As ever, I'll go through the men's draw a quarter at a time...

1st Quarter
Last year's champion, and the dominant world #1 is Novak Djokovic[1]. Djokovic's grip is not quite as strong as last year, as he has already lost as many matches this year as in the whole of last year - on the other hand, that's only 6, so he's still the hot favourite.

Djokovic doesn't have any particularly challenging matches on the menu until a potential Quarter Final meeting with recent finalist Tomas Berdych[6]. On the way to the 2010 final, Berdych beat Djokovic in the semi, however Djokovic has won all of their other 9 meetings, so it would be a surprise if Berdych could repeat that feat.

Gasquet[18] is also in this section, he will play some beautiful tennis before capitulating at some point, probably to Berdych in the Fourth Round.

1st Quarter winner: Djokovic.
Contenders: Berdych.

2nd Quarter
As per usual, Federer[3] is in Djokovic's half, and their usual semi-final meeting is on the cards again. This section has some interesting matches though.

The highly suspicious draw has again put Isner[11] and Mahut together, to meet in the second round! Isner demolished Mahut at last year's Wimbledon in the sequel to their ridiculous marathon match - two players great at holding serve and terrible at breaking serve. This time Mahut will be have more confidence after beating Murray at Queens, but Isner should still win easily.

Tipsarevic{8} and Nalbandian meet in the first round, which could be a five setter, assuming that Nalbandian is not anxious to depart quickly after what happened in the Queens final. Nalbandian is poor at low backhands, which Tipsarevic might look to exploit.

There is potential for valiant British defeats in this section, youngster Oliver Golding faces Igor Andreev in the first round, which could be winnable if he can deal with the heavy top-spin, leading to a match with Seppi[23]. If Josh Goodall can get through the first round, he give Verdasco a decent match.

Federer could get a stern test from Gilles Simon[13] in the Fourth Round. Simon has a 2-1 record over Federer in completed matches. Look out for the form of the two players going into the game, as this one could be the shock of the tournament. Federer lost to Tommy Haas in the Halle final a week ago, and he will need to get his massive forehand up to speed in time to face this challenge.

Should Simon get through, he would probably beat Tipsarevic, but could lose to Isner.

2nd Quarter winner: Federer.
Contenders: Isner/Simon.

3rd Quarter
Andy Murray[4] would appear to have had a terrible preparation for Wimbledon, having won 0 and lost 3 (Mahut, Tipsarevic, Djokovic) on grass in the past couple of weeks. However, the latter two were in an exhibition tournament, and the former was on particularly slippery grass at Queens. In fact, it may be a benefit in lowering expectations. Also lowering expectations is the fact that Murray has the biggest servers in the game in his part of the draw.

Murray meets Davydenko in the first round, which is not as tough as it sounds. Although he only has a 5-4 record against Davydenko, he's not the player he used to be, with a fragile serve, and a game that doesn't work well with the lower bounce of grass. Next up is the huge serve of 6'10" Ivo Karlovic, but again, Karlovic does not have the same consistency on his serve these days, so Murray should come through. The third round could be another massive server in the shape of 6'8" Kevin Anderson[32], who beat Murray in their last meeting. Again, Murray should be able to exploit the movement of Anderson to come through to face Cilic[16] or Raonic[21]. Canadian youngster Raonic has a huge serve, and Cilic is returning to his best with a tournament win at Queens. They would both be awkward opponents, particularly Cilic, but again it is difficult to see Murray losing to either of them.

Also in this quarter there are the talents of Andy Roddick[30], David Ferrer[7], and Juan Martin Del Potro[9]. Roddick just won the tournament at Eastbourne, but has had a very bad year. Even after that result, he has only won 12 and lost 11 matches in 2012. The grass and the memories will likely cause Roddick to raise his game, but only to the level of 'respectable'. He could have a tight match with Ferrer, who struggles on grass. Juan Martin Del Potro should dispose of whichever of those two faces him in the Fourth Round, coming through to face Murray in the Quarter Final.

Drugs cheat Wayne Odesnik returns to Wimbledon this year after a two year ban due to being caught with HGH in his luggage. He could possibly upset Roddick in the second round.

DelPo always has the potential to win any match, with his sheer flat power on serves and forehands, but Murray has a 5-1 record over him, and can use awkward, low, short balls to bring DelPo out of his comfort zone and control the points. However, if Murray elects to use the Lendl tactics to out-rally DelPo from the baseline, he could come unstuck.

3rd Quarter winner: Murray.
Contenders: Del Potro.

4th Quarter
Mardy Fish[10] will play Wimbledon less than a month after heart surgery to correct an irregular heartbeat. It is doubtful that he will be in a fit state to play well, but if he is, perhaps he could be inspired to new heights through adversity. He could face Brit James Ward in the Second Round, and perhaps rising star Tomic[20] in the Third Round.

This is not a quarter packed with top players though, and it is surely between Rafael Nadal[2] and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga[5]. Tsonga faces Lleyton Newitt in the first round, but Hewitt can't keep pulling out great performances from nowhere, and I expect Tsonga to blow him away, perhaps into retirement, as Hewitt is now ranked 202 and hasn't won outside Australia this year. Nadal doesn't have any tough matches, although could face Halle winner and 2009 Wimbledon semi-finalist Tommy Haas in the third round, that would not present a problem to Nadal. It would be more difficult if Kohlschreiber got revenge on Haas and came through to meet Nadal, who he actually beat in Halle. Even so, a repeat would be very unlikely.

So the highly probable Quarter Final is Tsonga v Nadal. Tsonga lost to Djokovic in the semi-final last year after beating Federer in the quarters, and it could be another upset on the second Wednesday this time if Tsonga can hold his over-emotional temperament together for long enough to win 3 sets. Nadal holds a 7-3 winning record over Tsonga, but Tsonga was the victor on grass and indoors in 2011, so it will clearly be close. A sensible person would say Nadal, so I'll go for Tsonga.

4th Quarter winner: Tsonga.
Contenders: Nadal.

Semi-Finals and Final
I am particularly inaccurate when it comes to predicting semi-finals, especially when the tournament hasn't even started.

Djokovic has a 12-14 losing record overall against Federer, but has had the upper-hand recently, beating Federer twice during the clay court season, including the semi-final at Roland Garros. They have never met on grass though, so this is an interesting proposition. If Federer can get back to the consistent serving, blistering forehands and solid backhands, he will win, however, most likely he won't do that (even if Andrew Castle proclaims he's back to his best after a basic winner in the first round) - so Djokovic should win.

Murray has a great record against Tsonga, and would beat him, but note that Murray would lose to Nadal.

So it looks like I've got the final as Djokovic v Murray. Murray is Djokovic's least favourite opponent, and on grass I would expect Murray to have the edge in a tight match. This is a Grand Slam Final though, and it is well established now that Murray does not play well in Grand Slam Finals. On that basis you've got to go for Djokovic.

Isner missed a match point on the way to defeat against journeyman Falla. McEnroe suggested he had poor preparation. Cancel the Mahut reunion.

It looks like Raonic is headed for the top 10, and grass should suit him. I'm not sure it will be this year though, as far as I can tell he's only had 7 competitive matches on grass.

A smashing read as always Gav. Helps to make the next two weeks vaguely comprehensible.

Raonic has an interesting match today against Sam Querrey, who is quite capable on grass as a past Queens winner. Querrey has struggled with an arm injury since then, but appears to be rising back up the rankings again. I predict tie-breaks.
http://www.tennisearth.com/news/tennisNews/Wimbledon-2012-Milos-Raonic-vs-Sam-Querrey-Match-Preview-599922.htm

This year is Rosol's first appearance at Wimbledon... well, only if you don't count him losing in the first round of qualifying in all of his previous FIVE attempts! He appears to be very inconsistent, having beaten Baghdatis at Queens a couple of weeks ago, but then losing in qualifying at Eastbourne.
http://www.atpworldtour.com/Tennis/Players/Top-Players/Lukas-Rosol.aspx?t=pa&y=2012&m=s&e=0#

If everything else goes to form, it looks likely that Murray will make the final, since he has such a good record against Tsonga. It will be disappointing if he doesn't make it now.
http://www.atpworldtour.com/Players/Head-To-Head.aspx?pId=MC10&oId=T786

I predict Rosol may be on some sort of performance enhancing drug after watching his performance. Being able to serve like that after playing 3 hours of tennis against Rafa is unbelievable!

The only match that looks close out of those is Murray v Ferrer. Djokovic, Federer and Tsonga look set for the semi-finals.

Murray v Ferrer is particularly interesting, because Ferrer knocked Murray out of the French Open a few weeks ago. Before that match, Murray said that they practice together and Ferrer always wins - but perhaps he meant on clay. Their head-to-head record is 5-5, with Ferrer winning the last two. Grass always changes the situation though, since it is more about the serve and the return of serve. In terms of return of serve, these two are actually amongt the all-time greats! In percentage of return games won, Ferrer sits 4th and Murray 5th in the all-time list!
http://www.atpworldtour.com/Matchfacts/Matchfacts-List.aspx?c=9&s=0&y=0

Ferrer has been poor on grass in the past, but has now clocked up 8 consecutive wins, and he's a player that Murray is unable to break down since he makes so few errors. In order to win, Murray will need to be at his creative best, while Ferrer will be looking to take apart Murray's astonishingly slow 85mph second serve. I'd predict Murray in 5.

Got to add that Federer has played some of the the worst tennis I've seen from him at Wimbledon since he had a pony-tail. He looks well out of form, and I can't see him beating Djokovic.

Korfball.com Forums - Viewing Message

© Korfball.com 2000-2012