Expected Points, my new short, daily podcast, highlights three numbers to illustrate stats, trends, and interesting trivia around the sport.
Up today: The women’s final four has paid their dues, Rafael Nadal keeps the bakery open, and Tamara Zidansek has a knack for winning matches during the second half of the French Open.
Scroll down for a transcript.
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Music: Love is the Chase by Admiral Bob (c) copyright 2021. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license. Ft: Apoxode
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Rough transcript of today’s episode:
The first number is 5.5 years, the average age difference between the winners and losers in the four women’s French Open quarter-finals. Tamara Zidansek and Paula Badosa were born within two months of each other in 1997, but the other three pairings in the final eight were generational battles, and in all three cases, the older player won. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova is eight years older than doubles partner and quarter-final victim Elena Rybakina, Barbora Krejcikova has more than eight years of life experience on Coco Gauff, and Maria Sakkari has a nearly six-year edge on defending champion Iga Swiatek. I won’t give you the trite explanation that experience is what makes the difference on a big stage, but it’s a seductive argument this week. Except for Pavlyuchenkova, all of the winners were underdogs according to my Tennis Abstract Elo ratings. If it isn’t veteran savvy that determined the final four, perhaps it was the fitness that comes from surviving years on tour: Pavlyuchekova and Zidansek went past 6-all in the final set, and Sakkari held strong while Swiatek suffered a thigh injury. Casual fans are learning a lot of new names at Roland Garros this year, but the unfamiliar faces who’ve made it to the final weekend aren’t the young ones.
Our second number is 5, the number of top-ten players that Rafael Nadal has bageled at Roland Garros. In his long career rewriting the French Open record books, Nadal has won 24 sets by a score of 6-0. What’s most impressive is the list of opponents he has dominated. Yesterday, Diego Schwartzman managed to take a set from the King of Clay, but Rafa bounced back to bagel him in the final set, winning 25 of the final 30 points. A disappointing ending for the scrappy Argentine, but Schwartzman has first-class company. At Roland Garros, Nadal has won a set to love against Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Dominic Thiem, and David Ferrer. Look beyond Paris to all clay-court events, and the list of top-tenners at the receiving end of a Rafa drubbing grows by another four. Nadal has dished out three bagels during this French Open fortnight, earning him a place in the semi-final against Djokovic, who lost the first set of last year’s championship match 6-0 to Rafa. For most players, the best-of-five format is a unique challenge of strength and stamina. For Nadal, it means that many more opportunities to make the best players in the world look helpless.
Today’s third and final number is 12, Tamara Zidansek’s active match winning streak during the second week of Roland Garros. Such a feat sounds positively Rafa-esque, so I’ll admit up front that I’m getting a little cute with definitions here. Zidansek is playing only her third French Open main draw, and this year’s semi-final is the first time she’s gotten past the first round. But after the losses in 2018 and 2019, her next stop was Bol, an island town in Croatia that hosts a WTA Challenger tournament during the slam’s second week. The Slovenian has beaten 7 top-100 players at the Croatian event, finishing her 10-match win streak with a 7-5 7-5 victory over Sara Sorribes Tormo in the 2019 final. She was on the entry list for the 2021 edition in Bol, but business in Paris has kept her occupied. Zidansek extended her second-week-of-Roland-Garros streak to 12 with wins over Sorana Cirstea and Paula Badosa to earn a place in the French Open final four. When this is over, she deserves an island holiday, and this year, she won’t have to pack a racquet.
