French Open Men - Tsitsipas and Djokovic ready to make amends

On Day 11 of Roland Garros, the remaining quarterfinals will be played. While our last women's outright hope failed us in Elina Svitolina yesterday, we saw some outstanding tennis on the men's side as Diego Sebastian Schwartzman fought through Dominic Thiem in one of the most dramatic matches of recent French Open history. The rollercoaster lasted more than five hours and the Argentine eventually got the upper hand to set up a semifinal clash with Rafael Nadal and bring home our outright to win the third quarter at 9.00 odds. Nadal for his part beat Jannik Sinner in three sets, but the Italian prodigy showed once again that the future is his as he was arguably the better player for at least the first one and a half sets.

Gritty Greek

Two semifinal spots are still up for grabs and before #1 seed Novak Djokovic enters Court Philippe-Chatrier, we will have a rematch of the final in Hamburg the week before Roland Garros. Both Andrey Rublev and Stefanos Tsitsipas were lucky to have escaped the rather ridiculous scheduling of that Hamburg final, which took place on Sunday when the French Open had already started. They both had to quarantine for 24 hours when arriving in Paris and had to play their first round matches on Tuesday.

Rublev was already down 6-7 6-7 2-5 against Sam Querrey, but somehow managed to fight his way back and win 6-7 6-7 7-5 6-4 6-3. Tsitsipas also went down two sets to love before coming back against Jaume Munar, 4-6 2-6 6-1 6-4 6-4. So while they were both able to turn things around, especially the Greek seems to be on a mission. He didn't lose another set after round one and only dropped 22 games in 9 sets against Cuevas, Bedene and Dimitrov. Rublev still struggled here and there against Davidovich Fokina and Fucsovics and the Hungarian in particular proved a tough nut to crack. Altogether, Tsitsipas spent two and a half hours less on court, which might become a factor in these challenging conditions.

The Greek already admitted that the loss against Rublev motivated him and he can't wait to get his revenge. He served for the title in Hamburg, but lost four games in a row and handed it to Rublev in the end. In today's match, the conditions are different and I feel like Tsitsipas' better use of the slice and the drop shot might give him the advantage. Rublev also won't be able to hit through the court as much as he did in Hamburg, so I'm counting on a motivated Tsitsipas and hope he won't hand over the match like he did against Coric and Rublev recently.

Steady Spaniard

In the other quarterfinal, Novak Djokovic will take on Pablo Carreno Busta. That's right, it's not long ago these two faced each other. The Spaniard bugged Djokovic with his consistent play and we all know how that ended in New York last month.

It's the second time Carreno Busta reached the last 8 at Roland Garros and he's playing some of the best tennis of his career. Coming off the US Open semifinal, he had one rather disappointing showing against Nadal in Rome, but at the French Open, he only lost one set so far against Roberto Bautista Agut. There are no particular weaknesses in the Spaniard's game and I think he can give Djokovic another fight. The Serb crushed through the field so far here in Paris, but other than Khachanov, no one had the game to really test him. Carreno Busta will be another level and although Djokovic will be motivated to make up for the US Open incident, I think the 28.5 line is at least one or two games too low. I expect a good fight from both and hope Carreno Busta continues to trouble Djokovic.