ATP Tournament in Halle, 1st Round, Tuesday, 20.03.2023
Jannik Sinner has to play Richard Gasquet in the first round in Halle. The world number nine was already on grass the previous week, but failed in the quarter-finals at the ATP 250 tournament in Hertogenbosch.
Gasquet has also played on the fast surface in recent days. Who will reach the second round? I give a prediction in my Gasquet Sinner tip.
The clay court season was no pleasure for Gasquet. The 37-year-old only managed to win four of his twelve matches. At the French Open, he already failed in round one.
He was also uncompetitive in Lyon against Mikael Ymer, whom he had beaten in two sets at the Bordeaux Challenger a week earlier.
The Frenchman now started the grass court season with a better winning record. He mastered rounds one and two in Stuttgart. He had hardly any problems against the strong server Christopher Eubanks (7-6, 6-4).
His success against Stefanos Tsitsipas (7-6, 2-6, 7-5) was surprising. For a while it looked as if the Greek could turn the tide. But in the third set, he was able to continue his strong service games from the first set.
Gasquet, who is ten centimetres shorter than Tsitsipas, even managed five percent more than his opponent after the first serve with 81 percent of the points.
He skilfully played out his experience from around three times as many grass court matches. However, the match came to an end against the eventual finalist Jan-Lennard Struff, who narrowly missed out on his first ATP title against Frances Tiafoe after leading the set.
The German served strongly against Gasquet, serving 18 aces with only two double faults, converting 91 per cent of his first serves into points and taking 30 per cent from Gasquet after service number one.
In Sinner, the Frenchman now faces a very strong opponent who is still inexperienced on grass.
At 1.16 odds at Betano, the Italian is the clear favourite going into the match. A Gasquet win (5.00) is considered unlikely.
The two professionals, who are 16 years apart in age, have only met once on the Tour. In this year’s Masters opener at Indian Wells, Sinner won after two sets (6-3, 7-6).
As so often in this match, Sinner came up trumps with his return game, but in addition he also served strongly in winning 31 of 35 points after the first serve. Gasquet took more than 60 percent of the points after the second serve.
Gasquet will also have to rely on his first serves for this duel, otherwise Sinner is likely to strike again.
After all, despite his fairly limited practice of 15 grass court matches, he managed to break through on the green in 2023.
Without Gasquet’s regular first serves, I think a quick 2-0 for Sinner is very realistic. Bet365 provides odds of 1.61 for this market.
Last year at Wimbledon, the Italian beat Stan Wawrinka, Mikael Ymer, John Isner and current world number two Carlos Alcaraz. This was followed by the unforgettable match against Novak Djokovic.
He took a 2-0 lead in sets (7-5, 6-2, 3-6, 2-6, 2-6) against the eventual tournament winner. But Djokovic turned the match around and didn’t let anything go from set number three onwards.
After the Wimbledon quarter-final, Sinner certainly wanted more than an exit in the second match at this year’s ATP 250 tournament in Hertogenbosch. He had no difficulties against Alexander Bublik (6-4, 6-2).
But against Emil Ruusuvuori (3-6, 4-6) he had no chance. However, he should not think too much after his performance. With Tsitsipas, Medvedev and Co., many other favourites failed early on at the grass court opener.
Summary: Sinner had some difficulties against Ruusuvuori. Overall, he has developed into a good grass court player, especially with the breakthrough last year.
Despite his current slight dip in form, I see the Italian clearly ahead. Sinner has won nine of his last ten opening matches at ATP tournaments without losing a set. That number means something.
After all, the first and only duel between the two professionals ended after two rounds. Therefore, I expect Sinner to bring his dominance to the court and send Gasquet home with a 2-0 win
