The day after.

After playing one of the best matches of his life, if not the best, the Italian now has to follow it up today in the final against his friend Ben Shelton. Sometimes you can worry about the match that comes right after a huge performance, but I'm less worried for the Italian, who has already proven in the past that he can back things up, as he did at the start of the season in Acapulco.

Beyond his rediscovered level and his happiness on court despite the sad news he recently received, the Italian mainly returned very well against the German who, despite landing more than 70% of first serves, didn’t manage to hit a single ace against him. That was actually something the American had already said about him, that the Italian returns well, so it’s a significant weapon against the American, even more so because today the weather will be cloudy or even rainy. As the Brazilian Fonseca said, the conditions change a lot depending on the weather; so we have an Italian in great form who has the tools to bother his opponent of the day.

Bothering Ben Shelton is something he has already done quite often in the past; he has a game that troubles the American because he’s solid from the baseline and forces his opponents to create intelligently. Against an in-form Italian, he’ll have to play a complete match at his very best level if he wants to win.

On the American’s side, we have an outstanding competitor who already made a final here last year and who has four titles in total in his career, compared to three for the Italian.

When you think of a final for Shelton, you quickly picture him being clutch and really turning into a competitive beast, and that’s surely what he’ll do, but despite that I still think the match-up is tricky for him in today’s conditions.