Similar trajectories…

A clay Challenger tournament to regain confidence with some wins, then confirmation at the Bucharest ATP 250, then a few victories in Munich before facing each other in the round of 16. Those are the two similar paths of the two players, who will arrive with solid confidence, with a Slovak who is playing well, serving well, and is hard to beat. He makes very few unforced errors and comes to the net in good conditions when he can. He doesn’t get carried away, he plays cleanly, and his lefty serve can do damage, especially since he mixes it up well with the serve down the T on the advantage side and therefore varies his spots nicely. A player who is not easy to handle, which is also the case for the German, who is playing at home and is always dangerous in those circumstances: home-player conditions and heavy clay, because the German combines two different weapons: power and aggressiveness, but also finesse and craftiness. So for now, there isn’t much to separate them. In terms of match-up, it’s quite tricky because it’s going to be a tight match with lots of rallies and strategies that will evolve over the course of the match, as the rallies will be demanding and it’s the first time the two players meet. Not easy to figure out or to decide on a clear favorite here. I think you see where I’m going with this.