What the heck is going on out here?
That has to be the question everyone is asking when they look the first-round results on the first two days at Wimbledon.
On Monday, it was Daniil Medvedev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Holger Rune, Paula Badosa, and Qinwen Zheng crashing out of the party. On Tuesday, they were joined on the exit row by Alexander Zverev, Lorenzo Musetti, Coco Gauff, and Jessica Pegula.
Tsitsidosa, Musetti, and Zheng at least have a bit of an excuse. Tsitisipas retired due to injury against Valentin Royer. Badosa has been dealing with physical problems of own, not helped by the fact that she drew Great Britain’s Katie Boulter in the opening round. Musetti has been hurt since the French Open. Zheng has never been comfortable on grass, plus she had to face a stellar grass-court player in Katerina Siniakova.
Losses by Medvedev, Rune, Zverev, Gauff, and Pegula were more perplexing. Medvedev fell to Benjamin Bonzi in four sets, Rune squandered a two-set lead over a struggling Nicolas Jarry, Gauff was erased by Dayana Yastremska in straight sets, and Pegula got blown off the court in swift fashion by Elisabetta Cocciaretto.
“I feel like historically Wimbledon always has so many upsets first rounds here, to be honest,” Gauff said during her press conference. “I think it’s always a topic. I think I would say really the quick turnaround most of the seeds are going deeper in Roland Garros, and then you spend like a long clay season, and then you have to come and try to adjust to grass.
“Jess won [the Bad Homburg title] on Saturday…. It’s not the easy, quick turnaround. Then if you go deep in Roland Garros, you’re debating on do I rush and play that week, or do I take time and play the week before? It’s a tricky thing.”
It’s a trick that not even Carlos Alcaraz solved easily, as the two-time defending champion needed five sets to get past Fabio Fognini in Centre Court’s opening match. Taylor Fritz also needed five thrilling sets, although that wasn’t a huge surprise considering that Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard was on the other side of the net. In Tuesday night’s Centre Court finale, Novak Djokovic dropped a set to Alexandre Muller while also receiving treatment from the doctor and the physio–a fitting end to a frantic first round.
It feels like it’s going to be a survive-and-advance kind of fortnight. And so far, surviving has been easier said than done.
Ben Rothenberg and I break down upset city on his No Challenges Remaining podcast
seeds tumbling left and right
Zheng lost today, but I digress. Zverev going out is not so big for me since Rinderknech has been playing some good stuff.
Zverev on grass is just a big server, ball needs to bounce up for his groundstrokes
Zheng, like Gauff, not great on grass.
I read something else, about Bublik. This was not an easy opponent , at all, and Bublik results on grass , look at Halle and nowhere else
Draw has just opened up nicely for Jack:)
Mensik is sneaky
Sneaky sounding name .
Well Zheng’s not great on grass, but Gauff was still the 2nd/3rd fav. behind Saba, she certainly expected to do well.
Yeah , but not unusual for the RG champion to be highly seeded to go out in round 1 . Some of the experts were saying her weaknesses were worse on grass and she often has gone out early here
Someone said the biggest single factor in these type of upsets was the conditions.
Cant remember who, but they were a famous player, female.
Greg said today the heat meant the courts were playing faster than usual. Now it’s coo led order should resume.
Apparently yesterday was the most seeds going out in any major in the Open era.
Reminds me of 2013 , the courts were playing funny, upsets happened
Was that the year loads of people got injured with everyone slipping and sliding??
The courts were slippery, Stakghovsky beat Federer among other upsets
Commies kept saying that female players who had won or gone deep in warm ups seemed tired with most obvious awful performance being Pegula.
Kind of begs the question as why play them then?? Sure we have heard this before.
Federer played Halle, Murray played Queens, very few of the really top players played the week before Wimby. Stupid really.
Yep
Tarvet seems to be relishing playing Alcaraz, really up for it, I know he lost the first set 6 1, but the match looks closer than the scoreline might suggest
Now Paolini out.