Good morning, Court Theorists! ☕️🥐🧱
Today’s tennis mood: Chuckles plus some head-tilting.
Let’s tennis!
-Allen
🎾 A few major upsets: Unsurprisingly, some of the lower seeds went out in the first round yesterday, including Corentin Moutet, Tallon Griekspoor, and Linda Noskova. But some of the world’s top 10 did, too. And that’s worth noting.
Daniil Medvedev dropped out in the first round after a 6-2, 1-6, 6-1, 1-6, 6-4 loss to Australia’s Adam Walton, currently ranked 97 in the world. “In tennis you need to adapt to things, and sometimes I’m not good enough to adapt to it, and sometimes I am,” Medvedev said. “That’s basically all I can tell you.” His wife had a thing or two to say about that.
Kimberly Birrell took down Jessica Pegula 1-6, 6-3, 6-3. The American may have won more points than Birrell, but she racked up too many unforced errors — 38 in all — to pull off a win on the red clay.
And ninth seed Alexander Bublik lost to Jan-Lennard Struff 7-5, 6-7, 6-4, 7-5 — a far cry from his quarterfinalist achievement a year ago.
🎾 A literal car wreck: In The Daily Theory yesterday, we here at Court Theory HQ called out Coco Gauff vs. Taylor Townsend for the one to watch. And the first set proved us right before Gauff ran away with the match 6-4, 6-0. But before the match, Gauff was put through quite an ordeal just trying to get to the grounds.
What she said: “We got in a mini car accident on my way to the site today,” Gauff told TNT Sports with a laugh. “We ran into a (pole). You felt a little impact. I spilled my juice all over the car.” She added: “The car was not drivable. So we ended up taking a taxi.”
🎾 One to watch: Nishesh Basavareddy vs. Alex Michelsen (2nd round - Roland-Garros): Two American hard-court specialists finding their way around a red clay court? Bring it on!
The record: The head-to-head record between Nishesh Basavareddy and Alex Michelsen is tied at two apiece. That comes with a caveat that one of the wins for Michelsen was at the Next Gen Finals last year, which has the best-of-five short sets format.
On the line: For Basavareddy, it would build on his first-round win over Taylor Fritz and show that it wasn’t a fluke. And, on Michelsen’s side of the net, it would prove that his very real efforts to get better on the red clay are paying off.
🎾 🏆 🎤 YOUR CALL
(Yesterday’s poll results: 90% of you called for Coco Gauff to defeat Taylor Townsend. Gauff won 6-4, 6-0.)
And that’s game.
