Tennis Prediction Botic van de Zandschulp vs Jakub Mensik: Montreal

Montreal 🇨🇦

• There is one figure that almost no one is looking at and that explains the whole week in Montreal: 35.4. This is the court speed index this year, the slowest of all the Masters 1000 events of the season. Arthur Fils said it after his match: it's almost slower than clay.

• In such conditions, free points disappear. And Jakub Mensik's game, 20 years old and with a cannon serve, is built on free points.

• On the other hand, Botic van de Zandschulp is exactly the player these courts demand: a solid baseline game, a return that puts everything back, and the craziest week of the tournament: Mpetshi Perricard, Medvedev, then Hurkacz after 34 games.

• His victory over Medvedev tells it all: he won by taking less than one point out of two behind his first serve. This is not a server who pulled off an exploit, it's a baseline player who wore down his opponent. On a 35.4 court, this is the profile that pays off.

• My ticket requires a set. Mensik will have to win two against a wall, on a surface that extinguishes his main weapon, in the last rotation of the night, in the coolness that slows everything down even more.

• A half-stake on the Dutch wall, and a conviction: this court doesn't let anyone escape in 2 easy sets.