Rafael Nadal vs Damir Dzumhur Tennis Prediction
Damir Dzumhur won their first meeting at Miami in 2016 (via retirement), but Rafael Nadal leveled the H2H by scoring a dominant straight-set win in this year’s Australian Open. Though the Bosnian has got the game to play out a decent match with Nadal, his fitness condition is nowhere near the level that is required to compete with the world #2 in these conditions.
Rafael Nadal News
Rafael Nadal failed to defend his title at Madrid last week as he was knocked out in the quarterfinal by the eventual runner-up Dominic Thiem in straight sets, 5-7 3-6.
It was a week to forget for the Spaniard as his 14-match winning streak, as well as the 21-match winning run of clay, came to an end. To make things worse, he was once again replaced by Roger Federer at the top of ATP Rankings.
However, it was only the second time Rafael Nadal lost a match on clay in the last 16 months, with both of those defeats coming against Dominic Thiem in Rome 2017 and Madrid 2018.
The seven-time champion of Rome Masters, Rafael Nadal, failed to progress beyond the quarterfinal in his recent three visits, in 2017 (Dominic Thiem), 2016 (Novak Djokovic) and 2015 (Stan Wawrinka).
Damir Dzumhur News
Damir Dzumhur, who is going through a difficult period at the moment, scored a confidence-boosting straight-set win over Fernando Verdasco in the first round, 6-3 6-1. He will now meet yet another left-handed Spanish opponent, Rafael Nadal.
It was a much-needed win for the Bosnian considering he could win just one of his last seven matches before entering the Rome Masters, against Julien Benneteau in Madrid.
Dzumhur had his career-best season in 2017 (titles at Moscow, St.Petersburg and Blois Challenger) and made a reasonably good start to the 2018 season (QF at Montpellier and Marseille) as well. However, recent fitness issues (two retirements in the last five months) had impacted his performances over the last few weeks.
Tennis Prediction: Under 17.5 Games
Odds: 1.66
