Carreno Busta – Lorenzi

Pablo Carreno-Busta will meet Paolo Lorenzi in the first round of the Masters event at Cincinnati.

Carreno-Busta has broken in the Top 20 this year, as he had an excellent season, and the Spaniard was playing some great tennis prior to an injury suffered two months ago in the Roland Garros quarterfinals. Carreno skipped the grass court season and returned one month later in Bastad, but his abdominal injury recurred and he took another one month break until coming back last week at Montreal. Carreno Busta looked in very good shape as he defeated Khakhanov and played well in a 3-6 6-7 defeat against Anderson on the Canadian hard.

Paolo Lorenzi reached the second round last week at Montreal, which was an impressive performance for him considering that he`s a natural clay courter with little ability to play on hard courts at ATP level. Nevertheless, Lorenzi’s play was as expected – poor. He got past Tiafoe in the first round (7-6 0-6 6-2) mostly because of Tiafoe being in very poor form and a total headcase. In the next round, Lorenzi was blown off the court by Kyrgios, 6-2 6-3.

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Carreno Busta leads the H2H 4-2 and won the previous two meetings, but Lorenzi surprisingly leads the H2H on hard courts 2-0. Both guys are at their best on clay, but Carreno Busta is much more accomplished and better suited on hard than Lorenzi, so it`s surprising he lost both meetings on this surface against the Italian.

Despite Lorenzi winning both matches on hard, those were more than three years ago and fact is that this surface is a big disadvantage for him against Carreno Busta. Lorenzi doesn`t have the game to be effective on hard, while Carreno Busta does, even reaching the semifinals at Indian Wells earlier this season.

The fact that Cincinnati has one of the fastest surfaces on tour will hinder Lorenzi’s game even more, and give Carreno Busta an even bigger edge.

Carreno Busta looked fit and well last week in Montreal, so his injury seems to be behind him and he should be even better this week now with two matches under his belt. The Spaniard should be able to dominate and outplay Lorenzi on these fast hard courts in Cincy.

My tip on this clash is Pablo Carreno Busta to win and cover the 3,5 handicap. A bet on a straight sets win also looks good (odds are similar), but I find that Carreno Busta winning something like 6-7 6-3 6-2 is more likely than him winning 7-6 6-4. As such, I`m sticking with my bet on the handicap. Prediction: Pablo Carreno Busta – Paolo Lorenzi 7-5 6-2.

Pick: Carreno-Busta -3,5 games
Odds: 1.88 @ 1xBet
Stake: 8
Possible profit: 7.04
Event date: 15 August