A little helping hand from fate

Comesana hit a rough patch before this tournament, and after saving a match point in the first round he’s lucky enough to play a qualifier.

I've been repeating in my analyses for a while now that Comesana hasn’t been getting much reward at the start of the season because he always fights hard but systematically lacks that little extra something to get over the line. It looked set to be the same story against Martinez, but this time he saved a match point and then pulled through in a tight deciding tie-break! A win that should do him a world of good. His level of play was still pretty average, but he’s hanging in there and it will end up paying off. His serve can be very damaging in these conditions, he’s firing a lot of aces but really needs to learn to cut down on the errors afterwards. He’s got a manageable second round that’s well within his reach, and with focus and not too many mistakes he should come out on top, unless Pellegrino manages to pull it off and cause an upset?

The Italian is really not bad and I’ve been backing him for a few matches now, I think he’s clearly progressing with an interesting level of play! He came through the qualifiers and just beat Barrena; for now there’s nothing amazing yet and he’s still looking for a real big performance to confirm his progress. He can spray the ball around and lack control too, but he can also dictate play and take advantage of the conditions. I think he’s still a notch below a good Comesana and that it’ll mostly depend on the Argentine: if he serves well and focuses on making his opponent play, then he’s clearly the favorite.