Expected Points, my new short, daily podcast, highlights three numbers to illustrate stats, trends, and interesting trivia around the sport.
Up today: Muchova brings almost no grass-court experience to today’s battle with Angelique Kerber, Karen Khachanov advances despite a serve gone missing, and Ons Jabeur leaves a raft of high-profile losers in her wake.
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 0, Karolina Muchova’s career win total at grass-court events other than Wimbledon. Of the final eight women in the singles draw, no one is keeping a lower profile than Muchova, the 19th seed from the Czech Republic. She reached a semi-final at the Australian Open, so there are few remaining doubts about her game. But with so little grass-court experience, it seemed like a longshot for her to defend her quarter-final showing from Wimbledon 2019. Two years ago, she made her tournament debut ranked 68th, then beat Karolina Pliskova in a memorable fourth-rounder. She lost in straights to Elina Svitolina the following day, but this year, she’ll be a bit fresher after Manic Monday. Success in warmups is apparently irrelevant to the Czech. She’s dropped just one set in four rounds, getting past Paula Badosa yesterday in 95 minutes. But this year’s quarter-final assignment is more challenging. She draws Angelique Kerber, the 2018 champion who has flashed more than a little of her former brilliance. According to the Tennis Abstract forecast, Kerber is the second-favorite to win the tournament, and Muchova will probably have to wait for another year to improve on her career-best result at the All England Club.
Our second number is 81%, the rate at which players have held serve in Karen Khachanov matches throughout the Russian’s career. Khachanov is an excellent server and a mediocre returner, so his grass-court matches would be expected to remain close and often involve tiebreaks. His fourth-round match yesterday against Sebastian Korda was certainly close, but it veered off-script early. Both players won about 60% of their service points, a rate more common on clay than grass. Khachanov and Korda were even worse when it mattered, saving only 13 of 32 break points. The 10-8 fifth set was a comedy of fatigued errors, as neither player won more than half of their first-serve points, and a whopping 13 of the 18 games went to the returner. Khachanov ended up on top despite being broken six times—one more break than he allowed in the entirety of the 2018 Paris Masters, where he last won a title. Instead of 81% of games going the way of the server, 67% did, and thanks to the bizarre final set, many fans won’t believe the fraction was so high.
Today’s third and final number is 6, the number of grand slam singles champions that Ons Jabeur has beaten in the last year. She has doubled the total from 3 to 6 since the start of the Wimbledon Championships, knocking out Venus Williams, Garbine Muguruza, and Iga Swiatek in succession. She also has recent wins over Sofia Kenin, Jelena Ostapenko, and Sloane Stephens, not to mention slam finalists Madison Keys and Marketa Vondrousova. Just as important as any of those scalps is her Roland Garros third-round victory over Aryna Sabalenka last fall. Sabalenka is Jabeur’s next obstacle, as they meet today for the third time since last summer’s restart. At the 2020 French Open, the Tunisian just barely got through, winning 49% of points to advance in three sets. In January, Sabalenka got her revenge, straight-setting Jabeur on a hard court in Abu Dhabi. Sabalenka has the better ranking, but Jabeur has more than just a gaudy record against slam champs. The Tunisian has shown more affinity for grass-court tennis and will be able to handle her opponent’s power. They’ve met only twice, but the stylistic contrast between these two rising stars makes them one of the most interesting matchups in the tournament so far.
