ATP Eastbourne Preview

EASTBOURNE: NOTABLES & TRENDS

*It’s a new era in Eastbourne as Mektic-Pavic are not back trying for a four-peat. The Croatians had dominated this event since 2021 with three straight championship runs during their usual domination of the grass court swing. Last year, Mektic-Pavic won the title match as 1.76 (-132) favorites over Dodig-Krajicek. Each of their three title matches from 2021-2023 went down in straight sets. 2019 was the last time that Eastbourne required a super tie break finish.

*The last underdog champion here came in 2018 when Bambridge-O’Mara knocked off the Skupski brothers as 2.43 (+143) dogs. That also marked the last time that an unseeded pair won the titles in Eastbourne. Since 2018, there has only been one unseeded pair involved in the final.

*Underdogs scored just two wins here a year ago. The biggest hit of those two came at 2.84 (+184) in round two when Arneodo-Weissborn edged Glasspool-Mahut. It’s been fairly consistent the last three years to see only a few underdog wins with just seven in the last 44 completed matches. The largest hit came in 2022 during Middelkoop-Saville’s unseeded run to the final. They hit at 3.52 (+252) when they upset (2)Cabal-Farah in the opening round and followed up with a 2.85 (+185) win over (4)Dodig-Krajicek in the semifinals.

*As you might expect with the information laid out so far, seeds have done well in Eastbourne of late. Only four seeds have lost in the first round here since 2018. Seeds have also accounted for 12 of the last 16 semifinal spots in Eastbourne over the last four runs of this tournament. There’s a little more depth to this year’s field on paper at least, so we’ll see if that trend continues.

*Super tie breaks were needed in six of the 15 matches in 2023. Four of those came in the opening round. There have been at least two super tie breaks in the first round each year since this event returned to Eastbourne in 2017 after a two-year absence. One place to focus if you’re hunting for these is the semifinals. Five of the last eight semifinals have needed a super tie break.

*The red hot French Open champions Arevalo-Pavic are ones to keep watching this week. They’ve now won 14 straight and 19 of their last 20 overall. Pavic obviously has a great history at this event when he was paired with Mektic, so he’s used to dominating on grass and it appears it’s continuing with his new partner.

SINGLES MINGLE

It’s the week prior to a Grand Slam, so that means the “singles pairs” are probably less likely to do as much damage as they might in another week. The singles players who do choose double duty are a bit more evenly spread out through the rankings, rather than seeing more top tier guys involved like Fritz-Khachanov last week at Queen’s Club. Here’s a look at the few involved this week in Eastbourne:

Cerundolo-Etcheverry
These guys seem to play most weeks, don’t they? I talked about them last week in the Queen’s Club preview to say their success and competitiveness on anything other than clay has not been great. That held up as they dropped their opener to Fritz-Khachanov in straight sets. It marked the fourth time in five tournaments played in 2024 that they’ve lost in the opening round.

Broady-Harris
A pair of singles wild cards are teaming up with this all-British duo. Billy Harris got a lot of press last week during his unexpected quarterfinal run in singles at Queen’s Club. As far as doubles he’s been a pretty regular player with 14 total matches, all Challengers, in 2024. Success has been fleeting though with seven straight losses. Broady has missed a lot of time due to injury this year and as a result has played just a single doubles match. He did have a good run last Summer with Jonny O’Mara on grass, winning the Surbiton Challenger and making the Nottingham Challenger final. They also scored a win in Eastbourne last year. It’s probably a tough ask for wins with this duo playing the first time in addition to Broady’s lack of match play (hasn’t played since March).

Baez-Navone
This winds up being a pair of singles seeds playing doubles for the first time together. Baez hasn’t found much success in doubles with a 7-19 record over the past two seasons. He’s 0-4 in his career on grass. Navone is just 4-12 in doubles since the start of 2023 and has never played a doubles match on grass. I am not expecting much out of these two.

Purcell-Ruusuvuori
Purcell is participating in the final round of qualifying today, so it’s possible both players here will be pulling double duty. We know Purcell has been great alongside Jordan Thompson this year, but it’s been a struggle without his fellow Aussie as his partner. He’s 21-4 with Thompson, but just 2-3 with other partners. Ruusuvuori hasn’t played a ton of doubles, but he’s won five of six matches in 2024. This will be their first time pairing up and it’s a rough draw against the top seeds Ram-Salisbury for them to start.

SEEDS: ONE AND DONE WATCH (First Match Upset Watch)

(3)Ebden-Peers
The Aussies have only played a half dozen times together and this will be the first since 2022, when they did make the final indoors in Napoli. They draw Mahut-Mansouri in round one. Mahut has been left in nomad mode after Roger-Vasselin split with him to pair back with Santiago Gonzalez. Mansouri will be Mahut’s fourth different partner since the split. It’s been a sluggish year for Mahut at 10-10 overall, but he’s usually a threat on grass no matter the partner. Mansouri has done most of his work with Luke Johnson at the Challenger level this year to good success with four titles. This could be a tricky duo if they find some chemistry.

(4)Venus-Skupski
The four seeds are playing in the Queen’s Club final today at the time of this writing, so they’ll come in with good form regardless of Sunday’s outcome. The draw however, is not kind as they’ll square off against Matos-Melo to open. The Brazilians put it all together in Stuttgart in a title run to grab four of their five wins on the season in limited action. A good thing to note for them – they played three super tie breaks in their four match streak in Germany. I’d expect them to be highly competitive in this one and it really shapes up as a 50-50 call.

DRAW PREVIEW

TOP HALF

Ram-Salisbury have a good history in Eastbourne, making the final in their 2021 debut here and getting to the semifinals last year. They come off a split of two matches at Queen’s Club last week, where they lost to Venus-Skupski in the quarters. It’s a fairly nice draw for them with first timers Purcell-Ruusuvuori to start. Experience as regular partners should help the top seeds in that one. The team to watch in this quarter is Heliovaara-Patten. They pair for the first time since the French Open, when they were forced out due to a shoulder injury to Heliovaara. Prior to that injury, they were one of the hottest teams on tour with wins in 21 of 24 matches during the clay swing. Certainly it’s a bit wait and see on how Heliovaara looks after the layoff, but he sounded optimistic about his fitness level at this point. Getting the inexperienced Brit pair Broom-Fery should help. While the Brits have both played doubles plenty in their young careers, most of that work has come at Challengers and Futures events. If Heliovaara is healthy, I think they move on and are a threat to come out of this quarter.

The second quarter sees Ebden-Peers as the seeds. It’s an interesting quarter with the Aussies as the “experience” with half a dozen matches together under their belts compared to none for the other three pairs. Mahut-Mansouri I do like and if they have an instant connection, they could be a dark horse in this section. I highlighted the British wild cards Broady-Harris earlier as they clash with Americans Krajicek-McDonald. That’s a team that interests me. McDonald doesn’t get much mention for his doubles work, but he’s usually fairly competent. He teamed with Hijikata in Hertogenbosch earlier in the swing with a win and a loss, both in super tie breaks. Krajicek has seen some action outside of the Dodig partnership this year, teaming with Ram a couple times and Skupski once. He’s 1-2 in those matches, but all three did go the distance. I think every team outside of maybe the Brits has a realistic shot here depending on what level they can find together. I’d keep my eyes mainly on who comes out of that Ebden Peers versus Mahut-Mansouri battle as the team to beat.

BOTTOM HALF

The third quarter should fall to the winner of the opening round blockbuster between Venus-Skupski and Matos-Melo. Those two clearly have an edge over the other two duos on this surface right now. I’d keep Venus-Skupski atop the list as the favorites with the way they served this past week at Queen’s Club. While Matos-Melo certainly showed the ability to win on grass, playing all of those super tie breaks shows that their margins may be a little thin. The other match in this quarter features two first time pairs. Cornea and Nedovyesov have the doubles experience edge. Cornea paired with Zhang in Stuttgart earlier in this swing and grabbed a win. Nedovyesov came through qualifying in Halle with Pedro Martinez, but lost in the opening round. He had some success with Escobar last year on grass at the Challenger level. I give them that edge against the Argentine duo, who have less doubles time and of course would probably fare better on clay.

The final quarter houses Arevalo-Pavic who saw their lengthy win streak end last week at Queen’s Club in the semifinals. The French Open champions did look comfortable on grass though, beating two good teams in Cash-Galloway and Koolhof-Mektic. Their opener certainly is winnable before what shapes up to be a quality quarterfinal. That comes against Glasspool-Rojer or Nys-Zielinski. Nys-Zielinski have won the first two battles between the teams in 2024, one on hard courts and one on clay. Glasspool-Rojer remain inconsistent at 16-16 overall for the season and 0-2 on grass so far. Both were competitive losses in Germany to Hanfmann-Koepfer and Krawietz-Puetz the last two weeks. Nys-Zielinski split a pair in Halle, losing to Hanfmann-Koepfer as well. They’ve been decent on grass, but have had trouble putting close matches in the win column: they’re 0-4 on grass in super tie breaks. I’ll stick with Arevalo-Pavic here, but do think that they’ll be pushed in the quarters. Glasspool-Rojer would be my dark horse pick in this quarter.

THE PIG’S DRAW PROJECTION

Q1 QF: (1)Ram-Salisbury vs Heliovaara-Patten
Q2 QF: Mahut-Mansouri vs Krajicek-McDonald
Q3 QF: Cornea-Nedovyesov vs (4)Venus-Skupski
Q4 QF: Glasspool-Rojer vs (2)Arevalo-Pavic

PIGPIX

Ram-Salisbury
Venus-Skupski

LAST WEEK’S PIGPIX