Tennis Prediction Alex de Minaur vs Brandon Nakashima: Washington

🇺🇸 Washington

• This quarter-final, we've already seen it. Same tournament, same stage of the competition, a year ago: Alex De Minaur had beaten Brandon Nakashima 6-4, 6-4, before going on to lift the trophy a few days later.

• So when I see the market hesitating so much on this match, I'm looking for where the hesitation is coming from. It comes from one figure: the American leads 2-1 in their head-to-head.

• Except that this figure was built elsewhere than on hard courts. His win this year was at Queen's, on grass, 6 weeks ago. The other one goes back to 2021, at a time when the Australian was not yet the player he has become. On fast surfaces and recently, there is only one reference point between them, and it's the one from here.

• The surface is not a detail in this particular match-up. On grass, Nakashima's serve produces points that no one catches up with, not even De Minaur. On the hard courts of Washington, the ball comes back, and you have to win the same point two or three times in a row against a player who never gives up a single one along the way.

• The credit, now, because it is real: the American is playing in front of his home crowd, he beat Jakub Mensik in 3 sets to get here, and his hard court season is nothing to be ashamed of. This quarter-final is not a formality.

• But between the world No. 6 who has already solved this problem exactly where we are and the world No. 33 who needs to maintain his best serving level for 2 winning sets, my choice is made.

• I see him taking control of the rallies from the start and not giving up that ground for the rest of the evening.