Novak Djokovic will contest his first ATP tournament this week since winning the 2023 US Open final. Djokovic will face Tomas Martin Etcheverry at the 2023 ATP Paris tennis event. This will be a second-round match in the tournament, a competition also known as the 2023 Rolex Paris Masters. Djokovic enters this tournament with some question marks at this point in his season. There will likely be a window of opportunity for Etcheverry to claim some games off of the World No. 1. My Djokovic vs Etcheverry prediction is that the latter will win OVER 7.5 games in this upcoming match.
Schedule of Play: Right-click/Open in the New Tab to check match times: subject to change
Novak Djokovic vs Tomas Martin Etcheverry Head-to-Head Series
These two players have one head-to-head match in their history. Djokovic beat Etcheverry earlier this season on clay at the 2023 Rome Masters in straight sets. Since that time, Djokovic has won the French Open, made the Wimbledon final, and won the US Open. Etcheverry’s resume doesn’t really stack up.
However, he does have some wins in recent ATP tournaments. Besides his first-round win in Paris this week, Etcheverry won a couple of matches in Basel last week. He defeated both Sebastian Korda and Andy Murray before falling to Holger Rune.
Djokovic is 45-9 at the Paris Masters over the years with six titles. The last time he lost a match early in the draw was back in 2012 when he fell to Sam Querrey. Since then, he has always either won the event outright or lost to a much more established player than Etcheverry.
The Draw: Right-click/Open in the New Tab for the draw for the 2023 Rolex Paris Masters
Djokovic vs Etcheverry Prediction: Etcheverry OVER 7.5 games
Like a lot of tennis matches involving an extreme talent against a peripheral player, the betting options are not great. Djokovic comes in at -1200 (bet365) while Etcheverry is +700.
Etcheverry did not quite play well enough in the previous round to even take with a 5.5-game handicap, in my opinion. He went deep into a third set against another peripheral player. Furthermore, in a long match, Etcheverry only had seven aces, which is not a lot for an indoor tournament on a hard court surface.
But what you can hope for here is for Djokovic to be a bit rusty. Except for one international match, Djokovic has been idle on tour since the US Open. That’s different than some previous seasons. For instance, in 2022, he went into Paris following titles in Astana and Tel Aviv.
In 2021, Djokovic contested no matches between the US Open and the Paris Masters. That’s interesting to note because he dropped a set in his first match in Paris 2021 to Marton Fucsovics before Djokovic rallied to win not only that match but all of the matches in his draw.
One way to understand 2021 is that he needed a bit of a warm-up to get back to form. He had 21 unforced errors in that match two years ago. There’s a chance that there is a lull for Djokovic against Etcheverry. Take OVER 7.5 games won in this match for the underdog at odds of -110.
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