"I’m not going to put my life savings against Rafa, but the deck is definitely stacked against him"- Kenny Ducey on Rafael Nadal's chances of winning at Wimbledon
Kenny Ducey, a sports betting analyst, believes that Rafael Nadal will struggle to win the 2022 Wimbledon Championships. Ducey added that although Nadal and players like him are anticipated to have an easy path to the title, it appears that this year's grasscourt Major will not follow that pattern.
The Spaniard, who is attempting to win a calendar Slam after his Australian Open and French Open victories, hasn't had the best start to his SW19 campaign. Nadal advanced to the third round at Wimbledon by defeating world No. 102 Ricardas Berankis in four sets.
It was by no means Nadal's most impressive performance, with his forehand not working in his favor. Moreover, the World No. 4 had to play both of his matches in four sets, having defeated Francisco Cerundolo on Tuesday.
In an interview with the Tennis Channel, Kenny Ducey spoke about Rafael Nadal's chances of winning a third title at Wimbledon by highlighting the difficulty of his draw.
"I’m not going to put my life savings against Rafa but I will continue to say that the deck is definitely stacked against him," said Ducey. "I just think he’s going to get batted and bruised along the way through this draw and like that’s just not something we normally say about the Nadals, the Federers, the Djokovics, we just usually expect them to come through without dropping a set pretty easily but yeah I mean I think we already the saw it and the more time on court, the worse for him."
Closing it out in style 😎
@RafaelNadal books his place in the third round with a 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 win over Ricardas Berankis
#Wimbledon | #CentreCourt100 https://t.co/jy0OEaHjeY
"The sheer amount of power that he’s gonna have to face, is gonna be so difficult"- Kenny Ducey on Rafael Nadal
Kenny Ducey continued by describing the challenging opposition Nadal will encounter if he advances to the quarterfinals. He claimed that Taylor Fritz has a good chance of facing the Spaniard there, and if that happens, Nadal might not be able to get past that obstacle.
"The top half of this quarter, there is going to be a good player coming out and playing Rafael Nadal assuming he gets to the quarter final, and it is going to be an American player which is very exciting," Ducey said. "You know you wanna talk about the proverbial favourite to get there would be Taylor Fritz and Taylor Fritz I mean he already has the win over Rafa."
"You know the foor will definitely be a factor there and that guy is just going to be absolutely relentless with that forehand, I mean the sheer amount of power that rafa’s gonna have to face, is gonna be so difficult," he added.
Rafael Nadal will take on Lorenzo Sonego in the third round in an effort to go further in Wimbledon's increasingly shaky draw. Initially, he was supposed to lock horns with Marin Cilic, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Matteo Berrettini all before the final.
However, he wouldn't have to contend with Cilic and Berrettini as they had to withdraw from SW19 due to COVID-19 while a significant upset ruled out Auger-Aliassime, who lost to serve-and-volley specialist Maxime Cressy in the first round.