Is it Muller’s time now?

The Frenchman is still in the middle of his comeback period and doesn’t seem to be at his best yet, but it will end up coming back, and why not as soon as this first round?

I'm still not convinced by what Muller is showing. Sure, you can say he took a set off Shevchenko, who then went on to have a great tournament in Gstaad. But honestly, that first set was a massive steal where he saved seven break points out of seven. He was struggling on most of his service games. And after taking the first set, he just completely collapsed both physically and tennis-wise. I think he's far from his best level, which is totally logical. I'm not blaming him, it's just that right now, things are tough. I think he’s got the legs to hold for a strong set and a half, but that will improve with time, and it’s already good to see him string a few matches together.

He’s facing an opponent who isn’t winning many matches at the moment and who might be a bit low on confidence. Navone lost pretty clearly last week in Bastad against an inspired and surprising Travaglia. But it’s the first time in a long while that I’ve seen Navone lose heavily and miss his match. Before that, he was on a three-match losing streak, but you have to look at the quality of his opponents and, above all, the level of his performances, which were still very good. I don’t really see this as a bad spell for the Argentine. I think he’ll quickly get back to winning ways since he’s playing well. I think he has a huge physical edge in this matchup, and the altitude could also help him steal a few points on his serve. He’s a player we know inside out, very complete, but sometimes a bit fragile too and capable of taking heavy sets. Maybe if Muller starts off firing and with Navone’s lack of confidence, we could get a real match.