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Another clean sweep on Tuesday for us as Berrettini and Simon both won their respective matches. Berrettini was made to work very hard by Balazs, eventually winning in 3 sets, whereas Simon cruised past Ivashka in straights.
Today we’re going to be looking at 2 Third Round matches from the main ATP clay court showpiece this week, being played in Barcelona.
Jaziri vs DImitrov – ATP Barcelona
I’ll keep this one short and sweet…
On paper Dimitrov should win, and guess what…i think he probably will. What i will however say is this, Jaziri beat the Bulgarian on a hard court in Dubai earlier this year, Dimitrov is likely to be the more fatigued of the two players following his long run in Monte Carlo last week and on top of that i’ve watched both of Jaziri’s matches here this week, and he is hitting is playing very aggressively and hitting the ball very well. He is also yet to drop serve, something which is very unusual on clay court on the ATP Tour. Given all of this, i was very surprised to see Jaziri’s pre-match price, and i do fancy him to win a set here, and he’s not even without a shot of nicking the match. Jaziri is a real value play here in my opinion.
Tsitsipas vs Ramos – Barcelona ATP
I am a massive fan of the Greek youngster, and i think he is destined to get inside the world’s top 10, at least. Today he is up against the veteran Spaniard clay-courter, Albert Ramos, who is certainly on the decline as far as his form is concerned.
Tsitsipas beat Schwartzman comfortably yesterday, and he looked superb, Ramos struggled past the tricky Dutra Silva, and looked less than convincing. Tsitsipas also has a 5-1 W/L record over the past month on the clay, versus Ramos 3-2 record.
During the past month, Tsitsipas has won 66% of his service points and held 86% of the time, Ramos has won 6%of his service points and held serve 76% of the time. The Greek player has also won 44% of his return points to the Spaniards 42%. So all of the key serving and returning stats are in Tsitsipas’ favour.
Off the ground, i also think he is more consistent, has more variety and certainly has more weapons. I also think Ramos isn’t the athlete he once was, and I even favour Tsitsipas when defending and looking to turn defence into attack in this matchup. Ramos will need to be playing at a very high level and hyper-aggressively to stand a chance i think here, and this just isn’t his natural game.
As you may have guessed by now, i’m favouring Tsitsipas to win this one.