The pressure on Cerundolo.

The Argentine has a golden opportunity to perhaps play the tournament of his life if he stays focused. There’s a real big chance to seize, but the pressure has just gone up a notch with Sinner’s defeat.

Everyone is now under serious scrutiny in this part of the draw, given how open it seems for everyone. Cerundolo is one of the favorites in this section. The Argentine has a few references at the highest level. We know what he’s capable of, but we also know that mentally he sometimes has big issues controlling himself. I wonder if this pressure won’t be too much for him to handle. In any case, he has a third round that is well within his reach.

He’s facing the American Svajda, whom no one expected here, but who is damn talented. He has a fairly light and mobile profile, but above all he has real ball quality and a nice touch. He’s a somewhat phlegmatic player, just like Cerundolo, who sometimes has a slightly nonchalant attitude, but when he plays, he plays very hard.

He beat Walton in a very controlled match, even though he started to seriously drop in intensity in the fourth set. The score doesn’t really reflect how much the match could have swung at that moment. He’s still a very inexperienced player on this surface and not really suited to clay, for that matter. He can shine with his pure game, but against a clay-courter like Cerundolo, I think he’s still quite limited over time.

They’re tied 1–1 in the head-to-head, with a win for Svajda in Winston-Salem in 2024, but also a set taken at the US Open before losing the next three. I do think that on hard courts he’s a somewhat tricky opponent for Cerundolo, someone who can stop him from playing and from imposing his game the way he wants. On clay it’s a bit different, and obviously Cerundolo starts with a huge advantage, especially in such a long format.