Photo Source: Getty
Week one of Wimbledon is in the books. Now that the dust has settled on the third round, let's look back on the biggest surprises of week one.
The LEVEL of seed carnage
The chaos seems to have abated in the last round, but the first and second rounds at Wimbledon were complete carnage. 36 seeds fell out before the third round, and eight Top-10 seeds were gone before the second round. The latter stat is an Open Era record, the former, a record since tournaments switched to 32 seeds just over two decades ago.
Now that the dust has settled and many big names are still in the mix for the round of 16, it’s likely that the many surprises – four players outside of the Top 100 in the fourth round – will start to fall by the wayside. We are in the process of reversion to the mean.
Laura Siegemund – should have done this sooner?
The German is so crafty, so daring, so made-for-grass. How has she not reached the round of 16 at Wimbledon sooner would be our question? She’s here now, at 37, and getting ready to take on lucky loser Solana Sierra for a spot in the quarterfinals. What an opportunity!
August in … July?
August Holmgren saved three match points just to finish his qualifying run at Wimbledon. Then he took out Quentin Halys in the first round and saved THREE MORE MATCH POINTS to defeat Tomas Machac in the second round. The 27-year-old, who was felled by Alex de Minaur in the third round on Saturday, made his major debut and he’s ranked 192. There have been plenty of shocks and surprises at Wimbledon this year, but of all the third-round participants Holmgren had to be the biggest surprise.
Cilic turns back the clock like a boss
Marin Cilic navigated his way past No.4 seed Jack Draper with commanding authority, and followed up that win on Saturday by shooting past Jaume Munar in four sets to reach the round of 16. At 36, Cilic still has what it takes to take the racquet out of his opponents hands on the surface, and if he keeps executing at a high level, he may just keep winning.
Hard to see that coming for a guy that was outside of the Top 1000 at age 35, just 11 months ago.
Success before Wimbledon a Curse?
Alexander Bublik won Halle. Jessica Pegula won Bad Homburg. Marketa Vondrousova won Berlin. Jiri Lehecka was brilliant in reaching the final at Queen’s. A lof of the success we saw in the grass-court leadup to Wimbledon helped us write previews of who to watch. But it didn’t help those champions when they got to the All England Club.
We can make an exception for Carlos Alcaraz, because he is the exception rather than the rule in general, and Iga Swiatek, who showed good form in Bad Homburg despite losing in the final. But in general, the lack of follow-through by many grass champions has us slightly perplexed.