We are now in the final stages of this the Roland Garros 2022, a tournament that, especially in the men’s draw, has given numerous surprises. Today the semifinals of the men’s tournament will be played and four are left to fight for the final victory.
The big favorite can only be the thirteen-time champion here in Paris, the clay court king Rafael Nadal. The Majorcan wants to continue his path after the victory in Australia and maybe get his twenty-second Grand Slam title, even further detaching the two great rivals, Roger Federer and world number one Novak Djokovic, both at 20.
The Serbian champion is the great loser of this tournament, eliminated in the semifinals and on one of the rare occasions, as a favorite, in the match against his great rival in the quarter-finals of the tournament. If it is not a surprise to see Rafa in the semifinals in Paris, the draw sees three other, in some ways surprising names.
The curious fact concerning Rafa Nadal
In addition to Nadal there is world number three Alexander Zverev. The German tennis player is one of the strongest in the world but here in Paris he was among the least expected and no one expected him to win in the quarters over world tennis prodigy Carlos Alcaraz.
On the other side of thedraw the names are even more surprising and they are two outsiders in the semifinals of the Roland Garros. Croatian Marin Cilic is a Grand Slam champion but has always given his best on surfaces such as concrete and grass and at almost 34 years no one expected to see him at this point in the tournament.
Less surprise but still a debut the semifinal of the Norwegian Casper Ruud. The Top Ten is now an outsider in all tournaments and on clay is immediately behind the big names: the fairly easy draw has also helped his rise and now Casper has a big chance.
All these tennis players have one thing in common: Ruud, Cilic and Zverev were number one in the world, as well as Casper Rune and Andrey Rublev who came out of the quarters, the only one who has never achieved this result is the most successful tennis player in history, strange to say but Rafael Nadal has never been number one at the junior level.