2019 French Open Quarter Final: Roger Federer vs Stan Wawrinka, Preview and Prediction

The two of the best male tennis players that Switzerland has produced – Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka will lock horns in a blockbuster quarterfinal match at the 2019 French Open.

The two have played each other twenty five times so far in a rivalry that has been heavily dominated by Federer who has lost only three of those matches. However, their rivalry on clay has been much more even.

The two have played seven times on clay and Stan has been able to snatch three wins. He may not have won a single match on other surfaces in eighteen attempts, but on clay he is almost an equal to the great Federer.

What will give Stan even more self-belief and confidence going into this match is that his last win over Federer came at the same venue and at the same stage – the 2015 French Open quarter finals, during his epic run to an unlikely French Open title, where he defeated Novak Djokovic in the finals.

After a long and laborious journey back from injury, Stan has looked closer to his fighting best in this tournament. He is one of those rare players who elevates his game on the biggest stage, i.e. the grand slams and his much better grand slam record in comparison to his performance at the Masters level is a testimony to that.

He has had two solid wins in his last two matches, a three-set win against Grigor Dimitrov in the third round where all the sets were decided in tie-breaks and a five-set thriller against Stefanos Tsitsipas. In both the matches, he managed to raise his game to win the important points. Against the Greek, he actually won twelve points less on return games and one point less, overall.

He will have to bring his big match mentality to the match against Federer who has looked extremely solid so far. He has won all his matches so far in straight sets. His dominance can be gauged from the fact that he has broken his opponents a whopping eighteen times while being broken only twice himself.

However, unlike Stan, Federer has not yet played a single seeded player and this sudden rise in the quality of his next opponent may put him off balance. If Stan can manage to hold off Federer early in the match, he will certainly be in with a chance. The longer the match goes, the better the chances of Stan.

Prediction: Roger Federer to win in Four Sets