Grégoire Barrère will reach a slam quarterfinal.

Awesome concept, although of course given enough time all possible wands will merge. I’ve often wondered if a wand started at the club level would eventually make its way up to the pros. I’m pretty sure it would in most cases.

Is that the first time he acknowledged chasing Connors’s record? I don’t recall him ever mentioning that before.

This is correct, Tomic is 283 right now and has been playing Challengers regularly. If he has a few deep runs, maybe qualifies for a slam or two, it could happen.

This is the year that it became indisputable. No arguments left unless Rafa pulls off a miracle next year.

Any particular reason why these are all hard court matches? Or were there just not that many high quality clay or grass matches this year?

I had to think about that sentence for a few seconds to figure out if he was being snarky or sincere. It appears it was the latter. Bravo Holger.

These guys should just take a page out of Tsitsipas’ play book and withdraw from the tournament. That’s the surest way to avoid playing Djokovic.

Why does it seem like it’s become “uncool” for the top players in this age group to play this event? I get Alcaraz and Rune skipping it, but what about Shelton and Musetti?

I think Sinner would actually want to play Djokovic again in the final. That’s his mentality, imagine the triumph of potentially going undefeated and also beating Djokovic twice in the same tournament?

The most chaotic scenario would be if Sinner beats Djokovic in 2 and Rune beats Sinner in 3. In that case, Sinner would advance, and Djokovic would need a straight set win over Hurkacz to have a chance. In that case it would come down to % games won between Djokovic and Rune, which I have no idea how it would be calculated, but if Rune’s win over Tsitsipas were to count as 6-1 6-0 then it would basically be lights out for Djokovic, and Tsitsipas would finally have his 4D chess revenge after being dominated by Djokovic these last few years.