TRACK FILS

“Fils is a real Sincaraz threat. No conversation about who may start challenging Sinner and Alcaraz in a more earnest way is complete without Arthur Fils. And it's because he matches those two in explosive athleticism. And I just don't really know who else you can say that about. Most guys, most top 100 pros, no matter what they do developmentally, they don't have a chance to be as good as Sinner and Alcaraz because either they don't hit hard enough or they don't move well enough. Fils is the closest thing.”

“And I think if you go back three years and watch Shelton's first steps on these clay courts as he was playing that swing, and then watch him in the Munich final and whole week this week, you will very obviously and very quickly see how much he has improved. He was all over the place on the clay. He didn't know how to move on it at all. He's such a good athlete, but normally, he's a great athlete moving in one direction, sprinting fast, on clay, you're constantly having to stop and change direction and be strong so as to withstand the sliding.”

“I feel like Goran Ivanovich is an ideal coach for this next stage of his career. The fact that, I mean, again, I always feel like I'm touching wood on his health because I can't believe this comeback. It's pretty unprecedented to come back and play like this, you know, consistently, but let's assume that that's in the past and that physically is okay. The next steps to be taken, he has the perfect guide in my view. Goran, by the way, believes that he was looking at a top 10 player in Hodar as well.”

“I'm not surprised. Because this is what he has done throughout his so far relatively young career. He's had some results that sort of make you scratch your head now that he's a bonafide, like, top ten player. Indian Wells, I know he was sick there. Miami's a head scratcher, right? Losing to Shevchenko in his first match.”

“Carlos Alcaraz is out of Madrid. Now, we knew this at the time that we recorded, I think, last Thursday, Matt, we're hearing rumblings coming out about this wrist injury being bad, being certainly more than just an excuse to pull out of an event. He didn't particularly want to play anyway, or that's too reductive. I'm sure we'd love to play, but perhaps didn't best suit a schedule tailored towards defending his role on Garros' title.”

“But I tell you, he's gonna be a French Open champion in the future, is Arthur Fils. Health permitting. It is health permitting. But I totally believe that the revs he's getting on that forehand with speed through the air. There's not really any other like that now, now that Nadal stopped. Get David on a French radio talk show, because I feel like Fils is really being talked about in France. There's like debate happening in France. Like, is he a potential threat to Sino and Alcares? Is he not?”

“You cannot properly credit Ben Shelton's serve for how good it is without talking about his second. Which, I believe, has become the best second serve in all of men's tennis. He is the leader right now, in 2026, on second serve win rate. In order, it's Shelton, Fils, Sinner, Alcaraz, Zverev. Historically, the players who have dominated that particular stat have just been the best baseliners. Shelton is pulling off an Isner right now. He is atop the leaderboard, and it is obviously because of the serve itself.”

“I think he's a top five guy. If he's healthy, the way he's played, the way he has proven to play in the past as well. You know, but it just scares you a little bit because of the back injury, right? He's just so young to have a back injury. So hopefully that's just a one off and he's good because again, like tennis is better when these young superstar guys like electric, great charisma on the court are out there playing.”

“Arthur Fils. Big event. Amanda is back, takes out Rublev in the final 6-2, 7-6. Stevie J, let me go to you. Second Frenchman to win Barcelona since his old French guy in 85, 41-year drought. Fils lit it up, though. The guy is back.”

“Rublev wasn't getting outmaneuvered. He was getting overpowered. It was striking how out of Rublev's hands this match seemed. And let's just remember who we're talking about here. Andre Rublev is typically thought of as a powerful player. He hits big off the ground. He did not look powerful next to Fils. He did not look dangerous offensively next to Fils. Serve damage came easier to the Frenchman. There was an 11 mile per hour advantage in first serve average speed and a 10% advantage in serves unreturned.”

“Marketa Vondrousova, the former Wimbledon champion, has been charged with refusing a doping test after what she calls an acute stress reaction. This from reporting by Charlie Echolchet in The Athletic. An ITIA spokesperson has confirmed to The Athletic that Vondrousova could face a ban of up to four years and that she's under investigation for an event which took place in December of last year. Vondrousova is free to play while under investigation. On Friday afternoon, she, Vondrousova, that is, issued a statement on Instagram detailing how a random visit from a doping control official caused an acute stress reaction.”

“How does clay hide Shelton's weaknesses? First off, it's easier for him to return serve. He's easily rushable on the return. He's worked very hard on abbreviated technique in order to improve on the return. But based on his numbers coming into this Munich final, that remains a work in progress. This week, he went to the back fence. The surface is obviously going to take speed off the ball. It's not going to punish negative court position as heavily. So Shelton took much fuller swings at the ball on the return because he had time to do so.”

“I was very unaware that there was potentially I had a membership. I've reached out. I'm in fact a member. I've already had someone this morning actually asked me to play the mixed doubles championships. There's a members party during the Queens Club that I'm not going to make. Unbelievable. I am in fact a member at Queens.”

“Loses in the quarterfinals of Houston as the number one seed. So he's not going into Munich with a lot of confidence or a lot like, like a lot of match wins recently. But he's done this in the past. Like, he doesn't necessarily need that. And all of a sudden he can pop these big results.”

“And Rybakina just continues to be in incredible form, doesn't she? This is now the first time she's won multiple titles somewhere. She has removed the Medvedev curse over her little collection of titles. She won this back in 2024, and she didn't play it last year. So she's on a real streak, actually, in Stuttgart. And those conditions, indoors, obviously we saw what she can do on an indoor hard court back in the WTA finals last year against the best players in the world.”

“Loses in the quarterfinals of Houston as the number one seed. So he's not going into Munich with a lot of confidence or a lot like, like a lot of match wins recently. But he's done this in the past. Like, he doesn't necessarily need that. And all of a sudden he can pop these big results.”

“Won by the top seed, Marta Kostyuk, following an all-Ukrainian final. She beat the 19-year-old qualifier, who quite frankly, I had not heard of before this week, Veronika Podrez, 6'3, 6'4, and had some incredibly powerful words to say after the match during the trophy presentation. She said, This match today was not just a match. It was a historical moment for Ukrainian tennis. The first time two Ukrainians play in a final. I know how much work, sacrifice, tears, and sweat goes into this sport, and to be able to be on this stage.”

“Yeah, and it got worse and worse as this match went on. You know, her first serve percentage just dropped in this match on, you know, by set. And you know, her first serve is not the most effective first serve anyway. So she kind of needs to be making a pretty high percentage to be able to get effect out of it. And then, as you said, the second serve is kind of sitting there and is very attackable right now. And I suppose the serve was an element that I wasn't expecting to have got better, to be honest.”

“I think he's a top five guy. If he's healthy, the way he's played, the way he has proven to play in the past as well. You know, but it just scares you a little bit because of the back injury, right? He's just so young to have a back injury. So hopefully that's just a one off and he's good because again, like tennis is better when these young superstar guys like electric, great charisma on the court are out there playing.”

“Yeah, she'd lost six times in a row to Goff. And she'd actually lost three times in a row to Svitolina. So to flip those head to heads around in consecutive matches, I agree with you, this does feel like a real step for Muchova. I talked on the pod on Thursday about some of those match up issues with Goff. Interestingly, we hadn't seen it on clay. And in my head, that would probably only help Koko Goff, but actually, I do think Muchova really played phenomenally well in this one and found a way to have a constant threat.”

“Arthur Fils. Big event. Amanda is back, takes out Rublev in the final 6-2, 7-6. Stevie J, let me go to you. Second Frenchman to win Barcelona since his old French guy in 85, 41-year drought. Fils lit it up, though. The guy is back.”

“50% of Arthur Fils' shots were contacted six and a half feet behind the baseline or further. Fils' court positioning was conventionally bad. It maybe used to be the case that you can't play offense from seven feet behind the baseline. That was before Arthur Fils existed. That was before 84 mile per hour forehands on average existed. If you have Arthur Fils' power, use it. You might as well buy yourself some extra time. There's no need to get rushed. He doesn't need to be on the baseline to hit a winner.”

“I was very unaware that there was potentially I had a membership. I've reached out. I'm in fact a member. I've already had someone this morning actually asked me to play the mixed doubles championships. There's a members party during the Queens Club that I'm not going to make. Unbelievable. I am in fact a member at Queens.”

“I'm not surprised. Because this is what he has done throughout his so far relatively young career. He's had some results that sort of make you scratch your head now that he's a bonafide, like, top ten player. Indian Wells, I know he was sick there. Miami's a head scratcher, right? Losing to Shevchenko in his first match.”

“In his semi-final performance, where he was absolutely unreal, it felt like a kind of exhibition performance. The winners, he was reeling off against Alexander Zverev in that straight sets victory. He burst into tears upon sitting down in his chair after that win and was sobbing for considerable length of time. We knew he was bearing a heavy weight. He had done an Instagram post the day before and he had also put some markings on the sleeve that he wears on his arm in memory of a young boy, a 13-year-old boy we're hearing from his tennis club in Rome”

“Cobolli clearly wanted to exploit Shelton's backhand return. On the deuce side, Ben was standing really, really deep. But it was strange after his match against Zverev, when he was locating the T-serve phenomenally well. Against Shelton, he totally threw that away. Cobolli went wide 82 percent of first serves on the deuce. He hit one T-serve all match. It's one thing if it keeps working and you just keep going to it. This was not that. This was just, I've got one serve, I'm going to hit it the whole match and it's not even working that well.”

“Number 1 is Yannick Sinner, winner of five of the last six big tournaments, beat Alcaraz in the Monte Carlo final, and had three championship points in Paris last year. This was just the first pass-through. The point of the power rankings is that as we go through the clay court season, they move around, they're updated, we refine them, we look into them, we make sure that they're really on point by the end. Sinner is currently on top, but there's a long way to go until Roland Garros.”