Ricky’s Preview And Picks For Day 3 Of The French Open Tennis • Including Rublev vs. Querrey & Tsitsipas Too

By Ricky Dimon

Andrey Rublev and Stefanos Tsitsipas, who contested the Hamburg European Open final on Sunday, will begin their French Open campaigns on Tuesday. There is no rest for the weary, but at least they got an extra day by finding themselves in the top half of the draw instead of the bottom half. Rublev is going up against Sam Querrey, while Tsitsipas is facing Jaume Munar.

Ricky previews the Day 3 action and makes his predictions for a whole host of men’s singles matches.

Sam Querrey vs. (13) Andrey Rublev

Rublev captured his third title of the season this past week in Hamburg and he now takes his talents to Roland Garros for the third and final major of 2020. The Russian boasts an amazing 25-6 record for the season and is up to No. 12 in the world after completing a Hamburg run that included victories over Roberto Bautista Agut, Casper Ruud, and lastly Stefanos Tsitsipas in Sunday’s final.

Up first for Rublev at the French Open on Tuesday is Querrey, who trails the head-to-head series 2-1. The 48th-ranked American unsurprisingly prevailed on his preferred grass-court surface via a 6-3, 6-2, 6-3 decision at Wimbledon in 2019, but Rublev rolled to straight-set wins on hard courts later that summer in Winston-Salem and earlier this year in Adelaide. Clay will be even worse for Querrey, especially in these somewhat slow conditions. A red-hot Rublev should have no trouble, even if he is a little bit fatigued.

Pick: Rublev in 3

Other matches:

Djokovic over Ymer in 3 – Ymer does not have any offensive weapons with which to hurt Djokovic. This will be straightforward.

Shapovalov over Simon in 3 – Simon is winding down his career, and not doing so with much success. Shapovalov is only on the way up.

Jaume Munar vs. (5) Stefanos Tsitsipas

Tsitsipas and Munar will be going head-to-head for the second time in their careers on Tuesday. Their only previous encounter came at the 2018 NextGen ATP Finals, where the Greek got the job done 4-3, 4-3, 3-4, 4-2. Tsitsipas ended up triumphing at that event and then won a much different kind of year-end championship–the real one in London–12 months later. That cemented the Greek’s status as top five kind of player, and he currently stands at sixth in the world (seeded fifth due to Roger Federer’s absence).

Tsitsipas is coming off a solid runner-up showing in Hamburg, whereas Munar went back to the Challenger circuit after retiring in round one of the U.S. Open against eventual champion Dominic Thiem. The 103rd-ranked Spaniard, who is 3-7 on the main tour in 2020, suffered two bad losses at those two Challenger events. There is no reason to think he can make this one competitive.

Pick: Tsitsipas in 3

Tsitsipas over Munar in 3 – Tsitsipas is experienced enough to avoid a hangover from Hamburg. Munar has not played a match since a U.S. Open retirement.

Rublev over Querrey in 3 – Rublev has a ton of momentum after beating Tsitsipas in the Hamburg final. Querrey is struggling and not good on clay in the first place.

Bautista Agut over Gasquet in 4 – Bautista Agut leads the head-to-head series 6-2, including 5-1 in their last six.

Dimitrov over Barrere in 4 – Dimitrov has rounded back into decent form following a coronavirus-plagued summer.

Garin over Kohlschreiber in 3 – Kohlschreiber is right up there with Sousa and Basilashvili as one of the most hopeless players on tour right now.

Lajovic over Mager in 3 – Mager has little Grand Slam experience and Lajovic is at his best on clay.

Cuevas over Laaksonen in 4 – Laaksonen is mostly a Challenger player and Cuevas is the essence of a clay-court specialist.

Carballes Baena over Johnson in 4 – Again, this all comes down to the surface. Carballes Baena thrives on the slow stuff; Johnson most definitely does not.

Djere over Anderson in 4 – Anderson is a question mark from a physical standpoint, and even at 100 percent he would be an underdog against Djere on clay.

Davidovich Fokina over Mayot in 3 – ADF is in fine form and Mayot is not ready for the Grand Slam stage.

Ricky contributes to 10sballs.com and also maintains his own tennis website, The Grandstand. You can follow him on twitter at @Dimonator.