Well, well....

Here we are again! After Dimitrov’s horrible defeat against Atmane, what on earth could be different today?

For those who didn’t see the match, the two men played each other in Acapulco a week ago, and the score was very one-sided in favor of the Frenchman: 6–3, 6–3. This score can be explained by two main things. The first is Grigor Dimitrov’s poor form: he’s coming back from a major injury and hasn’t returned to his former level. He had shown some improvement in previous tournaments, and I thought he was mainly lacking the physical stamina to sustain high intensity for an entire match. However, in this match he showed that the problem was even bigger, with his tennis completely unraveling — really a match to forget for him. The second reason for this result is that the Frenchman’s game bothers Dimitrov, especially when it’s played at its peak. Terence played very good tennis, staying mentally locked in throughout the match. I think he can be very good again at Indian Wells, because the American courts allow him to express himself better, whereas he feels a bit more pressure in France. There is also more space behind the baseline, which he loves. His game troubles Dimitrov because Dimitrov struggles to hit through him; Atmane stands far back and hits loopy, high-trajectory forehands on Dimitrov’s backhand diagonal. Terence’s heavily spun forehand forces Dimitrov to stay deep, build the point and be patient, or take more risks to hit that ball with perfect timing in order to step in and attack the Frenchman. To sum up, the match-up is at least as big a reason as Grigor’s poor form for the result of their previous meeting. The conditions at Indian Wells also slightly favor the Frenchman more than the Bulgarian in my opinion (they’re not very different from Acapulco). In conclusion, I find it unlikely that we’ll see such a lopsided defeat again. But I still think the value lies somehow on the Frenchman’s side. The key is to choose the right bet.