aldeayeah
G.O.A.T.
So. On paper this is a no-brainer; Kukushkin had won a single match on grass in his whole career before this tournament, and he's spent long stretches of the last few years playing challengers (although, to his credit, he's won quite a few of them); his career high ranking being around #50 (which he's reached several times, curiously).
His best results have come indoors, where he scored his single tournament win and top 10 win against Youzhny back in Moscow 2009. He made the final again last year, falling to Gasquet in 3 sets.
He also made a rather impressive run in AO 2012, upsetting GGL, Troicki and Monfils before retiring against Murray.
But here he is, in third round, after two victories in straight sets against Sela (who's not having his best year) and lucky loser Dancevic (who ousted Karlovic), in two matches I'm not sure anyone in this boards has seen (were they even televised?). According to the statistics, he returned well, saved lots of BPs, made few errors and didn't play many net points.
On the other side, we have Nadal who has shown a few glimpses of his best grass game in the Rosol match and who's probably starting to feel confident.
Anything but Nadal in 3 would be a surprise; but it's still the first week of Wimbledon, so who knows. If they schedule this in Centre Court and the conditions are right (closed roof, etc), things could get interesting.
Certainly, Kukushkin has nothing to lose; I expect him to play freely, with abandon, trying to reenact the aggressive game play that has proven effective against Nadal.
H2H Nadal 2-0 Kukushkin
2012 Monte Carlo R16 Nadal d. Kukushkin 6-1 6-1
2010 Bangkok QF Nadal d. Kukushkin 6-2 6-3
His best results have come indoors, where he scored his single tournament win and top 10 win against Youzhny back in Moscow 2009. He made the final again last year, falling to Gasquet in 3 sets.
He also made a rather impressive run in AO 2012, upsetting GGL, Troicki and Monfils before retiring against Murray.
But here he is, in third round, after two victories in straight sets against Sela (who's not having his best year) and lucky loser Dancevic (who ousted Karlovic), in two matches I'm not sure anyone in this boards has seen (were they even televised?). According to the statistics, he returned well, saved lots of BPs, made few errors and didn't play many net points.
On the other side, we have Nadal who has shown a few glimpses of his best grass game in the Rosol match and who's probably starting to feel confident.
Anything but Nadal in 3 would be a surprise; but it's still the first week of Wimbledon, so who knows. If they schedule this in Centre Court and the conditions are right (closed roof, etc), things could get interesting.
Certainly, Kukushkin has nothing to lose; I expect him to play freely, with abandon, trying to reenact the aggressive game play that has proven effective against Nadal.
H2H Nadal 2-0 Kukushkin
2012 Monte Carlo R16 Nadal d. Kukushkin 6-1 6-1
2010 Bangkok QF Nadal d. Kukushkin 6-2 6-3
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