The bruisers

And yes, it’s going to hit hard today with the Georgian Basilashvili, who’s continuing his momentum. He’s coming out of qualifying just like in Bucharest and Madrid, and he’s facing a man in form at the moment, the Spaniard Merida. The latter is revealing himself to the general public, notably thanks to a very good tournament in Madrid. Their playing styles are quite similar, with lots of powerful, fairly straight shots hit from their baseline. The small difference is that the Spaniard comes to the net a bit more often, which isn’t difficult when you look at the Georgian’s stats, and he also takes the ball a little earlier. What the Spaniard doesn’t like are players who mainly send a lot of balls back at him, which is also the case with Basilashvili. We’ll have a power battle here, with Merida, in my view, taking the initiative a bit more, with perhaps slightly better movement and above all an earlier contact point on the ball. For me, it’s only logical that he’s the favorite in this match, but I tend to underestimate the Georgian too often, and he doesn’t give much away either. The winner here will be the one who, in my opinion, gets the best ratio of winners to unforced errors, and also the one who manages the key moments a bit better, because both players are known to make a few too many mistakes in tense situations, even if that’s normal given their style of play.