When Andy Murray withdrew from Wimbledon and several other British men lost heartbreakers, Jack Draper and Cameron Norrie came to the rescue with wins on Tuesday. Now they will go head-to-head in the second round on Thursday. Hubert Hurkacz and Arthur Fils are also taking the court.
Here are my previews and picks for Thursday’s best matchups.
(28) Jack Draper vs. Cameron Norrie
Draper and Norrie will be squaring off for the third time in their career. Each previous meeting has been won by Norrie; 6-3, 6-3 at the 2021 Queen’s Club event and 7-6(5), 6-4 at the 2022 Miami Open. Those results hardly mean anything at this point, of course, because Draper is a much different player now. The 22-year-old is 21-13 in 2024 and up to No. 28 in the rankings. His grass-court season features an upset of Carlos Alcaraz at Queen’s Club and he battled past Elias Ymer 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 on Tuesday in SW19.
As for Norrie, he is going in the other direction. The 28-year-old was as high as No. 8 in the world (September of 2022) due primarily to the 2021 Indian Wells title and a semifinal run at Wimbledon in 2022, but he is now down at No. 42. Norrie won just his 15th match of 2024 by beating inexperienced grass-court player Facundo Diaz Acosta 7-5, 7-5, 6-3 in round one at the All-England Club. The draw suddenly gets much more difficult against his fellow lefty–probably too difficult, in fact.
Pick: Draper in 3
(7) Hubert Hurkacz vs. Arthur Fils
Hurkacz has played well at Wimbledon in the past, to put it mildly. The current world No. 7 beat Roger Federer in the Swiss legend’s last match to reach the semifinals in 2021 and he tested Novak Djokovic in four extremely competitive sets in the 2023 fourth round. Hurkacz could be poised to make even more noise in this trip to London. So far in 2024 he is 34-13 with a recent runner-up showing in Halle and a mostly routine four-set win over Radu Albot on Tuesday.
Up next for Hurkacz is a first-ever encounter with Fils. This is matchup we could see in the business end of Grand Slams for years to come, but for now Fils is unseeded (just barely at No. 34 in the world). The 20-year-old Frenchman has earned 17 tour-level victories this season, including a four-set defeat of fellow NextGen star Dominic Stricker in the first round on Tuesday. Fils is quickly learning how to play on grass in the nascent stages of his career, but at the moment he remains more comfortable on clay. And he would obviously prefer to face Hurkacz on anything except grass.
Pick: Hurkacz in 3
Ricky contributes to 10sballs.com and also maintains his own tennis website, The Grandstand. You can follow him on Twitter at @Dimonator.
