By Jake Davies
- Casper Ruud [4] vs Nicolas Jarry
- Iga Swiatek [1] vs Lesia Tsurenko
- Alexander Zverev [22] vs Grigor Dimitrov [28]
PARIS, FRANCE – Defending champion Iga Swiatek looks to book her place in the final four, while Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev are also in action in our must-see matches of the day.
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Casper Ruud [4] vs Nicolas Jarry H2H and Match Fundamentals
| Casper Ruud [4] vs Nicolas Jarry | H2H: Tied at 1-1 |
| Roland Garros 2023 | Paris, France |
| Clay (O) | Prize money: €142,000 |
| Second on Court Chatrier, from 11.00am (10.00am BST) | Discovery+ Add-on via Amazon Prime
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Casper Ruud sealed a decent four set victory in his third round, coming from a set down to surpass Zhizhen Zhang in four sets. In the third and fourth set in particular Ruud was getting a lot more of a platform from the first serve and there were greater signs and indications that his lethal forehand was clicking in offence more often than not.
Ruud will have his work cut out for him in the fourth round as he faces someone that has already beaten him this year in Nicolas Jarry. Jarry has mostly enjoyed his tour-level success either at high altitude or on quicker clay surfaces, but inside the last 12 months there is certainly more rally tolerance to his ground game, an eagerness to build and construct with his forehand more, and not look to overpower and bail out of points within second and third rally ball. As a result of Jarry’s improvements we are seeing a bit more progress on the slower clay and the Chilean notching wins against players that would normally be a lot more consistent than him from the back of the court.
Jarry scored a big win versus Ruud in the Geneva Open earlier in the clay court swing, and you could already see the difficulties that Ruud had in terms of containing, suppressing and keeping ahold of Jarry’s gigantic game. Jarry’s strengths are the potency of the first serve, the way he protects his second serve as if it is a first serve, but also the brutal power that comes with it. Ruud will struggle to get the control of points that he desires and he may need to fall into a game-style of making Jarry play and over-press to get over the finish line here.
Prediction: Ruud in five sets.
Iga Swiatek [1] vs Lesia Tsurenko H2H and Match Fundamentals
| Iga Swiatek [1] vs Lesia Tsurenko | H2H: Swiatek leads 2-0 |
| Roland Garros 2023 | Paris, France |
| Clay (O) | Prize money: €142,000 |
| Third match on Court Suzanne-Lenglen, from 11.00am (10.00am BST) | Discovery+ Add-on via Amazon Prime
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Iga Swiatek’s level in her first three matches at this tournament has put her in the driving seat of being able to defend her title from last year, and she still looks head and shoulders above the rest in terms of clay court pedigree without question. It can be argued that Swiatek’s opponents in terms of match-up have suited her comfortably, but even then Swiatek has rounded off her performances with killer second sets this fortnight.
Lesia Tsurenko is somewhat of a surprise package being at this stage of the event. The Ukrainian only has one Grand Slam quarter-final to her name, so despite being a familiar face on tour for many years she is relatively inexperienced at this point of a tournament. With that being said Tsurenko is deserving of her place here, beating 2021 French Open champion Barbora Krejickova in the first round and then dropping just the two games to Bianca Andreescu thereafter.
Swiatek leads the H2H 2-0, having beaten the Ukrainian en route to the French Open title last year and also winning in Rome earlier this season, dropping just the two games in both of those encounters. The problem that Tsurenko often faces in this match-up is that she does not possess a standout weapon, cannot really depend on one killer shot and as a result Swiatek has full control and command of a lot of the back court exchanges. One thing that Tsurenko has done extremely well this week is make her presence felt off return of serve, and with Swiatek’s serving not being quite at its best just yet there could be openings there. But Swiatek should have far too much time to dictate and overwhelm off the ground.
Prediction: Swiatek in straight sets.
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Alexander Zverev [22] vs Grigor Dimitrov [28] H2H and Match Fundamentals
| Alexander Zverev [22] vs Grigor Dimitrov [28] | H2H: Zverev leads 3-1 |
| Roland Garros 2023 | Paris, France |
| Clay (O) | Prize money: €142,000 |
| Fourth on Court Chatrier, not before 8.15pm (7.15pm BST) | Discovery+ Add-on via Amazon Prime
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For Alexander Zverev his comeback to the tour after a long-term ankle injury has felt like he has had something to prove, with his title as one of the leading male players on the clay coming under question now that so many other younger players are looking to take his spot at competing at the back-end of Grand Slam tournaments. With that being said, Zverev’s typical tendency at often going the scenic route at this tournament, grounding his opponents down and sealing hard-fought wins has once again been a common theme here. But the way that the draw has fallen apart Zverev will have one eye on potentially making the semi-finals for the third consecutive year.
Grigor Dimitrov is very much approaching his twilight years, the best days on a tennis court shortening and he will be aware that these opportunities of competing for majors aren’t going to be available for him much longer and it certainly puts more emphasis on this fourth round versus Zverev.
Zverev holds the big advantage on a clay court, with the serve still being potent and effective enough to be dominant in slower conditions and the German utilises that extra time to soak up pace competently when typically miles behind the baseline and on the back foot. I feel like at this point in Dimitrov’s career he needs more give out of the surface that enables his serve to stand up to some of the bigger servers, but also gives him more pop on his forehand groundstroke in addition. If Zverev can ensure he has zero second serve yips then he should make it into another quarter-final.
Prediction: Zverev in four sets.
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