2023 Swiss Open Preview: Can Wawrinka Delight Home Fans With a Title Run in Gstaad?

Shapovalov, Bautista Agut Could be Top Contenders in 2023 Swiss Open

There will be a new champion in Gstaad as two-time defending champion Casper Ruud has not entered the Swiss Open. Could that open the door for veteran Stan Wawrinka to be the first player from Switzerland to win the event since Roger Federer in 2004.

Wawrinka did reach the finals in Gstaad in 2005. Since then, he is 5-7 in the Swiss Open. This will be his first appearance at the event since 2013. Keep that in mind when it comes to the 2023 Swiss Open preview.

Wawrinka is joined by fellow Swiss products Marc-Andrea Huesler and Dominic Strickler in the field.

Dominic Thiem, the 2015 champion, with Spain’s Roberto Bautista Agut the top-ranked player in the field at the current time.

When it comes to tennis betting, the odds are against a player from Switzerland winning the Swiss Open.

The 28-player singles draw is set to get underway on Monday.

Some Home Cooking?

When looking at the 2023 Swiss Open preview, keep in mind that before Federer’s title run in Gstaad in 2004, the last player from Switzerland to win the event was Heinz Gunthardt in 1980.

Between those two tournaments, players from Spain won the title 11 times with competitors from Sweden winning three times.

Can Swiss players make some noise in 2023?

Wawrinka reached the third round at Wimbledon before running into four-time defending champion Novak Djokovic.

Wawrinka isn’t the top-ranked player from Switzerland as No. 81 Marc-Andrea Huesler was seven spots ahead of Wawrinka in the most recent rankings. The 20-year-old Stricker is trying to break into the top 100.

Stricker did get into the French Open draw as a lucky loser after advancing to the final round in qualifying before falling to American Tommy Paul. Stricker got into Wimbledon as a qualifier and topped Alexei Popyrin in the first round before running into 10th-seeded American Frances Tiafoe.

A quick look at the tennis scores will show that Huesler fell to Yosuke Watanuki in a five-set match featuring three tiebreakers in the first round in his first match at Wimbledon.

Swiss tennis fans couldn’t have been happy when one of the first-round tennis matches in the 2022 Swiss Open has Huesler meeting Stricker.

Eyeing Another Title

Thiem returned to the Swiss Open a year ago in his first appearance since winning the title in 2015.

Once again, he made himself at home on the clay by winning his first three matches before falling to Matteo Berrettini 6-1, 6-4 in the semifinals.

More recently, Thiem has been eliminated in four of his previous five tournaments. However, he put up quite the fight against No. 5 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas before falling in the fifth-set tiebreaker.

When Thiem made a surprising run to the 2020 US Open title, he had lost his only match leading into the tournament. That came during a time when the global pandemic was wreaking havoc with tennis tournaments. He is hoping for better results in the coming weeks, beginning in Switzerland.

Ready to Collide?

Roberto Bautista Agut and Denis Shapovalov could easily have met up in the third round of Wimbledon.

Shapovalov took care of his end of the bargain with a pair of hard-earned wins. However, Bautista Agut fell to Roman Safiullin in the first round. Safiullin also eliminated Shapovalov.

Expect Bautista Agut and Shapovalov to be among the top contenders in Gstaad according to the 2023 Swiss Open preview. He reached the semifinals in 2017 and followed that up in 2018 by advancing to the championship match. Since then, he is just 1-3 in the tournament as he has lost in his opening match to the No. 113 and 100 ranked players in the last two tournaments.

Shapovalov entered the 2021 Swiss Open ranked 10th only to suffer a stunning loss to No. 249 Vit Kopriva.

Jiri Lehecka upset Paul in the third round at Wimbledon. However, he had to retire after dropping the first two sets to No. 3 seed Daniil Medvedev in his next match so keep an eye on his status
Lorenzo Sonego, who lost his first match at Wimbledon, is another player to keep an eye on.

Yannick Hanfmann and Roberto Carballes Baena both had tough draws at Wimbledon with Hanfmann falling to seeded American Taylor Fritz in the first round and Carballés Baena losing to eventual quarterfinalist Holger Rune in the second round.

Hanfmann needed to work his way through qualifying to make it into the main draw in Gstaad in 2022 so it would be quite the story if he wins the event a year later. He did post a pair of top-10 wins on clay in the Italian Open in May.

Miomir Kecmanovic is another contender coming off an early exit at Wimbledon.

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