Basel Quarterfinals Beanalysis

Alcaraz vs. Carreno Busta

Alcaraz baby! He’s back at his normal shenanigans once more, and we are glad to see it. Honestly, poor Botic was doing everything he could, and Alcaraz was just insane and couldn’t be stopped. His shots were firing, his serve was pretty good, and don’t even get me started on his drop shots. It makes you wonder what’s going to happen in this next match. As a PCB fan, I’m scared. (My heart goes out to all my Botic fans out there. Thoughts and prayers.)

I will also be keeping PCB in my thoughts and prayers, because oh boy is Alcaraz looking tough to beat. I think it is doable, but not easy whatsoever. Let’s take inventory of what PCB has that can beat Carlitos. He has a mighty mental game, honestly close to Rafa, Roger, and Novak if you ask my opinion. He also makes little to no unforced errors. His playstyle is counterpunching, and hitting the ball back, with little to no pace. What does all of this mean against Alcaraz? Well, it means that PCB can possibly drag the match to a point where he can pull a win out with his incredible mental strength. This is for many reasons, those being little to no errors means that Carlos will have to hit more winners than normal, and with his high amount of percentage shots when going for winners, might cause extra errors, giving PCB some extra points, and also counter punchers do really well on the hard courts, and Alcaraz, though having a kind of unquantifiable playstyle, is not a counter puncher, and that might give PCB an edge. I think this one goes to Alcaraz in 2, or if PCB can drag it to 3, he will take the win.

Auger Aliassime vs. Bublik

Oh my God. Felix, you murdered poor Kecmanovic. Good grief dude, what was that? Something insane. I have no idea what I just witnessed. I think this part of the writeup is going to be close to nothing. Felix is burning through people like crazy, I’m honestly kinda scared. This is the FAA we all wanted from the start. He himself even said that this last match was one of the best in his entire life. So that’s something.

Bublik should quit while he’s ahead, because he has a head as of right now, and if he continues much further, his head will be left on the court tomorrow, because FAA is going to blow it off. I think there isn’t much to say except for congrats on beating ARV, but good luck with whatever monster is currently inhabiting FAA’s body. (Maybe it’s the spirit of Federer, coming back to a youthful body, and making a return to tennis) Either way, this match has only one possible outcome, and it’s FAA in 2. I mean come on, if he can completely dismantle Kecmanovic like that, surely he can do it again against Bublik.

Rune vs. Rinderknech

Rune is making some big waves here recently. But wait! There’s someone attempting to tame the big wave! It’s my ex’s dad? Oh no it’s just Rinderknech. Well, I personally enjoy some quality Rinderknech, and also some quality Rune, and that is all we’ve been getting this week so far, and Rune even gave us more last week. This match is going to be a treat. Rune is playing great, beating Humbert, which some people were skeptical of Rune’s ability to keep it together after a full week of tennis last week, and then going all out here in the first round to take out ADM. I think that fear is more prevalent to me in this match than it was in the other match. I feel like Rune is A: going to be more tired than last time, and B: going to be exploited more by Rinderknech. I think he could definitely go out here.

I have been waiting for Rinderknech to win a title since that little teaser taste he gave us at Adelaide, before losing to Kokkinakis. Maybe it’s an addiction. Well, whatever, who cares, shut up. I think Rinderknech has most of the advantages that matter here, including but not limited to, less fatigue, better shotmaking, beat PCB, better looking, wait no scratch that, and also more experience. I think Rinderknech deserves to win this match, simply considering that he beat a much harder opponent in round one of this tournament (Cilic) and also his tennis is overall looking better than Rune’s at the moment. I think this match is going to Rinderknech, but you can never guess how many sets are going to happen in a Rune match. So Rinderknech in an undisclosed amount of sets.

Bautista Agut vs. Wawrinka

RBA has actually had the easiest route to this point, in my opinion, of course, that doesn’t mean I don’t think he’s good, I just think the Draw gods have blessed him this week. I’m not sure if Stan continues that blessing, or ends it. I think I’m leaning more towards continuing it, because Stan looked a bit shaky against Nakashima. I don’t think RBA should normally have much trouble with Stan, but who knows if you’ll be facing average Ruud shirt wearing Wawrinka, or if you will face the mythical “STANISLAYER” It seems that Ruud faced this Stanislayer, and Nakashima to a lesser extent, but I feel like the Stanislayer may not make an appearance against RBA, but as I’ve said before, you never know when you are going to get “STANISLAIN”

Wawrinka has pulled out all the stops in order to make sure the Swiss keep their singles trophy. So far, it’s worked, will it work in this match? Who knows. I don’t doubt Stan will make this as difficult as possible for RBA, I just feel like this one is going to go the way of RBA. I don’t know what else to say, but I just think it’ll end up going to RBA. But hey, sometimes people need to not be persuaded for a change. Just simply believe. RBA won’t win this one in straight sets, it’ll take three sets I’d bet. RBA in 3.