Day 4 at Wimbledon saw a much-anticipated rematch of Nadal vs Kyrgios; and the retirement of the 2006 Australian Open finalist and Wimbledon semifinalist Marcos Baghdatis. Ultimately, all Top 8 seeds–Federer, Nadal and Nishikori–progressed to the third round. That doesn’t mean the day was devoid of upsets, with last year’s semifinalist John Isner and the 2017 finalist Marin Cilic being sent home early by unseeded players.
Wimbledon Day 4 Men’s Recap
Who looked good:
Sam Querrey looked in ominous form as he quickly dispatched Andrey Rublev in straight sets. The 2017 semifinalist is yet to be broken in this tournament and is eyeing another deep run. He’s certainly the favorite to make the quarterfinals in his section now, with John Millman awaiting next round and then the winner of Fognini vs Sandgren.
Kei Nishikori rolled past Cameron Norrie dropping only eight games, and seems well on his way to a 5th consecutive Grand Slam quarterfinal appearance. Known for getting involved into early round marathons that end up depleting him of energy for the latter rounds, Nishikori so far has been uber-efficient in this tournament. Steve Johnson awaits him in the next round.
Daniel Evans has been having a bit of a comeback season after a rough 2018. He notched an impressive straight set win over Nikoloz Basilashvili to reach the third round. He’ll be favored to make the 4th round, too, with João Sousa being his next opponent instead of Marin Cilic.
Lucas Pouille has been struggling all season apart from his run to the Australian Open semifinals, but he seems to be coming alive again at a Slam, posting two consecutive easy and quick wins over countrymen. The problem is Roger Federer will be waiting for him in the next round.
Who looked bad:
Marin Cilic continued his terrible season with a shocking straight set loss (6-4 6-4 6-4) against João Sousa, wasting all 12 break points he generated. The Croat now sits at #54 in the race to London, which is shocking after having qualified for the O2 season finale in each of the past three years. He even reaches as high as #3 in the world just one-and-a-half years ago. It looks like his days as a top player might be numbered.
Gilles Simon came into this tournament confident after a run to the final at Queen’s, where he almost won the title. But he was upset by Tennys Sandgren 8-6 in the 5th set after recovering from losing the first two sets. Simon also earned a break early in the fifth and served for the match. This is all the more surprising, considering Sandgren had never won a match on grass in his career before this tournament.
John Isner looked far from 100% physically as he lost from 2-1 up in sets against Mikhail Kukushkin, failing to repeat his semfinal run from last year. It was clear he only returned to action because of the importance of this tournament. He’s just not physically ready yet.
Taylor Fritz came into the tournament having won his first tour title in Eastbourne. He had hopes of a deep run, especially given his draw, but he couldn’t get past Jan-Lennard Struff, who has been having quite an impressive season himself.
Match of the day
The award for Day 4 can only go to Nadal vs Kyrgios. In a very tight match, Nadal’s superior play in the third and fourth set tiebreaks made the difference after no break points for either player in both sets. Kyrgios showed up to play as he almost always does vs the “Big 3” and had Nadal seriously rattled for long stretches of the match. You could see how happy and relieved the Spaniard was after finally clinching the match.
Main Photo from Getty
