Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray to play opening round on Monday – Wimbledon Championships 2011
Third Grand Slam tournament of the year, the Wimbledon Championships kick off with the top ranked players into action on the very first day at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in Wimbledon, London, England.
World number one Rafael Nadal of Spain will feature in the opening match on Monday afternoon, taking on the unseeded Michael Russell from the United States in the first round clash.
The top seed Nadal has been in tremendous form during his French Open campaign, bagging the sixth Roland Garros title of his career a couple of weeks ago. His French Open title victory over his arch rival, the third seed Roger
Federer of Switzerland, depicts the sublime form of the defending champion and makes him the strongest contender for winning the Wimbledon title for the third time.
The invincible Spaniard will play his first round match against Russell, who is currently ranked as number 90 in ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) World Rankings. Many tennis fans anticipate it as a one-sided affair between
the top seed and the 90th ranked player, clearly citing Rafa to be the favourite for winning the match. However, the game of tennis might be very surprising at times and huge names have fallen to relatively unknown players at many occasions.
Although Russell might not be a tough match Nadal, the defending champion must not get lose in the contest and play his quality tennis to get ready for the forthcoming big matches. Russell will have to come up with something extraordinary
if he wishes to take down the world number player in his Monday’s match.
Nadal tends to be a bit sloppy at the start of his matches and this could be the only opportunity Russell might exploit to put up some decent fight against the world number one. Nevertheless, it should not be a difficult task for
Nadal to take down the unseeded competitor in the opening round.
World number four, Andy Murray of Great Britain, also plays his opening match of the Wimbledon Championships on Monday, taking on the world number 59, Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain. Once again the fourth seed is deemed to be the
favourite for winning the competition with ease, as his recent performance at Roland Garros suggests.
Murray was among the last four competitors at the French Open, losing to Nadal in the semi-final and is among one of the strongest contenders in Wimbledon. He has already defeated Gimeno-Traver in their prior encounter, which took
place at Valencia in 2009, with the Briton winning in straight sets 6-3, 6-1, in the round of 32. Murray will certainly like to replicate the similar feat on Monday when he faces the Spanish opponent on the grass court for the first time.
Gimeno-Traver has won only six of the 24 matches he played this ATP season and his low winning ratio certainly depicts the poor form he has been throughout the year. Murray needs to play his regular game, without taking many risks
against the low-profile Spaniard in the opening round match and it should be enough to take down his opponent.
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