The ATP Finals have gotten down to the final four players and both Semi Final matches are set to be played today.
Daniil Medvedev - 4.5 games v Casper Ruud: Winning a Group with a perfect record will give Daniil Medvedev plenty of confidence going into Finals Weekend at the ATP Finals. He is a previous Champion of this event, but the move to Turin has meant dealing with different conditions, although the US Open Champion has looked pretty good in the tournament.
The serve has been a major weapon for Daniil Medvedev and the key to winning all three matches, although he has been forced to dig deep in each match played. All three have needed a final set decider, but the last two have both needed a final set tie-breaker and that means the Russian has spent plenty of time on the court.
At least he had Friday off to prepare for this Semi Final on the day that Casper Ruud had to come back from a set down to finally beat Andrey Rublev for the first time. That means a recovery from an opening match defeat to Novak Djokovic and in both wins this week, Casper Ruud has had to come from a set down to turn the match around and that is going to give him a mental boost.
He will have to improve markedly from what we have seen in the Group Stage of the tournament though- Casper Ruud won 12 fewer points than Andrey Rublev in his winner takes all battle against the Russian on Friday, while he was significantly down in both the service and return numbers compared with his opponent.
Now he has to take on another big serving Russian and one who has shown a lot more mental strength than Andrey Rublev who had been guilty of throwing the match away. Daniil Medvedev has been particularly impressive behind serve and looked to be getting to grips with his return a little more in the win over Jannik Sinner.
There have been moments of really good serving from Casper Ruud which will test Medvedev, but it should also be noted that the Norwegian has faced eleven break points in his win over Andrey Rublev. While serving well enough in the win over Cameron Norrie, the other two matches in the Group saw Casper Ruud fail to win more than 60% of the service points played and I do think Daniil Medvedev can match the margin of win that was recorded by Novak Djokovic over this opponent.
Daniil Medvedev has dominated their two previous matches and his serve has been a potent weapon in those wins over Casper Ruud. Earlier this season, Medvedev broke the Ruud serve five times on the grass courts in Mallorca, arguably the World Number 2's worst surface, and I think he is going to move through to another Final at the ATP Finals with a convincing win.
Novak Djokovic-Alexander Zverev over 22.5 games: You can't win the ATP Finals by dominating your Group, but you can certainly lay down a marker about your ambitions in those early matches. There is no doubt that Novak Djokovic has looked the strongest player by some distance in Turin and his numbers have been very, very impressive as he has won all three Group matches heading into the Semi Final.
It is no surprise that the layers are thinking Novak Djokovic is going to blow past another opponent when he takes on Alexander Zverev in this Semi Final, but this has proven to be a tough match up for the World Number 1. The point is underlined by the fact that Alexander Zverev beat Novak Djokovic in Tokyo and their match at the US Open also needed all five sets to separate them.
Four tough sets were needed at the Australian Open, which is Novak Djokovic's favourite Grand Slam, and the numbers actually back up how well Alexander Zverev has matched up with this opponent.
The big question for Alexander Zverev is whether he can serve well enough to push Novak Djokovic all the way in this one and perhaps even earn the upset. For the most part, his serve has been very effective in the conditions in Turin and it has resulted in the German being broken just once so far at the tournament.
Of course, Zverev has not really faced too many returners with the capabilities of Novak Djokovic who has had his eye firmly in while dominating his matches here. It can be pointed out that Novak Djokovic was in a relatively weak Group and now he has to really step up his level to compete with someone like Alexander Zverev.
The return has proven to make the slight difference in favour of Novak Djokovic more often than not against this opponent, but matches have rarely been straight-forward. I would not be surprised if the two players split the first two sets played and have to get through a decider to earn their spot in the Final and that is why I will look for the players to surpass the total games line.
Their last four matches have all seen both players win a set and all of those have been on the hard courts. Only the match in Tokyo resulted in some easy sets being won by the two players, but in general Novak Djokovic and Alexander Zverev have pushed each other into long matches and looks like being the outcome of this one too.
MY PICKS: Daniil Medvedev - 4.5 Games @ 2.10 Bet365 (2 Units)
Novak Djokovic-Alexander Zverev Over 22.5 Games @ 1.87 Bet Victor (2 Units)
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