After comfortable wins for Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer on the opening day of the ATP World Tour Finals it is the turn for the other group to take centre stage inside the o2 Arena on Monday.
That means we will see the likes of Andy Murray, Stan Wawrinka and Rafael Nadal on what should be a high quality day at the London venue.
Murray faces David Ferrer in the opening match of the day and this is a match full of intrigue. That intrigue centres around the world number two. He has the Davis Cup final at the end of next week and has been practicing on clay which isn’t ideal preparation for this match it has to be said.
I would imagine Murray wouldn’t mind taking it a bit easier this week but if you are hoping to do that they last thing you need to see over the net is a David Ferrer ready to chase down every ball and make you play more than you’d like.
Ferrer always gives it a good go in this tournament. He’s often outclassed but that’s just the strength of the sport at the minute so we shouldn’t hold that against him but if Murray is slightly off the top of his game the Spaniard can at least make this tricky for the Scot and extend the match longer than Murray would like.
Murray thrashed Ferrer in Paris recently so we know what he can do in this match but with all the doubts about how he will go I have to leave this match alone rather than get heavily involved in it.
The second match should be an absolute cracker. It sees Wawrinka taking on Nadal in what should be the match of the tournament so far.
The two met in a quality encounter in Paris just over a week ago where Wawrinka got it done in a couple of tie-breaks. The Swiss player had an awful record against Nadal but he’s now won three of their last four meetings and you get the feeling he believes he can beat him every time he steps on the court now.
Rafael Nadal has been showing signs of getting back to his best form and he will doubtlessly be inspired by being back in this tournament having been forced to miss it last year with injury and I fancy him to play well. The question is whether he’ll play well enough to beat a Wawrinka who looks to be in good touch.
Not only did Wawrinka beat Nadal in Paris but he then took a set off Djokovic in the semi-final and not many have done that in recent times so if the Swiss player brings that level of form to London with him I think he can edge out Nadal here.
In the doubles competition we have odds on favourites in Tecau and Rojer and Melo and Dodig. The latter are my pick for the tournament so I can sit their game out and I’m not rushing to back the former at odds on with Marcin Matkowski and Nenad Zimonjic both very handy shot makers.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Serb-Polish pair come through but I made a pre-tournament choice of watching the first round of doubles matches before getting involved and I’ll be true to that idea.
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