Khachanov on his home turf

It will take at least that to allow the Russian to get back to his best level, and he really needs it because it’s been disastrous!

A finalist in Toronto last year and a semi-finalist in Montreal a few years ago, the Russian is a pro at Masters 1000 tournaments in this part of the world and seems to really enjoy himself here, even if he did somewhat walk that back and said that the conditions in Toronto and Montreal have nothing to do with each other. In other words, he’ll have to treat this tournament as something unique, and last year’s final won’t be of much use to him. The problem is that his level has been really poor this season—and I really mean that. To be a bit clearer, he has only one win as an underdog this year, and that was against Prizmic, who is absolutely overrated by the market in terms of odds, which, in my mind, doesn’t even really count as a genuine underdog win.

Khacha holds his rank in a laboured way most of the time and no longer produces any notable performances. Apart from his track record in Canada, there’s nothing right now that makes him trustworthy. You’re even tempted to bet against him. He’s still coming off a disastrous loss in Los Cabos against Tomic but seems unfazed. He claims to have worked well recently and put in a good training block, that he’s focused on the work and so on, but that’s already something he was saying at the start of the year and nothing is happening…

It’s completely the opposite for Atmane who, although he doesn’t have as many highlights or as much experience as Khachanov, is having a very interesting season. The Frenchman is clearly taking a step up and, despite often drawing nightmare opponents, he has once again come through his first round by beating a top player. Granted, Draper is just coming back and seemed a bit injured again at the end, but that doesn’t take anything away from the quality of Atmane’s match: he went toe-to-toe with him for much of the encounter and even showed breathtaking ruthlessness. That backs up his fine win over Tiafoe last week, and let’s not forget that afterward he only narrowly lost to Tabilo, who went on to reach the semi-finals. Atmane is very good at the moment and it takes a lot to knock him out.

It’s a new match-up between two players who have never faced each other. I really like Atmane’s profile: he already has a big serve and can hit extremely hard while injecting pace, but he’s also excellent in the way he defends from the baseline. On top of that, with his current confidence and a relatively short first-round match for a best-of-three, I see him as quite comfortable in this match-up and in the upcoming match.