Well, That's Awkward

Are you feeling better yet, Shapovalov?

How many "rematches" do we have this week? It sure feels like there are a lot of them. Let's start off by working through their last match quickly. It started quite shaky with both players struggling on serve... Shapovalov took the first set and had 3 breakpoints in the first game of the second set. Fonseca managed to save them, and that pretty much turned the match around. Shapovalov became very erratic, and it ended with what seemed like a "rage retirement". We can give him the benefit of the doubt, but it was hard to see anything physically wrong with Shapovalov. Fonseca's backhand was great the entire match, and I also liked the way he was using a good amount of variety to not just constantly feed Shapovalov pace. There are quite many question marks ahead of their upcoming match. Different conditions, Fonseca coming off a big title, and Shapovalov's ability to handle this match from an emotional perspective. I do slightly worry for Denis when it comes to the crowd and atmosphere here. Also, what changes is he going to make to his game plan for this match? Or perhaps he will play the same and just try to be more consistent? He seems quite pleased with himself now, ahead of Paris, stating that he feels he has been playing some good matches lately, indoors. Shapovalov also mentions he is looking forward to returning to Paris, where he has had good results before. I don't think that he has been awful, but I also think he's been quite far away from the beast version of Shapo we have seen indoors a few times... confidence is a big deal for him as well. Emotionally, he had a big outburst already in Stockholm, followed up by the retirement in Basel that I mentioned... which makes it quite hard to trust him not to spiral out of control once again. Rematches are always tricky, let's see what odds we have, compared to last time...