Good tricky first rounds

This kind of R1 is hard to analyze, but if you read it right, it gives you great odds!

I’ll start with Majchzrak, who I find really average for several weeks now, he’s almost invisible on court and I feel like he’s got some hidden issue. Indian Wells is kind of the tree that hides the forest, because people will remember that he took a set off Djoko, but he should have gone out against Mpetshi and his match against Djoko wasn’t even that great, it was mostly clinical finishing with a Djoko who needed a set to get going before steamrolling him. Besides, Majchzrak then lost to Basilashvili in the first round in Phoenix right after, I’m really not a fan of his last few weeks.

Kecmanovic is better, but I’m still wary of him. He was coming off a good stretch of crap results and then the US swing woke him up and he’s been having good tournaments since! I was a bit disappointed with the end of his match against Cobolli where he completely collapsed, and he just lost to Walton in Cap Cana. I didn’t see the match unfortunately, but I guess the combo of heat + an in-form opponent makes the loss kind of “ok”. Anyway, I’m personally much more worried about Majchzrak.

In terms of H2H it’s Kecma who is clearly ahead 4–1 with some good, clean scorelines, but that was a while ago and Majchzrak wasn’t playing as well back then. In their last meeting last season it was 7–6 7–6, which I think is more representative. I like Kecma in this kind of match, it’s going to be a tough baseline battle and in that kind of scenario he’s very strong; if on top of that we don’t have an inspired Majczrak at the moment, there’s definitely a chance to do something! It’s not easy to trust Kecma when he’s the favorite, but I feel like going for it.