Gael Monfils is no stranger to ATP finals, but titles have been difficult to come by. He hopes to add one at Vasek Pospisil’s expense on Sunday in Montpellier, while Egor Gerasimov and Jiri Vesley are battling for the Pune trophy.
Open Sud de France: (1) Gael Monfils vs. (PR) Vasek Pospisil
Something will have to give when Monfils and Pospisil square off in the Montpellier final on Sunday. Monfils is sweeping the head-to-head series 5-0 (including an utterly dominant 10-0 in total sets), but he has been nothing short of a disaster in ATP finals throughout his career. In fact, the 33-year-old Frenchman is saddled with an 8-21 lifetime record in these situations. Monfils has earned all five of his victories over Pospisil on hard courts, including two indoors–most recently via a 7-5, 6-4 success a little more than a year ago in Antwerp.
Mercifully armed with a clean bill of health to begin this season, Monfils is 7-2 with losses only to Australian Open finalists Novak Djokovic and Dominic Thiem. So far in Montpellier the top seed has defeated Adrian Mannarino, Norbert Gombos, and Filip Krajinovic. Pospisil is through to his first final since 2014 (runner-up in Washington, D.C.) following wins over
Aljaz Bedene, Denis Shapovalov, Richard Gasquet, and David Goffin. The world No. 132 needed two hours and 21 minutes to scrape past Goffin and he probably doesn’t have enough left in the tank to turn the tide of his past failures in this matchup.
Pick: Monfils in 2
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Tata Open: (8) Egor Gerasimov vs. Jiri Vesely
The Pune field will likely go down as the weakest at the ATP level in all of 2020, so it is hardly a surprise that Sunday’s final pits the world No. 90 (Gerasimov) against the world No. 107 (Vesely). Their only previous encounter came last year during Dubai qualifying action, with Gerasimov getting the job done 7-6(5), 6-4.
A late bloomer at 27 years old, Gerasimov’s ranking is a career-high and he will reach at least No. 71 next week (likely No. 61 if he wins). The Belarusian booked a spot in his first-ever final by beating Paolo Lorenzi, Nikola Milojevic, Soonwoo Kwon, and James Duckworth. Vesely, who had not done anything since Wimbledon last summer, has advanced with defeats of Arjun Kadhe, Salvatore Caruso, Ilya Ivashka, and Ricardas Berankis. The Czech survived third-set tiebreakers against Ivashka (13-11) and Berankis (9-7) while requiring a total of five hours and 32 minutes on court in those matches. He saved six match points (two in the quarterfinals, four in the semis). Gerasimov has clearly been the best player in Pune and Vesely has to be running on fumes.
Pick: Gerasimov in 2
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Allez Monfils!…in 2.