{"id":32088,"date":"2026-07-04T14:21:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T14:21:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/32088\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T14:21:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T14:21:19","slug":"preview-novak-djokovic-vs-roman-safiullin-wimbledon-prediction-form-head-to-head","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/32088\/","title":{"rendered":"Preview: Novak Djokovic vs. Roman Safiullin – Wimbledon prediction, form, head-to-head"},"content":{"rendered":"

Competing in the fourth round at Wimbledon for the 18th time in his career, Novak Djokovic<\/a> aims to maintain his perfect record against Roman Safiullin on the singles draw when the two face off on Sunday.<\/p>\n

In his Friday affair, the 24-time Grand Slam champion defeated Arthur Rinderknech 7-5 6-4 1-6 7-6 (7-4) while Safiullin ousted Joao Fonseca 6-3 6-3 6-3.<\/p>\n

Match preview<\/p>\n

He has been pegged back a couple of times at the tournament so far, but Novak Djokovic always seems to find the will to forge ahead like he did on Friday.<\/p>\n

At Wimbledon this year, he has twice been forced into a fourth set but won the only tiebreak in his round three outing to get the upper hand.<\/p>\n

Not since 2006 have we seen the Serbian lose a round of 16 match at the All England Club, when Mario Ancic beat him in five sets.<\/p>\n

Djokovic will qualify for the quarter-finals of this event for the ninth consecutive time should he triumph on Sunday.<\/p>\n

His serve remains a major weapon with the seventh-seeded player on the men\u2019s draw hitting a combined 42 aces in his three matches at Wimbledon in 2026.<\/p>\n

At the same time, the seven-time Wimbledon champion has won over 75% of his first serves in all three of his outings thus far.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Imago \/ ZUMA Press Wire<\/p>\n

Roman Safiullin has kept his Wimbledon aspirations intact to this point, showing plenty of power, balance and resiliency, while winning three epic five-set outings at the tournament so far.<\/p>\n

A qualifier at the event this time around, the Russian did not register a single double fault on Friday and did not concede a break point.<\/p>\n

This weekend, he has a chance to equal his best-ever finish at Wimbledon on the singles draw, advancing to the quarter-finals of this tournament in 2023.<\/p>\n

In 2026, he has not lost one round of 16 outing, advancing beyond that stage in all four of his singles matches on tour.<\/p>\n

Since advancing from the qualifying stage this year, the 28-year-old has won over 70% of his first serves in each of his last three matches, including 79% on Friday.<\/p>\n

He has not lost a Wimbledon singles match after winning the opening set since 2024, when Arthur Fils came back to beat him in five sets.<\/p>\n

Tournament so far<\/p>\n

Novak Djokovic:<\/p>\n

First round: vs.\u00a0Wu Yibing 6-5 5-7 6-4 6-4<\/p>\n

Second round:\u00a0vs. Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-3 6-4 6-2<\/p>\n

Third round:\u00a0Arthur Rinderknech 7-5 6-4 1-6 7-6 (7-4)<\/p>\n

Roman Safiullin:<\/p>\n

Qualifier:\u00a0vs. James McCabe 6-3 7-6 (7-4)<\/p>\n

Qualifier:\u00a0vs. Kimmer Coppejans 7-6 (7-2) 7-5<\/p>\n

Qualifier:\u00a0vs. Jerome Kym 4-6 7-6 (7-2) 3-6 7-6 (8-6) 6-4<\/p>\n

First Round:\u00a0vs. Andrey Rublev 6-4 6-7 (6-8) 3-6 6-3 7-6 (14-12)<\/p>\n

Second Round: vs. Botic van den Zandschulp 6-0 4-6 6-3 3-6 7-6 (10-5)<\/p>\n

Third Round: vs. Joao Fonseca 6-3 6-3 6-3<\/p>\n

Head To Head<\/p>\n

Tel Aviv Open (2022) – Semi-finals:\u00a0Djokovic wins 6-1 7-6<\/p>\n

ATP Masters Monte Carlo (2024) – Round of 32:\u00a0Djokovic wins 6-1 6-2<\/p>\n

ATP Masters Shanghai (2024) – Round of 16:\u00a0Djokovic wins 6-3 6-2<\/p>\n

Four years ago, in the first meeting between these two, Djokovic won 84% of his first serves while converting three of his break-point opportunities to earn a victory.<\/p>\n

In the Principality in 2024, Djokovic got the better of Safiullin again, winning 92% of his second serves while the latter won just 33% of his.<\/p>\n

Djokovic made it three for three later that year in China, winning 88% of his first serves and converting eight break points.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

We say: Djokovic to win in three sets<\/p>\n

As resilient as Safiullin has been throughout the tournament so far, we wonder how much stamina he will have left against a battle-tested Djokovic who still looks as hungry as ever to lift this trophy one more time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Competing in the fourth round at Wimbledon for the 18th time in his career, Novak Djokovic aims to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32089,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[2102,2104,575,2099,2101,1834,139,1046,2103,2100,113,2106,2105,28],"class_list":["post-32088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-novak-djokovic","tag-cycling","tag-epl","tag-football","tag-formula-1","tag-golf","tag-nfl","tag-novak-djokovic","tag-olympics","tag-premier-league","tag-rugby","tag-sport","tag-sports-mole","tag-teams","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32088\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}