Borges' Opportunity?

Nuno is playing some of the best tennis he has in a long time...

It might not be the most flashy tennis, but he has been consistently delivering solid performances ever since the grass season. While he really struggled in the first round in a huge battle against Kokkinakis, he was able to take full advantage of windy/gusty conditions to easily win against the older Cerundolo, who is really struggling at the moment, especially with his confidence and attitude. Rublev was able to benefit from a nice draw as well... against PCB, whom he has dominated in the H2H. Andrey could really feel the hot conditions, and we saw him with his head in the ice bucket, but his level of play remained good, and in the end, PCB was the one who really faded away in the second set, as we had some indications of in his last matches as well.

I'm still quite optimistic for Rublev... I think he's been building a decent level for some time now; both his losses to Shang and Van Assche don't bother me that much. He also tends to be quite strong physically, which is of course a very important aspect here in Cincinnati. Then we have the fast courts and low bounce, which suit his aggressive style of tennis, especially if it's not going to be too windy. It's still early, but the forecast for Tuesday looks a bit less windy, which I think benefits Rublev. Besides that, something we talk about often is Borges' matchup problem against these kinds of aggressive players that play at a high pace. I remember their most recent match this year at Roland Garros... Rublev won in three straight sets; all of them were quite competitive, but in a way it felt like Rublev was in control of the match. It's also something that can be seen in Rublev's dominance in this matchup, 5-0 with only a single set lost. The argument for Borges would be that he is improving while Rublev perhaps has reached a plateau or is even declining, but this is also something that is very much factored into the odds...