Sam Querrey vs Thomas Fabbiano ATP Picks & Predictions - 6/28/2019

Sam Querrey vs Thomas Fabbiano

5 am EST, 28th June 2019

ATP Eastbourne, England

Grass courts

It didn't take long for Sam Querrey to shake off the rust after a 2-month absence from tennis courts and get into his 3rd semifinal of the season. Fact that this tournament is played on grass courts is a big reason why he managed to get back on track very quickly and win 3 matches in a row. He loves to play on this surface, holding a 60-36 record and a title from Queen's club couple years back. Rolled through first two rounds without any problems, getting past Mikail Kukushkin (in very poor form) and Dusan Lajovic (poor form and not being a grass court lover). Had a way more competitive match in quarterfinals against Fernando Verdasco. The first set was full of quality exchanges from the baseline. Spaniard was testing Querrey and maybe even held a slightly better chance to take the opener. But unfortunately for Nando, everything went downhill after missing an easy forehand being 4-1 up in the tie-breaker. He lost 6 points in the row and the set. Failed to recover mentally to stay in the game during the second set. Querrey scored "only" 7 aces, which is not that much for his standards. But still had a very solid serving performance, with 0 double faults and winning 82% of the points behind his serve.

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Similar to the first semifinal in Antalya, we have a first-time semifinalist in Eastbourne as well. 30-year old Italian Thomas Fabbiano is playing the best tennis of his career at the moment. After winning 2 matches in the qualifying, he went on and added 3 more in the main draw. And we can't say that he was helped by the draw. In the first round, he fought back from a set down against grass court specialist and a home crowd favorite - James Ward. After that, he eliminated No. 2 seed Laslo Djere. Although Serbian is not a big fan of grass courts, he's still a very good player overall and a tough competitor. Gilles Simon was the biggest name on his path to his semifinal appearance, but it turned out that was the easiest match so far because Fabbiano won comfortably in straight sets. Frenchman was probably a bit tired after playing finals in London last week and was feeling some fatigue this week. But Thomas still deserves credit for his performance, where he was striking the ball on a high level, forcing Simon to scramble all the time.

Matchup

And although his groundstrokes were the main building block for his success this week, there are other elements in his game that are working really well at the moment. He is moving very well, which is not something that can be taken for granted on grass courts. Playing good tennis and winning matches, raised his confidence, and he became more creative with his point construction. He is using a variety of shots and playing with more flair now. He already played Querrey on the grass. It happened at Wimbledon in 2017, when he lost in straight sets. But back then, he was definitely not the player he is today. For a smaller guy like Thomas, there is always a chance of being overpowered by a heavy hitter like Querrey. But I'm pretty sure he's not going in there to trade power punches with the American. He is playing smarter at the moment and knows how to construct the point, move the big guy around the court and get him off his spot.

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Betting odds & prediction

Betting market is obviously not impressed with all that Fabbiano managed to achieve this week, being priced at +353 to win this match. There is definitely some value with the underdog in this match, but the way to make the most out of it in this spot is to bet the over, in my opinion. Reasons for that is because this is the biggest match of Fabbiano's career. If he's going to perform on the same level as earlier in this tournament, there is no doubt he can stay close in this one. But whether he can win or not will be decided in a couple of key points, where he might be too nervous considering this will be his biggest opportunity so far.

Guy's Pick: over 22.5 games (+100)

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