The last official ATP event of the 2023 season takes place on Saturday in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where Arthur Fils and Hamad Medjedovic will battle for the title at the NextGen ATP Finals.
This should be a good one, as Fils and Medjedovic have been by far the best players throughout this 21-and-under tournament. Medjedovic’s undefeated run has come as a bit of a surprise given that he was among the lesser-known players in this competition. The 20-year-old Serb is ranked outside the top 100 (110th) and has won just seven tour-level matches in his career. So far this week Medjedovic has defeated Alex Michelsen, Luca Van Assche, Abudallah Shelbayh, and Dominic Stricker–the latter via second-set retirement in the semifinals.
Fils has been even more dominant in Jeddah. The 19-year-old Frenchman won his round-robin group with victories over Stricker, Luca Nardi, and Flavio Cobolli before beating Van Assche in a four-set semifinal showdown. Fils has not been pushed to five sets since his opening match of the week against Nardi.
This is pretty much an expected performance from Fils. He was without question the most accomplished player in this field heading into the event, with a ranking of No. 36 and an ATP title already to his credit (Lyon this spring). Through four matches in Jeddah, nothing has changed regarding Fils’ status as the cream of the crop.
Medjedovic can test the favorite, but Fils will likely wrap up his week in style.
Pick: Fils in 4
who ya got?
serb
You got it right, congratulations to Hamad👏
PS
Though both are correct I prefer “Serbian” to “Serb” since country is called Serbia, same as I prefer “Beograd” to “Belgrade” since Belgrade means nothing and “Beograd” means “White City”, bit English language has to turn everything wrong😉