The draw ceremony of the Shanghai Rolex Masters 1000 took place on Saturday afternoon at the Rolex Experience in Shanghai, a beautiful neo-classical House of Roosevelt building on Shanghai’s historic Bund. Rolex Ambassador Bjorn Borg, world number 7 Dominic Thiem and Chinese Zhang Ze attended the ceremony.
World Number 1 Rafael Nadal will open his Shanghai campaign with a second-round match against either Jared Donaldson or Uruguay’s Pablo Cuevas. Nadal is on collision course for a possible third round match against Frenchman Lucas Pouille, who was a rival to the Spanish star in their previous two head-to-head matches. At the 2016 US Open Nadal battled past Pouille in five sets winning a hard-fought tie-break in the decider. This week Nadal came back from one set down to beat the French player in three sets 4-6 7-6 (7-5) 7-5.
In another potential third round clash this year’s Wimbledon semifinalist Sam Querrey could meet Grigor Dimitrov, who won his first Masters 1000 ttle and lost two semifinals against Nadal at the Australian Open and in Beijing.
In the second quarter this year’s Wimbledon finalist Marin Cilic could face a very tough match against Nick Kyrgios. The Aussie player will meet US Steve Johnson in one of the most interesting first round matches. Other interesting first round matches are Kyle Edmund vs Jiri Vesely and US Open finalist Kevin Anderson vs Adrian Mannarino.
The third quarter is the most competitive as it could feature two potential third round matches like Dominic Thiem vs John Isner and Juan Martin Del Potro vs Next Gen star Alexander Zverev. Thiem will make his debut in the second round against Canadian wild card Denis Shapovalov or Viktor Troicki. Shapovalov reached the fourth round at the US Open this year. Zverev, who has qualified for the ATP Finals in London after reaching the semifinal in Beijing, will make his debut against either Paolo Lorenzi or Aljaz Bedene.
Roger Federer will start his Shanghai campaign against Tokyo semifinalist Diego Schwartzman or a qualifier in the second round on Wednesday. This year’s Australian Open and Wimbledon champion could meet Jack Sock. In another potential third round match David Goffin could meet Roberto Bautista Agut. The Spanish player will clash against Hyeong Chung, who is looking for points to qualify for the Next Gen finals in Milan. Ivo Karlovic and Feliciano Lopez will meet in a first round match between two tennis veterans.
