WIMBLEDON: Simona Halep - Madison Keys
Keys has been taken to three sets in her last two wins (Kirsten Flipkens/ Alize Cornet), but ran away with the decider in each, never really looked in any trouble, has been serving big and hitting an enormous amount of winners and looks to have made a lot of progress in the mental side of her game. She is taking a little more time before the big points and composing herself and she has clearly made some progress already under Thomas Hogstedt and his influence should really be seen in the bigger tactical battles which are more likely to come this week and hopefully he can get her to just play a shot or two more on occasion, before going for the "winner".
Simona Halep's record at Wimbledon is quite poor and this is just the second time in seven visits that she has made it beyond R2, there was a run to the semis in breakthrough year of 2014 and she only really beat one player really comfortable on the surface in that run and has not met anyone who could do much damage to her this year, today will be a real test. Halep is 3-6 on grass against taller players ranked inside the top 50 and is 6-7 against top 100. Keys has won 13 matches in a row against players who are under 1.68m, which is exactly Haleps height, but it does mean she matches up well against shorter players and she is 13-2 on grass v all shorter players with the two defeats coming against Radwanska and going to three very close sets and Keys is a much better all round player now, than when she played those.
Madison Keys -1.5 games 1.97 Pinnacle Sports/ Sportmarket Pro
Keys has been taken to three sets in her last two wins (Kirsten Flipkens/ Alize Cornet), but ran away with the decider in each, never really looked in any trouble, has been serving big and hitting an enormous amount of winners and looks to have made a lot of progress in the mental side of her game. She is taking a little more time before the big points and composing herself and she has clearly made some progress already under Thomas Hogstedt and his influence should really be seen in the bigger tactical battles which are more likely to come this week and hopefully he can get her to just play a shot or two more on occasion, before going for the "winner".
Simona Halep's record at Wimbledon is quite poor and this is just the second time in seven visits that she has made it beyond R2, there was a run to the semis in breakthrough year of 2014 and she only really beat one player really comfortable on the surface in that run and has not met anyone who could do much damage to her this year, today will be a real test. Halep is 3-6 on grass against taller players ranked inside the top 50 and is 6-7 against top 100. Keys has won 13 matches in a row against players who are under 1.68m, which is exactly Haleps height, but it does mean she matches up well against shorter players and she is 13-2 on grass v all shorter players with the two defeats coming against Radwanska and going to three very close sets and Keys is a much better all round player now, than when she played those.
Madison Keys -1.5 games 1.97 Pinnacle Sports/ Sportmarket Pro
