Why Tsonga will NOT win Indian Wells 2012

There are two seeded players in the top 10 who, because of their placement in the draw, have the opportunity to win the Indian Wells 2012 tennis tournament by beating the top three players in the world (#1 Novak Djokovic, #2 Rafael Nadal and #3 Roger Federer) in consecutive matches. They are #5 David Ferrer of Spain and #6 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France. I like Tsonga’s chances better – he has the better hard court record having won all his 8 ATP titles in the surface, and he’s been to the finals of one Grand Slam, the 2008 Australian Open.

Tsonga is 13-3 in matches this year and won the Doha tournament in January including a walk-over Roger Federer along the way. He certainly has had some success finishing in the top 10 in three of the last four years. He has earned $8.6 million in career prize money earnings so far – and yet, despite this success, it is hard to predict him capturing the Indian Wells 2012 title.

For starters, no one has beaten the current top 3 players to win a tournament. Tsonga will have to contend with Nadal in the quarterfinals. He has a 3-6 record against Nadal, but he did win their last meeting at the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals in straight sets. Nadal has had considerable success in Indian Wells winning in 2007 and 2009 and finishing runner-up last year. If Tsonga moves past Nadal, he will be going up against Federer in the semifinals.

Tsonga has a 3-8 record against Federer and he did win back-to-back matches against the 16-time Grand Slam champion last year – at the quarterfinals in Wimbledon and the round of 16 of the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 in Canada. Yet, it was Federer who came out on top in their last four matches including a quarterfinal at the US Open. Federer also has a very successful career in Indian Wells being the only player in history to win the tournament three consecutive times.

Let’s say Tsonga gets by Nadal and Federer and reaches the finals where he will match-up against Djokovic. Of course, that can only happen if Djokovic will defeat Andy Murray in the semifinals. Amongst the three top players, Tsonga has a winning record over Djokovic holding a slim 5-4 lead in their head-to-head career match-up. Still, it is difficult to see Djokovic losing to anyone outside the Nadal-Federer-Murray triumvirate. And, Djokovic is the defending champion and also a winner in 2008 in Indian Wells.

As for Tsonga’s Indian Wells record, it is barely impressive. He has a 5-4 win-loss record in the tournament and his best achievement was reaching the fourth round in 2010 and 2008. Tsonga’s best chance is if someone can take out Nadal and Federer so he doesn’t have to face either one of them. If he reaches the finals, he would have a better chance against Djokovic than he has against Murray, who holds a 5-1 advantage over Tsonga.
Can Jo-Wilfried Tsonga win the Indian Wells 2012 tennis tournament? No. Not this year.