"Cream of the Crop" Beanalysis: Metz Round Two

Medvedev v. Wawrinka

SOUND THE AMAZING MATCH ALARMS! NO WAIT, SOUND THE INCREDIBLE MATCH ALARMS, NO! SOUND THE BEST MATCH OF THE TOURNAMENT ALARMS! I’m not even joking with you guys, I would be willing to stay up until 3 a.m. to watch this if I needed to, but luckily it’s at 11:00 my time, so that’s a huge plus. Thank you Metz for not being irrational for the people of other time zones, we appreciate it. Anyway, Medvedev is coming off of a losing streak, not too bad of one, but he crashed early to Nick Kyrgios at Montreal, lost in the semis at Cincinnati, and once again crashed early to Nick Kyrgios at US Open. He won Los Cabos, though, so that’s nice. Sadly, I don’t think the dry run ends here. He got one of the absolute worst draws possible to mankind, and it all starts with a certain Stanislas Wawrinka. Well, we’ll get to him in a bit. Medvedev, I need not tell you all about him, because you probably know already, but for the newbies, and also to not seem lazy, I’m doing it anyway. Medvedev has a playstyle unique to him, (and Gasquet, to an extent.) It consists of swinging the racquet very slow, but then putting extreme amounts of pace onto the ball. It is interesting to see, but even more interesting to think about how he does it. I’m pretty sure he turned on the unlimited power shots hack. Medvedev has quite the backhand as well. He has a great serve simply due to his height. He is quite the lanky player, but he sure does play well. I think he is sporting a very good chance to win this match. I don’t think that it’ll be easy for him, but he’s still very much a contender here.

Stanislas Wawrinka is an amazing player. Having 3 slams in the midst of the big 3 reigning supreme over the last 20 years. Stan has stolen 3, a number only Andy Murray equals in terms of active players. Alright, Stan Wawrinka vs. Joao Sousa highlights, click play. “Wait, I thought Casper Ruud was playing at the Davis Cup?” Well, me from 15 minutes ago, it is in fact Stan Wawrinka, in the exact same shirt that Ruud wore at the US Open, it must be good luck. It might just work, because Stan is playing great. He’s ripping forehands, ripping backhands, going up and down the court, cross-court, down the line, playing some great serves, and playing very well at the net. In my honest opinion, Stan can win this one. I know he’s got the stuff, he’s got an advantage on Medvedev in almost every single category I can think of. EVEN HIS SHIRT PEOPLE! EVEN THE SHIRT! You all know how seriously I take player’s shirts. It is a huge factor. I will admit, it looked better on Ruud, but still, it’s a darn good looking shirt. So, with all of this taken into consideration, I think this match will go the way of Stan, but it’ll be dragged out to 3 by Medvedev.

Rune vs. Bonzi

Holger Rune piqued my interest when he beat Tsitsipas on the clay of Roland Garros. He has since decided to disappoint me in every way imaginable, winning only 3 matches in the time since that tournament. Well, he “beat” Isner, but that was a walkover and it doesn’t count. So my expectations are not high for this tournament, or this match on his part. With a game suitable for clay, and not a lot else, very similar to Tsitsipas, but worse on everything else, and better on clay. So he is definitely a one-trick pony. Those are the worst. Something that I do enjoy about Rune’s game is his speed, he is quite young, and that might change as he ages, but for right now, he has the speed of Monfils, but he lacks just about everything else possible. I am very sorry to Rune fans, if he has any left, for insulting him so much, but it’s just true.

Benjamin Bonzi is another upcoming star, just having broken onto the tour recently. He was there at the end of 2021, and at the start of this year, but he didn’t start playing mainly ATP tour events until after the French Open. Unlike Rune, though, he has won more than three matches in the time following. I think he got a bit unlucky with some of his draws, but he seems to have struck gold here in Metz. He has a game that is good, there’s room for improvement, but there’s less room than Rune, and I think Rune doesn’t have the specs to pull this one off, unless he has been randomly training very hard in the past two weeks. I’m thinking Bonzi in 2.

Basilashvili vs. Rinderknech

Nikoloz has quite the powerful strokes, but sadly lacks the accuracy to follow it up. I think he should’ve gone about this in a different manner, getting accuracy down first, and then getting the power afterwards. It probably would’ve made it a lot easier to gain that accuracy. Basil has been having bad results since his amazing run at Indian Wells at the end of last year. He made the finals at Doha this year, and has barely progressed past the second round of most other tournaments he’s played. I don’t think that he can win this one, Rinderknech has been having much more acceptable results for his skill level and his ranking, making the final at Adelaide 2. Basil just lacks that accuracy, and it’s so exploitable that it’s sad. R.I.P Basil.

Rinderknech, as I said earlier, has had a good season for his skill level and his ranking. He suffered a loss to Basilashvili at Doha earlier this year, but Basil has since fallen out of form, and Rinderknech has not. I very much like Arthur’s ability to serve big on those important points, he also possesses the ability to put out very percentage shots. He has a very good game, and I really enjoyed watching his match against Medvedev at the US Open, and his match with Munar in round one here was also high quality, I am excited to see how this one turns out, because regardless of Basil’s quality of play, Rinderknech will be playing at a very high level, I presume. I think this match could go either way, but I don’t think it’s gonna be a 3 set match, it’s going to either be a Basil beatdown like earlier this year, or Basil is going to be playing at the bad level he’s maintained in the past 7 or so months. I think, though, that Rinderknech is a safer bet, so Rinderknech in 2. (P.S. Don’t take my betting advice all the time. That is, assuming you take it at all)

Thiem vs. Hurkacz

Dominic Thiem is back everyone!!!! I’m so excited! I took a peek at part of his match today, and he’s looking very close to the form that can win him bigger tournaments. Thiem has a forehand that is striking all of the time, a serve that is able to put him out of a tight jam, which will be helpful, because Hubi seems to be very good at putting people into tight positions. Thiem is able to put in those shots that you think he would never be able to play. Despite all of that, I think that the best part of Thiem is definitely his backhand, ripping into his opponents, pushing cross-court, slicing into oblivion, and just being masterful. That’s a hard decision to make, though, because every single part of his game is so good! I know he has what it takes to beat Hurkacz, but it’s more of a question of what will Hubi be taking to this match.

Hubert has been amazing this year, no, I’m kidding. Hubi has been odd this year, showing up big time for some of the tournaments, and then bombing the next three or four. He did perform pretty well at most of the Masters, but has a very poor performance at the slams, and also a very poor performance at some of the minor tournaments. I think Hubi has a great game, and he was able to put away a firing, on-point Nick Kyrgios at Montreal. I think he definitely has the stuff to make this match go into his favor, but the big question that I mentioned earlier, is he going to bring all of the components of his game that are so good into this tournament, or is it going to be another early round blowout? That’s a hard question to answer, considering I have no insight on what he’s been looking like for this tournament, because he hasn’t played a round yet. That’s kind of what I hate about the early rounds of tournaments, is that you have no idea how the players are gonna be playing. Based on recent happenings, though, I think Dominic Thiem is going to triumph, in how many sets? I do not know, but if I had to guess, I’d pick 3.