First, I hope you all are enjoying le Tour. Great countrysides, towns, villages and sprawling fields interrupted by languid rivers, and made more adventurous and even dangerous by the ancient mountain ranges. The athletes and their narrators (thank you Phil and Bob — RIP Paul) make for such great television.

The Euros have reached a final. I’ve watched most of those matches. England was awful in that SF, Sterling a perfect embodiment of the sheer crap of that country’s football. More Kane, Foden, Sancho…the dive that earned England the winning PK was just shit, rubbish of the highest order. Hopefully the final makes us smile.

Italy has the style and belief, but does England have some kind of destiny?

Which brings us to Wimbledon and one Roger Federer.

My QF preview was spot on but for some bullshit take on the destiny of Federer’s place in the SF. I was going to include in this post many of my tweets over the last week, engaging with tennis Twitter. I have been so sour on the Swiss gent’s tennis; I’ve been a bit rude.

He hasn’t been a threat in my eyes since round 1. I lost my way in the QF preview. And I like Hurkacz’s tennis a ton (I was intending to evidence my commentary on that bloke as early as 2019. I wrote, for instance, of his nearly beating Federer at IW 2019 though Federer took him out 4 and 4. I said the match could have easily swung on a point or two. I hear everyone saying Fed beat him in straights at IW, so this QF result is so shocking. Between what I’ve seen of Hubert for a few years and what I’ve seen of Federer in the last few months, weeks and days, I should never have seen this Federer destiny. After all, Federer pretty much expired and rotted on CC aback in the 2019 WB final).

Other than that faux pas, my picks were on the spot.

Here’s my SF shakedown:

Djokovic should beat Shapovalov fairly easily unless Denis has a little Tsitsipas resistance in him ala that 2020 SF at RG — he pushed Novak merely for the drama; the result was never in question. Great to see the Canadian get to the SF, matching his SF at Queens last month.

Give him hell, Shapo. But Novak is not stopping there.

I like Matteo still in the other SF. I’ve had him from the word go, even beating Federer if the 40 year old had advanced.

Seems quite the pick to take the Pol and this could be his true arrival, his first major championship moment. Look at his FS (128-133mph), his flat, dangerous ground strokes, his play at the net! Great offensive tennis, with tremendous range for his size.

My Berrettini pick rests on the Italian’s class on grass (won Queens last month and has at least one other grass title). The pick also comes from who Hurkacz just beat. I don’t trust his form based on that win (I don’t even trust his win over Medvedev).

I like the Italian and know I could lose this just like that.

Cheerio. Talk to you on the other side.

PS

I just wrote this on my phone. 😉