2025 Wimbledon Semifinal Preview: Men's Draw

We have reached the final weekend of Wimbledon 2025. Jannik Sinner, Novak Djokovic, Carlos Alcaraz, and Taylor Fritz will battle it out to see who joins Sinner and Alcaraz as 2025 Grand Slam champions.

3 of the 4 men in these semifinals were also in the semifinals of Roland Garros. That is exemplary of the entire landscape of men's tennis, where Sinner (World #1), Alcaraz (2x defending Wimbledon champion), and Djokovic (7x Wimbledon champion) tower over everyone else. For his part, Fritz has turned himself into a very good grass court player, having won two warmup tournaments this year in Stuttgart and Eastbourne.

Let’s look at the Wimbledon men’s semifinals by reviewing how our models evaluated each player’s journey through the draw and ending with a prediction for each match.

(2) Carlos Alcaraz vs (5) Taylor Fritz

Carlos Alcaraz's biggest flaw is that he occasionally likes to go on adventures. I think that the best way to use data to show this is through his Serve CFOE Ratings. In wins, this rating tends to regress to 2. Alcaraz has been above 2 just once during this tournament, and even then he did not get above 3. His Ratings have also been below 0 twice. Carlos Alcaraz is perfectly capable of mowing people down in straight sets. His hold and break rates are very high, and he generally keeps his Serve Excitement Index numbers below his Return Excitement Index numbers, meaning that he typically earns more chances than he gives up. But then, that wanderlust hits and he is just out there having a good time for a while. He has, however, been pretty good in the past about toning that down in this part of tournaments.

When Taylor Fritz walks into the stadium, everyone knows how he wants to beat you. He is going to lead with his serve and try to pounce on the rare opportunity he generates on his return. Those opportunities are not quite as rare as you might think of a typical "servebot", but just 1 of Fritz's 4 completed matches in his run to the semifinals has had an Excitement Average above the 17th percentile for men's main draw matches at Wimbledon. Fritz has done very well with a difficult draw, including two 6'8", big serving opponents in Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard and Gabirel Diallo and a player who is arguably the best pure athlete in professional tennis in Alejandro Davidovich Fokina. Davidovich Fokina tends to fall a lot and Fritz does the same on grass courts, so those two rolling on the floor was a very entertaining watch.

Taylor Fritz will probably hold serve a lot and break serve very little, but Carlos Alcaraz counters that style well. So Fritz's most realistic path to victory is Alcaraz falling asleep at the wheel for long enough to cause himself problems and Fritz then using that serve to slam the door on Alcaraz. It is not likely, but it is definitely a possibility.

Prediction: Alcaraz in 4. Our model has Alcaraz's win probability at 75%. Below are the predicted outcomes

(1) Jannik Sinner vs (6) Novak Djokovic

It is difficult to figure out what to say about this match. Jannik Sinner was down 2 sets to 0 to Grigor Dimitrov in the Round of 16 before Dimitrov suffered a devastating pectoral injury (he says he will be back for the US Open) and was forced to retire. Earlier in the match, Sinner himself ran into some physical issues. He fell and injured his elbow, which was clearly hampered during his Quarterfinal win over Ben Shelton. Novak Djokovic does not come into this match healthy either. While match point up on Flavio Cobolli in the Quarterfinals, Djokovic slipped on the grass and hurt his hip/upper leg. On top of the struggles he had following his retirement from the Australian Open due to a hamstring injury, his status is also up in the air.

Outside of the Dimitrov match, both Sinner and Djokovic have been playing well. They have kept Excitement Index numbers low on their serve and higher on their return. Neither one has had a completed match really in doubt. Sinner is the favorite here, but there are too many unknowns about both players' health.

Prediction: One player retires before the end of the 3rd set. Our model has Sinner's win probability at 71%. Below are the predicted outcomes