A confident man

This sentence applies to both!

Shelton won the title in Munich by raising his level throughout the week. When I saw his first rounds I really wasn’t impressed at all, but with warmer conditions at the end of the week and consistently good attitude, he went and grabbed his title on clay. The transition is “simple” in the sense that he goes from Munich to Madrid with slightly higher altitude conditions, but the change isn’t huge either, and physically I’m not worried. I’m just a bit scared of the match right after the title: you have to get going again in a new tournament, and on the other side of the net Prizmic has already been there for several days and already has three wins under his belt this week.

He’s confident as well, he’s winning a ton of matches this year and has finally pulled off a “big win.” Yeah, Berrettini was awful, but he’s still a name and Prizmic was the underdog. It’s his first win this season as a non-favorite, so we’ll see whether that unlocks something or not. In any case he’s in good form and confident, the momentum is excellent on his side just like Shelton’s, but he has the advantage of having been in Madrid longer, and I’m wondering if he might be able to surprise Shelton at the start of the match before logically losing afterwards?

Even though Shelton arrives with a title and is a dangerous outsider in Madrid, I’m wary of this first round...