A quick preview on the upcoming ATP Madrid Masters:
There’s no Novak Djokovic this week, so Jannik Sinner will go into his first Masters event as the top seeded player. He will potentially face Lorenzo Sonego, Jordan Thompson, and Karen Khachanov in his first three matches. Not the easiest assignments, but it’s hard to see him not overcoming them. A quarter final against Casper Ruud would be an exciting match for both players.
Ruud is in stellar form, taking out his first ever ATP 500 event, and I don’t see him being troubled until perhaps the fourth round, where Grigor Dimitrov will likely await. Grigor has been in exceptional form over the last 8 months or so, and although clay is not his best surface, he has had some decent results on the dirt throughout his career.
Brazilian teenager, Joao Fonseca will play his first clay court Masters event, so I’m quite excited to see what he can do on the big stage. First up, he will take on the young American, Alex Michelson, who has struggled a bit since breaking into the top 100, but certainly nothing to worry about, as he himself is only 19 years old.
We know Daniil Medvedev isn’t a clay court specialist, but his draw here isn’t too bad. His biggest test until the quarter finals, might be his first match, likely against Italian Matteo Arnaldi, who can play some good tennis on the clay, and is pushing for a ranking within Slam seeding.
Rafael Nadal has been drawn against the youngest player, and lowest ranked player in the field, American wildcard, Darwin Blanch. Darwin has been playing in ITF 15K events, so it’s fair to say this will be a massive step up. Assuming Nadal cruises through this, a rematch of Barcelona, with Alex De Minaur will await. It will be very interesting to see if Nadal pushes his body a bit more this week, and if he’s learned from their last encounter.
Stefanos Tsitsipas is also in rare form at the moment, splitting titles with Ruud in the last couple of weeks. It’s a fairly favourable draw for the Grecian, and I see him moving through to at least the semi finals.
The bottom half might come down to whether or not Carlos Alcaraz is fit. He comes in as the second seed, but not having played on the clay yet, may just find him pull up a bit short for this event. He has a few potential tricky matches in his section, including Lorenzo Musetti, Ugo Humbert, or Jan-Lennard Struff, who is coming off his first ever ATP title. If he does make it through to the quarters, he will likely run into Holger Rune, who, on his day, is good enough to match it with anyone (despite his horror show against Struff in Munich).
Zverev looks to have a fairly clear path through the early stages, although Tomas Etcheverry, who almost made it to the final of Barcelona, could be a tricky round 3 opponent.
Arthur Fils had one of his best wins last week, knocking over Alex De Minaur in Barcelona. If he can re-capture that form, he may be able to knock over Hubert Hurkacz in a potential round 3 clash. However, the Polish giant is in pretty good clay court form himself, winning Estoril a few weeks back, so I can see him also progressing through his section of the draw.
Some interesting matches await, but my predictions are:
Semi-finalists:
Jannik Sinner v Stefanos Tsitsipas
Alexander Zverev v Holger Rune
