Albert
·
3d
My Prediction
Paul in 4 sets.Lines, odds, numbers, they all can dampen the spirit of our starkly unpredictable sport of tennis, can’t they? Here we are at the sun-basked clay courts of Roland Garros discussing Karen Khachanov taking on Tommy Paul in a round of 32 matchup.
Going by seed, Khachanov finds himself in the underdog slot as 24, whereas Paul is sitting pretty at 12. Must be all that hair gel in his kit bag adding that extra weight to his performance. And the past tends to echo loudly on these courts. Do you hear it? It's shouting, "Paul has had the upper hand over Khachanov!" Just in case you lost count, that's 2-1, Paul.
Looking at recent form, Tommy Paul has been bouncing balls and competitors off the court with victories over Fucsovics and Moeller. Did face a blip in his performance against Sinner. But hey, we all need to learn our lessons, right?
On the other side of the net, Khachanov has been pushing some rallies to the finish line against Ofner and Vukić. But there's no love lost when stating that there were some defeats scattered in his recent outings too. However, they say setbacks are just setups for comebacks.
Hats off to the folks sweating over calculators and pulling out their hair to create those payouts. They have tilted a bit favorably towards Khachanov and, believe me or not, there's every reason to notice.
In this pearlescent unpredictability of clay court tennis, if the chalk clouds were ever to clear out based on facts, form and seed, they’d likely whisper Tommy Paul’s name just a little bit louder. So, here's where the coin flips.
Albert’s Prediction: Paul in 4 sets.