The Damger ?

Damm is an excellent left-handed server, super aggressive, a profile that’s always a trap for the seeds..

After an out-of-nowhere breakthrough indoors, Damm kind of faded, or rather he played little and often lost! Really unsuitable conditions for his game in Indian Wells and a loss to Carabelli, then he went to Cap Cana (instead of going to Phoenix, who knows why) where he lost to Meijia. He’s just lost to two good clay-courters/solid players on slow courts. Miami is 10x better for his attacking game and we expect him to be more dangerous there. I don’t know if we can say he delivered in the first round given that Fearnley was injured and the match lasted 20 minutes, but at least he wins a match and gets a bit of confidence back before taking on Zverev.

The German is going to have to be switched on right away because Damm will grab him by the throat and won’t let him dictate play, that’s the part that worries me for Z, but everything else reassures me. His track record in Miami is good, his serve will be almost impossible to break on a good day, and the other rock-solid argument is his record against left-handers: he almost never loses to them (I don’t remember the exact number, but it’s a big streak). I don’t want to lay Zverev, but I imagine he’ll be around 1.10...