Monte Carlo Masters, 1st round, Tuesday, 11.04.2023
After the hard court Masters in Indian Wells and Miami, it’s on to the first 1000 clay court tournament in Monaco. In the city state, the first round will see Daniel Evans vs Ilya Ivashka.
It is the third meeting of the two top 100 players. Both matches were won by the Briton. Will Evans be Ivashka’s final stop again this time? In my Evans Ivashka tip I get to the bottom of this question.
The last few months have been tough for Daniel Evans. After he managed to reach the third round at the Australian Open, a series of busts followed. In the Davis Cup he lost his match against Nicolas Mejia in three sets.
A surprising result, after all, the Colombian is outside the top 200. In the following weeks, the results did not get better.
In Doha and Dubai, it was all over against Emil Ruusuvuori and Borna Coric. Evans had to retire from the second game due to injury at 2:2 in the first round.
After a two-week break, the losing streak continued. At the Masters in Indian Wells (Jack Draper, 4-6, 2-6) and Miami (Lorenzo Sonego, 6-4, 3-6, 2-6) he also had to retire after his first match.
But the last tournament should give Evans a boost. He beat Alexei Popyrin (6-1, 6-3) and Andrea Vavassori (6-3, 7-5) in the clay court opener in Marrakech.
In the match against Roberto Carballes Baena, however, Evans lost out again. After leading the set, the Spaniard turned the tables in the semi-final match (6-2, 4-6, 2-6).
However, the recent better performance is not enough for the bookmakers to classify Evans as favourite in the first Monaco match. With a 2.20, he goes into the match against Ilya Ivashka (1.66) as a slight underdog for Bet365.
The bookmakers are definitely not expecting a clear-cut number. For two sets played, odds of 1.61 are offered. For three sets played, odds of 2.20 would open.
This is the third duel between the two players. Evans and Ivashka met twice in 2018.
In the Wimbledon qualifier, Evans prevailed after two sets (6-4, 6-4) and the same result came in the quarter-finals of the Vancouver Challenger tournament two months later.
However, Ivashka was outside the top 100 at the time and did not play as good tennis five years ago as he does today. Last year, he even made it to 40th place.
The Belarusian is currently ranked 75th. Like Evans, he also had a dry spell in 2023. He suffered defeats in the first five matches of this year.
Twice he lost to Botic van de Zandschulp. US players Jeff Wolf and Jack Sock also kept the upper hand.
In Indian Wells he at least managed to get revenge on the Dutchman. However, van de Zandschulp had to retire in the second set due to an injury.
At the first Masters of the year, he made it to round three. Only against Daniil Medvedev (2-6, 6-3, 1-6) was he finished. He won one set against the world’s best hard court player.
He also started with a success in Miami against Daniel Altmaier, whom he outclassed 6-2, 6-1. Casper Ruud (2-6, 3-6) then sealed his tournament exit in round two.
The qualification for the Monaco Masters went better. The 29-year-old prevailed against Hugo Gaston and Taro Daniel, who defeated Alexander Zverev last time out.
Will it also be enough for a success against Evans? In the following conclusion, I present an answer and my betting tip for the match.
Summary: Both players had to struggle with dry spells this year, but were able to get out of the bad phases. More convincing for me were the performances of Ivashka, who was only stopped by Ruud and Medvedev in the Masters tournaments.
In Monaco, he has already defeated a very strong opponent, Daniel, and with two matches in the city state, he has a small sensory advantage over Evans.
In addition, the Briton stumbles more often with his own service game than the Belarusian. And in recent weeks and months, he has only been able to beat one top-100 player (Alexei Popyrin), who is also only ranked 95th.
My tip: Victory Ivashka
