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Second round clash at the ATP Shanghai Masters event between Americans John Isner and Steve Johnson. Two big servers here, so few breaks are expected.
Isner did not really have the best second part of the year and he played rather poor tennis on the US hard court series, at least for his standards. Besides winning the Atlanta title, Isner did not do anything special and eventually ended up losing to Kohlschreiber in the US Open 3rd round. He played a quarterfinal at Beijing last week (def. Robredo, lost big to Berdych) and here at Shanghai Big John edged a three setter against Andujar, a match he should really have won easier.
Steve Johnson has emerged this year as a solid Top 50 contender and he had a very good US Hard court season, highlighted by a semifinal showing at Washington, where he actually got past Isner in the second round. Last week Steve reached the semifinals at Tokyo, losing 6-7 1-6 to Simon. I watched Johnson a lot in the last few months and he`s a solid, stable player but what impressed me the most was his composure when taking on big servers – he manages to stay very focused on serve, reach tiebreaks and find a way to get that big points there. Steve won against Isner or Karlovic lately, played a fantastic match against Raonic and defeated other big servers earlier this year like De Schepper. Here at Shanghai, Johnson defeated Golubev in three sets in the first round.
The H2H is 1-0 for Johnson, Steve winning the only meeting a couple of months ago at Washington 6-7 6-3 7-6. Clearly both guys are big servers – even though Johnson does not have the same devastating first ball like Isner, he serves well and generally keeps his cool under pressure against big servers, denying them too many opportunities.
I actually fancy Johnson to spring a surprise here, his performances against big servers were top notch recently and Isner is not playing his best tennis. However, Big John is still the favorite and I reckon the best value lies in a first set tiebreak to happen. We all know Isner is the tiebreak king, while Johnson has played no less than 8 tiebreaks in his last 6 H2H matches against big servers (all on hard). Having watched Johnson perform against these guys I feel like a tiebreak has very high chances to occur, and hopefully we`ll see it in the first set, when both will be in the process of adjusting on the return – and where the odds have the best value, especially at Bwin, who I think judged this a bit wrong (but anything over 2.50 is worth taking). That being said, my tip is a first set tiebreak – I trust this pick more than the similar one on Lu – Karlovic yesterday, hopefully it will go the same way. Considering the odds, I am happy to take a calculated risk with big stakes. Prediction: John Isner – Steve Johnson 6-7 7-6 4-6.
Pick: First set tiebreak – Yes
Odds: 3.25 @ Bwin
Stake: 8
Possible profit: 18
Event date: 8 October
