Honestly, I almost feel obliged to try something on the Russian given the level of play he has been displaying since the start of this fortnight.
Match after match, Safiullin continues to gain momentum. Coming from the qualifiers, he is now perfectly settled into his tournament.
Some may see it as fatigue, personally, I see it as a huge amount of confidence and references that few players still possess at this stage of the competition.
His last match against João Fonseca actually completely reassured me physically, despite the intensity of the match, he continued to move very well until the last point.
What I like most is his serve level, since the start of Wimbledon, he is turning at 77% of points won behind his first serve and 58% behind his second.
Statistics very close to those displayed by Novak Djokovic in this first week.
With such quality behind his serve, I see him largely capable of staying in touch for a good part of the match.
Of course, Djokovic remains the logical favorite, he is also having an excellent tournament and seems particularly focused on his goal.
On grass, his experience remains incomparable but at 39, I still have the feeling that he experiences more lulls than before.
His third round against Arthur Rinderknech is a good example. After completely controlling the first two sets, he concedes the third set 6-1 before regaining control.
In the first round, he had also left a set to Yibing Wu, this shows that he is no longer totally impervious to small drops in intensity.
For his part, Safiullin has exactly the profile to take advantage of it, so
