Daddy Nuno

According to Shelton’s rule on tour, Borges has become Etcheverry’s daddy this season in just a few months. The Portuguese clearly has the upper hand in the match-up with Etcheverry and leads him 3–0 this season alone.

I can only talk about the first two matches because I didn’t see their meeting at Roland-Garros, and if I’m not mistaken, I think Etcheverry had a slight issue, but I’m not sure about that. So I’m not really going to factor that match into my thinking, but one thing is certain: Borges loves this kind of match-up, and not just against Etcheverry. The Portuguese player loves dictating play, he knows how to attack intelligently and he also likes battling from the baseline. Those two qualities allow him to get the better of Etcheverry every time, because the Argentine lacks power and aggressiveness to really hurt him. That said, the match-up isn’t completely one-sided either, in the sense that there isn’t a huge gap in level to clearly confirm that. Borges still has to work and make the match easy for himself, but for now, he’s doing that pretty well.

The Portuguese completely missed the mark in Estoril and you could feel him a bit tense during his first-round win here against Kovacevic, but the content of the match was still pretty good. Honestly, I think Borges is playing some great tennis at the moment and that he’ll soon be able to back that up with a big result.

It’s a different story for Etcheverry, who has been really sluggish for weeks now and doesn’t seem to have an immediate solution to turn things around. He’s a player who relies heavily on his mentality, his physicality, and his ability to find a solution over the long run to wear his opponents down. The problem is, he depends a lot on that, and the rest of his game isn’t anything special. He has to battle even more than before and is losing quite a few matches. Maybe hard courts will help him be a bit more impactful on serve and with his forehand, but it’s not great for him either when it comes to the more defensive side of his game.

Here, we’re on a hard court that isn’t very fast, or at least not one that’s going to transform his game. And he doesn’t have a great draw either. It would be a bit of a surprise to see him win, even though I don’t think he’ll be outclassed. He always hangs in there, even when things are tough.