Key events
It has indeed stopped raining! The covers are indeed coming off! Badabing!
Yup, we could indeed have guessed. Uchijima did well enough at the start, but down break point she again can’t find a first serve, a booming backhand return too nails for her to keep her riposte in court. Sabalenka leads 6-2.
The weather, by the way, is absolutely minging … or at least it was! I wasn’t expecting this, but there are men sweeping water off covers and no brollies up, so perhaps it’s stopoped.
On Chatrier, Rus and Rybakina are knocking up.
Sabalenka is targeting Uchijima’s forehand now, raising break point at advantage before crushing a second serve return cross-court on the backhand. It’s taken her longer than expected, but she’s up 5-2 and we can probably guess how this is goig to proceed from here.
Uchijima is doing well against Sabalenka though struggling to handle the power; they’re level at 2-2. So a question: does the world number two hit the ball harder than any woman in history? I don’t think I’ve seen anything comparable.
Dayana Yastremska (30) beats Yifan Wang 6-2 6-0
She meets Coco Gauff next.
I guess we should round up the matches that have been suspended:
Men
Hurkacz (8) 6-7 6-1 1-1 Nakashima
Marozsan 0-6 3-5 Dimitrov (10)
Muller 4-6 1-6 2-0 Arnaldi
Ofner 3-2 1-2 Baez (20)
Bergs 3-6 2-2 Marterer
Squire 4-6 1-2 Auger Ailassime (21)
Korda (27) 6-4 6-4 1-3 kwon
Women
Siniakova (32) 6-3 2-1 Paquet
Wang 7-5 1-0 Tomova
Badosa 4-6 2-0 Putintseva
Vekic 7-5 Kostyuk (18)
Next on Lenglen: Arantxa Rus v Elena Rybakina (4).
Tiafoe and Shapovalov are playing a first-set breaker, level at 3-3 … and here comes the rain; off they go. Absolute sake.
Daniil Medvedev (5) beats Miomir Kecmanovic 6-1 5-0 retired
Ah that’s a shame, but that match was only going one way. He meets Navone (31) or Mahac next.
Auger-Aliassime is a set to the good, leading Squire 6-4 1-0; Yastremska leads Wang 6-2 5-0; Korda leads Kwon 6-4 6-4 1-2; Putintseva leads Badosa 6-4 0-1; and Arnaldi leads Muller 6-4 6-1 2-0.
Shapovalov and Tiafoe are locked at 5-5 in the first while, on Chatrier, Sabalenka and Uchijima are knocking up.
Hubie levels his match with Nakashima at a set apiece, serving out for 6-7 6-1, while Kecmanovic summons the trainer; er yeah mate, I’m that’ll sort this.
Shapovalov saves four break points to hold for 4-3 against Tiafoe, while Kecmanovic eventually finishes a 27-shot rally to regain deuce serving at 1-6 0-2 – though not without Medvedev returning all sorts of balls first. And it’s no great surprise when a succession of booming grondstrokes secure the double break; this is no kind of contest.
Goodish news as regards the weather: where first thing this morning, the thunder and lightning was due to start at 11am, that’s now been bumped to 2pm.
I’m certain it’ll be clipped up before long, so hopefully I’ll get to stick it up, but Hurkacz has just played a tweener lob. In fairness, Nakashia ought still to have put away the overhead, but perhaops the element of surprise befuddled him.
Hurkacz is giving Nakashima a going-over in set two, 5-0 up in no time at all, while Medvedev quickly raises three break points; Kecmanovic doesn’t move as well as him and can’t find the angles to trouble him. He does, though, close to 40-30, only for Medvedev to eventually find his length in the next rally, opening space to pound a forehand down the line. He leads 6-1 1-0 with a break.
Medvedev serves out easily for a 6-1 set. Kecmanovic has some thinking to do.
Griggzy Dimitrov has bagelled Fábián Marozsán in the first set of their match; Shapovalov and Tiafoe are 2-2; Siniakova leads Paquet 3-2 with a break; Arnaldi, who’s a prospect, leads Muller 6-4 3-1; Potapova leads Golubic 6-2; Badosa leads Putintseva 5-2; Fernandez leads Wang 5-3; Auger-Aliassime leads Squire 3-2; Vekic leads Kostyuk 5-1; and Korda leads Kwon 6-4 3-4.
Medvedev, having consolidated, absolutely spanks a forehand down the line from way out of court – that seemed to gather pace as it travelled, not unlike the below free-kick. We wind up at deuce, and after Medvedev makes advantage, he chops a delicious drop for 5-1 and the double break!
I’ll never tire of calling Hubie “Hubie”, and he breaks Nakashima at the first time of asking in set two only to find himself down 0-40 in no time; as it has so many times, his serve gets him out of trouble. He makes deuce then rushes through advantage to trail 6-7 3-0.
Up 2-1, Medvedev gets 0-30 on the Kecmanovic serve, and though it’s soon 30-all, a big inside-out forehand into the corner raises break point. And a decent return of a big first serve entices the Serb to go for a shot that’s not really there, a backhand down the line, and it’s wide by a fair bit. Medvedev leads 3-1.
And Nakashima quickly secures the first set so, as in round one, the number eight seed must come from behind if he’s to win.
Hubie Hurkacz is in a spot of bother. Having held to force a breaker against Nakashima, he’s now 5-1 down in it.
Just for the record, I know I’m majoring on three matches in the men’s competition – that’s not deliberate or desired, it’s just the best we’ve got first up.
We’re away on Lenglen, and Calv Betton, our resident coach, messages with his expectations: “There won’t be many volleys, variation or winners and the rallies will be long. Could get tricky for Medvedev coz Kecmanovic won’t make loads of errors and that’s really Medvedev’s s only way of winning points if his serve doesn’t do it. But Kekmanovic is hard to read really. He can often be disinterested, but when he’s interested he’s hard as nails.”
Hmmm, our commentator just hoped we’d get through all our matches today; that’s not what the weather forecast proclaimed, but perhaps things have changed since earlier this morning. I hope so.
OK, it’s not raining; that’s a start. So I guess I’ll start off by watching Kecmanovic v Medvedev, Shapovalov v Tiafoe and Hurkacz v Nklashima.
Preamble
Salut tout le monde et bienvenue à Roland-Garros – jour cinq!
“Thanks” to the rain, there’s an absolutely indecent quantity of glorious tennis awaiting us today … except the likelihood is that we see almost none of it, because the likelihood also is that it’s going to rain almost all day once more.
For that reason I’m not entirely sure why, given the first hour of play might be dry, we’re not trying to finish matches which started yesterday, but by and large, we’re not. However, we do have the buzz of yesterday’s classic between Iga Swiatek and Naomi Osaka to sustain us, along with a full programme on our two covered courts.
So we’ll begin on Lenglen with Daniil Medvedev, still not loving clay, against Miomir Kecmanovic, good enough to give him trouble; and after that, we’re getting some Elena Rybakina, Alexander Zverev v David Goffin, and a bit of Madison Keys.
On Chatrier, meanwhile, Aryna Sbalenka opens up against the young Japanese, Moyuka Uchijima, after which Elina Svitolina takes on the dangerous Diane Parry and Novak Djokovic meets Roberto Carballes Baena. Or, in other words, it’s not what we came for … but it’s plenty.
Play: 11am local, 10am BST