French Open 2020: Thiem, Cilic, Murray, Wawrinka - Early meetings of the major winners
The draw for the 2020 French Open brought top matches between former and reigning major winners in round one: Dominic Thiem meets Marin Cilic , Andy Murray takes on Stan Wawrinka .
by Jens Huiber
last edit: Sep 26, 2020, 02:23 pm
The list of those men who have won a Grand Slam tournament since 2009 and who are not named Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic is honestly short: there are only five names on it, starting with Juan Martin del Potro through Andy Murray, Stan Wawrinka, Marin Cilic and recently also Dominic Thiem. Del Potro is curing an injury again and will be absent from the 2020 French Open. It is all the more remarkable, however, that the draw brought together the other four major champions apart from the big three in round one.
First there are Murray and Wawrinka, who have already played against each other 20 times (the Scot leads on the balance sheet with 12: 8 wins). Exact information about the respective constitution is difficult to make, although Wawrinka won the first ATP Challenger in Prague, not without effort, but already in round one against Lorenzo Musetti in Rome he left the Foro Italico rather informally.
Murray and Wawrinka in the final in Antwerp
Andy Murray, on the other hand, comes to Roland Garros on ashes with no match practice. At the US Open, the Brit just barely won a marathon against Yoshihito Nishioka in round one, after which there was nothing to gain against Félix Auger-Aliassime. Murray has renounced the tournaments in Rome and Hamburg. The most recent meeting between Murray and Wawrinka was a memorable one, even if it “only” happened in the final of the ATP Tour 250 tournament in Antwerp last autumn.
At that time Andy Murray was able to get his first tournament victory after his hip surgery.
The two veterans clashed in Paris in 2016 and 2017, each in the semifinals. Andy Murray still has fresh memories of the match three and a half years ago, which lasted five sets and lasted significantly longer than four and a half hours. Especially since he sees this game as the beginning of the end of his hip, as he posted on Instagram.
Thiem against Cilic at the US Open
Dominic Thiem and Marin Cilic, on the other hand, do not have to look back long on their last meeting. At the US Open it was in round three, where Thiem won the first two sets without any problems, but had to fend off some chances of his opponent after losing the third in the fourth. Not much can be said about the current clay court shape of these two. Even though Thiem noted after his triumph in New York City that returning to Ashes was always very easy for him.
Thiem and Cilic have played against each other three times - the 2014 US Open champion is still waiting for his first win. So far there has been no comparison on sand, especially not so late in the tennis year. But that is also one of the unknowns at the French Open 2020: That the third and last major of the Corona year can become an indoor tournament for some players. With the new roof over the Court Philippe-Chatrier.
Here the single tableau in Paris
rg2020