MATCH OF THE DAY

Scheduled as the first slot of the night session, this match can't disappoint us—it's impossible.

With two magical styles and a very high level of play this season, our two protagonists meet for a legendary match. Everyone’s talking about their last showdown where they almost came to blows—tension was massive—and Coco didn’t cool things down after his win today; he says Bublik is a good player but they don’t share the same values. He adds that he’s going to try to send him packing—just the thing to heat up the match before the first point!! The aim is clearly to make Bublik lose it, and the Kazakh is already a bit on edge too; against Popyrin he refused to shake hands because the Australian didn’t apologize on two lets—personally I can understand that—and in general Coco is super sportsmanlike, so the problem won’t come from him. It’s mostly the crowd, and the fact that Moutet will be unmanageable facing him, that could make him snap. The mental side will be decisive, but in terms of pure tennis Bublik starts with the edge in my opinion—he leads Moutet 3–0 H2H. It’s simple: the game plan against Coco is clear—go after his backhand; Opelka did only that on his service games and it worked for a long time, and Bublik will try to do the same. The Kazakh is great in the touch game like Moutet; they’re both strong there, and the Frenchman’s guile gets neutralized a bit, even though it’s his strength. Bublik is also comfortable against lefties; his backhand is particularly solid. So how can Moutet win? First, we’re in Paris and he got through a tricky first round. Bublik serves worse than Opelka, and I think Coco will be able to have more of a say on the return already. Plus our Frenchman has leveled up this year—he’s in great form and has never played this well. I didn’t really like Bublik’s R1 match; it was mostly Popy being terrible again. There might be a great opportunity for Coco.