reached new heights this week with wins over No. 8 seed Matteo Berrettini and countryman Cameron Norrie.
Thiem, though, represents Murray’s toughest test of the season. This may not be the fifth-ranked Austrian’s favorite time of year, but he has recovered from a summer virus to pick up Beijing wins at the expense of Richard Gasquet and Chinese wild card Zhizhen Zhang. Thiem has not surrendered more than four games in any set. Murray has been playing all kinds of grueling matches during this Asian swing and he could run out of gas against an opponent who loves playing long rallies and will be running him all over the court.
Pick: Thiem in 2
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Japan Open: (1) Novak Djokovic vs. (5) Lucas Pouille
Djokovic has dealt with injury issues of his own and not unlikely Murray he has arguably already outperformed expectations in the early stages of the fall swing. After all, the top-ranked Serb was expected to miss more time with the shoulder problem that plagued him in round four of the U.S. Open (retired against Stan Wawrinka after two sets). Djokovic suddenly finds himself in the Tokyo quarterfinals following straight-set defeats of qualifier Alexei Popyrin and Japanese wild card Go Soeda.
Up next for the No. 1 seed on Friday is a third career meeting with Pouille, who trails the head-to-head series 2-0 and has never taken a set. Djokovic dominated 6-0, 6-2, 6-2 in the semis of this year’s Australian Open before winning 7-6(2), 6-1 in the Cincinnati quarters. Those were two of Pouille’s best results in what has otherwise been an inconsistent 2019 campaign. The 24th-ranked Frenchman just barely has a better than .500 record (20-19) thanks to victories over Hubert Hurkacz and Yoshihito Nishioka, but that will almost certainly fall back to even with Djokovic on the other side of the net.
Pick: Djokovic in 2 losing 8-10 games
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