Wimbledon, 3rd round, Friday, 05.07.2024, 12:00
.. and bad luck strikes again! Jan-Lennard Struff has reached the 3rd round at Wimbledon. As he has experienced countless times in recent years, an absolute hammer opponent is now waiting for him early on.
However, it is precisely this opponent who is struggling on the hallowed turf and is therefore not as far ahead in the bookmakers’ favor as you might think.
In my Struff Medvedev tip, I’ll now tell you why I’m clearly going for over 3.5 sets here
It was one of those victories that took a hell of a lot of strength, both physically and mentally. Jan-Lennard Struff made it to round 3 at Wimbledon, but the path there was anything but easy.
At the very beginning, he had prevailed 6-4, 6-7, 6-2, 6-3 against Fabian Marozsan, but had to tremble in the first half of the match. A little later, he faced the Chinese player Zhizhen Zhang.
A lively match developed right from the start, with small details deciding the winner set by set. In the end, the German was able to celebrate a close 5-7, 6-3, 7-6, 7-6.
20 aces, but also nine double faults (as against Marozsan), nevertheless absolute top values in service (84% points won in the first and 72% in the second service), the Warstein native showed both strengths and weaknesses
The serve is of course his hobbyhorse, and we are familiar with his close results, especially those peppered with tiebreaks. There have already been three of them at Wimbledon, and we’ve also seen a few thrillers before that.
In Halle, for example, Struff played three matches and ended up with five tiebreaks. If you follow the veteran closely, you probably know that he beat Stefanos Tsitsipas here and almost sent Jannik Sinner home.
He has played seven matches since the French Open, taking the number of tiebreaks to a whopping ten. Now the 1.93m man faces an opponent who is even five centimetres taller.
Daniil Medvedev is everything, but certainly not a favorite opponent. The score is 1:5 in the head-to-head, with the German only managing to prevail for once in Halle three years ago. Can he at least keep up?
Definitely almost always, yes! Medvedev only won outright twice, and in 2021 at Wimbledon he had to work really hard at 6-4, 6-1, 4-6, 7-6. But I also have to say this: The two have not met at all since 2021.
So I wouldn’t overestimate the direct comparison and odds of 1.50 to 2.50 with our bookmakers in favor of Medvedev also show that a close match is definitely expected.
By the way: While Struff is fighting for a place in the round of 16 at Wimbledon, the German national soccer team will face Spain in the quarter-finals of the European Championships on Friday
Daniil Medvedev is therefore slightly favored, as he was only defeated by Carlos Alcaraz in the semi-finals last year. At first, it also seemed as if the Russian would have no problems at all on the holy turf
He started the tournament with a very confident 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 win against Aleksandar Kovacevic, but he started to falter against Alexandre Müller. Although he won, he had much more work to do than he would have liked.
6-7, 7-6, 6-4, 7-5, Medvedev had not planned on needing so many hours! He hit five double faults into the net, the 74% of points he won on his first serve did not come close to Struff’s score.
Medvedev, who is actually quite at home on grass, was not really convincing at the preparatory tournament in Halle. After a narrow victory over Nuno Borges, who did he lose to?
Exactly, Zhinzhen Zhang, who Struff defeated in the second round of Wimbledon. What’s definitely interesting is that the Russian has now played four matches on the fast surface, with a total of four tiebreaks
My Struff Medvedev tip
How strong is Daniil Medvedev really? The odds of 1.50 to 2.50 clearly show that Jan-Lennard Struff is by no means without a chance. Both the German and his opponent had to work hard in the second round.
Four sets, long games, several tiebreaks – both can shake hands. What’s more, I’ve noticed on both sides that it usually doesn’t work without a tie-break anyway.
I’m therefore betting on a close result next time and am predicting: Three sets are not enough here!
