Fifth seeded Andrey Rublev will face 26th seed Fabio Fognini in the Third Round of the 2021 Wimbledon Championships. The match is scheduled to be played on Friday July 2nd, 2021 at a time yet to be determined.
An exciting match is expected between two stars of the ATP Tour, fifth seeded Russian Andrey Rublev and Fabio Fognini of Italy who is the 26th seed. Both men play a very flashy and attacking brand of tennis, and where they are, exciting tennis is sure to follow. This is not a match that tennis fans will want to miss, who will get the win and advance to the Round of 16?
Andrey Rublev has been one of the surprise packages of the ATP Tour in recent years, winning a host of titles and breaking into the top 10 for the first time. While he has dominated the lower ATP-500 events he is yet to truly breakthrough at a major but based on his play so far this might be the year. After surprisingly dropping the first set in his match against Federico Delbonis, he has been dominant, rushing through the next three sets in that match before crushing Lloyd Harris in straight sets. Harris was expected to cause the Russian some problems, so he clearly is in some serious form. With his big serve and pounding groundstrokes he can be a major threat on this surface, and he enters this match against Fabio Fognini as the favorite to advance.
Fabio Fognini is a former top 10 player who currently finds himself outside of the top 25. Seeded 26th here at the 2021 Wimbledon Championships he also has been impressive, advancing to the Third Round for the loss of only one set. He is yet to be truly tested here however, and has only faced clay court players Laslo Djere and Albert Ramos-Vinolas up to this point. His next test will be his biggest, and he is the clear underdog here against the in-form Andrey Rublev. Fognini is very talented and experienced, but has traditionally struggled on grass and likely will find it difficult to cope with the Russian’s power.
This has the makings of a very exciting match, with lots of flashy and aggressive tennis. However, there will only be one winner here and that will be Andrey Rublev. He simply has too much power, and should dominate the talented Italian on these faster courts. Fognini is good enough to keep it interesting for a while, but he likely will get frustrated with the surface. Andrey Rublev will win and advance to the Round of 16 here at Wimbledon for the first time.