Italy’s Matteo Berrettini, runner-up at last year’s Wimbledon, who finally won the Stuttgart and Queens tournaments on grass, chose the same lane as Spaniard Rafael Nadal in the third Grand Slam starting on Monday, according to Friday’s draw .

Top seed Novak Djokovic, who is starting his title defense campaign against South Korea’s Kwon Soon-woo, is likely to face rising Spanish star Carlos Alcaraz in the quarter-finals.

Nadal will have to beat Felix Auger-Aliassime in the quarter-finals, knowing the Canadian pulled him into five sets in this year’s Roland Gorers final before the Spaniard advances to his 22nd Grand Slam title, bolstering his record.

And if that happens, Nadal, who has won Wimbledon twice, most recently in 2010, could take on a strong Berrettini on grass in the semi-finals, if the latter manages to beat Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quarter-finals, knowing that grass is not preferred by the Greek who remains better. His record at Wimbledon reached the fourth round in 2018.

Berrettini is hoping this will be his third stable after losing to Nadal the only two matches he has collected, both in the semi-finals of a major tournament (Flashig Meadows 2019 and Australia 2022).

Paradoxically, Berrettini practiced with Nadal on Thursday at Wimbledon’s main court, which is a precedent of its kind since the oldest major tournaments first allowed training on the court prior to the start of the tournament, after players repeatedly complained about the slipperiness, especially on the back line, as I did not check before launch.

In women’s singles, seven-time champion Serena Williams returns to singles for the first time since being eliminated from the first round of Wimbledon due to injury.

Serena will meet in the first round with the Frenchwoman Armoni Tan, who occupies 113th place in the world ranking.

And the American received an invitation to participate after falling to 1204 places in the world as a result of her absence from the matches.

Serena, 40, returned to women’s doubles competition for the first time this week at the Eastbourne tournament alongside Tunisian Anas Jaber, and the two took two wins together before they withdrew ahead of the semi-finals due to Jaber’s right knee injury. .

Since winning her last major title in Australia in 2017, the American is still looking for her 24th title to match the record set by Australian Margaret Court, knowing she has since lost four Grand Slam finals (Wimbledon and Flash Meadows in 2018). year and 2019).

As for Poland’s Iga Sheventek, this year’s Roland Garros champion, who is on an astounding level with 35 consecutive wins and six titles in 2022, she is starting her campaign against Croatia’s Jana Wit.

With the absence of Australian champion Ashleigh Barty following her sudden retirement at the start of the year, schwentec’s favorite grass and the disparity at the top of the women’s racket, the race for the title will be open.

As for Jaber, who won the Berlin Grass Title last week, second this year behind the Madrid Championships, and the outstanding levels that have propelled her to third in the world rankings are the best of her career. faces Sweden’s Miriam Björklund in the first round, knowing she reached the quarter-finals last season.