👋 Welcome back to The Daily Theory, our morning rundown to help you stay on top of your favorite sport. I’m Allen McDuffee, your guide to all things tennis.

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Let’s tennis!

Three Points

🎾 U.S. Open wild cards: The USTA has released the singles and doubles draws for the American Collegiate Wild Card Playoffs for the U.S Open.

  • ICYMI: The NCAA championships have been reshuffled, and the winners of the individual championships no longer have a direct wild card. Instead, an invitational playoff will take place on the USTA National Campus in Orlando next week to determine who gets the main draw wild card.
  • The upshot: More guaranteed wild cards. Only one player or doubles team will get the main draw wild card, but singles finalists will obtain wild cards into U.S. Open qualifying.
  • The downside: The players eligible to compete are invited, which comes across as antithetical to collegiate tennis.

🎾 Healthy competition: With Katie Boulter losing to Diana Shnaider on Thursday, Emma Raducanu will become the British number one on Monday, no matter how long she lasts at Queen’s Club the rest of the week.

  • What she said: “Having Katie in front, it was nice for me to have something to chase. Now I’m sure she’s going to enjoy that with me,” said Raducanu. “The grass season is still young, and so is the rest of the season. But regardless, we have a healthy competition between us two...It was nice to also play doubles with her this week.”
  • Yes, but: Can the British press keep itself from pouring on even more unnecessary pressure on Raducanu?
  • Next: Raducanu faces Qinwen Zheng on Friday in London.
  • The numbers: Raducanu is ranked 37th and is in striking distance of grabbing a low seed (and theoretically a more favorable draw) at Wimbledon. Not a bad position, given that her ranking was outside the top 200 a year ago.

🎾 Scouting report: It’s only week one of the grass season. But, unlike the clay season, there aren’t any players who have jumped ahead as ones to watch as we move toward another major. In other words, there’s no obvious Tim van Rijthoven rising up just yet. Next week will be a better litmus test once more of the top players are in draws. Until then, we’ll just enjoy the nice lawns and some pleasant tennis.

And, that’s game.

On The Radar

More tennis matches we’re monitoring today:

London - WTA 500 (Grass)

  • Diana Shnaider vs. Madison Keys (Quarterfinals)
  • Tatjana Maria vs. Elena Rybakina (Quarterfinals)
  • Qinwen Zheng vs. Emma Raducanu (Quarterfinals)
  • Emma Navarro vs. Amanda Anisimova (Quarterfinals)

’s-Hertogenbosch - WTA 250 (Grass)

  • Veronika Kudermetova vs. Ekaterina Alexandrova (Quarterfinals)
  • Yue Yuan vs. Elise Mertens (Quarterfinals)
  • Elisabetta Cocciaretto vs. Suzan Lamens (Quarterfinals)
  • Elena Ruse vs. Bianca Andreescu (Quarterfinals)

’s-Hertogenbosch - ATP 250 (Grass)

  • Daniil Medvedev vs. Reilly Opelka (Quarterfinals)
  • Zizou Bergs vs. Mark Lajal (Quarterfinals)
  • Nuno Borges vs. Ugo Humbert (Quarterfinals)
  • Gabriel Diallo vs. Karen Khachanov (Quarterfinals)

Stuttgart - ATP 250 (Grass)

  • Felix Auger-Aliassime vs. Justin Engel (Quarterfinals)
  • Marton Fucsovics vs. Taylor Fritz (Quarterfinals)
  • Alexander Zverev vs. Brandon Nakashima (Quarterfinals)
  • Ben Shelton vs. Jiri Lehecka (Quarterfinals)

📺 Learn how to watch today’s action over at Tennis Watchers.

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