Still alive

Wawrinka is immortal—at 40 and with no real preparation for this tournament, he put on a first-round masterclass, completely demoralizing Kecmanovic!

One of Wawrinka’s best matches in a long time, it was cleannnnnn. Stan just showed that indoors he still has the level to be a factor on the main tour; he’s dipping less physically and with his firepower he can set a heavy pace. It’s super reassuring for the end of the year but also for next season—if he keeps working hard and having fun on court, then why stop now when he’s still capable of matches like this? In any case, he’s loving it at home and even more so at the tail end of his career; he wants to enjoy it, and now that the first round is out of the way he can play even more freely! He’ll be a threat in the next round, but unlucky for him he runs into Ruud, one of the hottest players on tour right now. The Norwegian got his confidence back in Stockholm and has kept rolling since. His first round here wasn’t easy against a LL and in conditions much faster than what we had in Sweden. He did his job perfectly by maintaining a serious level of play—once again this week it’ll take something big to knock him out, especially since I don’t find center court to be incredibly quick either. Their only meeting was right here three years ago, and honestly it’s hard to take much from that. Wawrinka won, and I’d say that’s logical indoors, but Ruud has improved a lot on this surface lately—he’s much better than before and with his current momentum he’s the clear favorite in this matchup. It would take a prime Stan and an off day from Ruud to see the Norwegian lose this one.