Same difference!

Similar career paths for these two players

A decisive tie-break win in the second round and then a 2–0 win today after saving set points—that’s what happened for FAA AND Collignon in this tournament! I chalk that up to Félix’s seriousness; he stays disciplined and focused when matches could turn against him—he keeps his cool. Collignon is almost the positive opposite: he can fire himself up and get the crowd going if needed—he loves that stuff! I notice a difference in the match scripts: Collignon saved SPs in the first set and then Foki completely stopped playing afterward, whereas for FAA it was in the second set after he’d been ahead the whole match. I wonder if Collignon would have won had he lost the first set. He hit a lot of double faults today and will need to erase that tomorrow without touching the rest because everything else was so good, especially the forehand! He’s going to be tough to beat in this tournament—he’s buzzing and hungry! FAA will have to calm him down, and I’m afraid he’s got the game to do it: very clean serving that should keep him relatively safe on his service games, and on return, if Collignon keeps gifting points with doubles, he could be in trouble multiple times. I want to believe in him, but he still has to raise his level tomorrow while cutting down the freebies. It’s really not easy, especially since this time he’s facing a much stronger opponent than he’s had since the start of the tournament, in my opinion. Either he transcends himself and reaches the final in a trance, or he gets shut down...