This is one of the more interesting matchups for Day 4, with two players capable of both amazing and poor tennis, sometimes in quick succession, meet for a place in the third round.
Starting with Denis Shapovalov, and the Canadian has managed to find his way back into the world's top 50, largely due to a finals appearance in Los Cabos a couple of weeks ago. Now I don't hold the form lines of that tournament very high when you compare it to a lot of the other recent tournaments, but it was a step in the right direction for the Canadian. What I did love though was his response in round 1 after falling behind on the scoreboard against Miomir Kecmanovic, a tough opponent over best of 5 sets on any surface (just ask Jannik Sinner at Wimbledon). After dropping the second set, Shapovalov was broken to love at the start of the third, and it looked as though things were getting away from him. After losing the first 10 points of the set, Shapovalov was able to reset, winning 10 of the last 11 games to take the victory on the back of 64 winners and 31 unforced errors. Certainly a stronger performance than we have seen from him at times, in what has been an injury interrupted year.
Luca Van Assche currently sits at a ranking of 40th in the world, which is a career high for the 22-year-old. His mix of playing ATP tournaments, whilst also getting some solid reps in at Challenger Level (won the Quebec City Challenger a couple of weeks ago). LVA also had a strong round 1 showing, defeating Cam Norrie as an underdog in 4 sets. After dropping the first set in a tiebreak, Van Assche responded strongly, claiming the next three sets 6-2 6-2 6-3. It perhaps wasn't the worst match-up for him in his current form, but I wonder if the firepower across the net today may make things a little more difficult.
For all the knocks on Shapovalov, and there have been many over the journey of his career, I feel his experience and comfort in these conditions both in round 1 and at times in the past should stand for a little more than we are seeing here in the market. I have his price for this match sitting fairly and squarely at $1.55, so I am happy to take the $1.70+ that is currently available for 2 units.
Shapovalov to defeat Van Assche
$1.72 (2 units)
