Diego Schwartzman meets Karen Khachanov in the third round of Tokyo 2020 on Wednesday, July 28th, 2021.
Which of these two very entertaining players will come out on top of this encounter, will it be the great returning Diego Schwartzman to fight his way through or will it be the power hitting Russian Karen Khachanov to win a big match?
Karen Khachanov came through a good win in the second round, beating James Duckworth from Australia in 2 sets 7-5/6-1 to get himself into this third round. Karen Khachanov will know that he can go far here in Tokyo if he is improving match after match. Karen has not been at his best for a couple of years now but he seems determined to turn things around and get himself back up the rankings now that we are on hard courts. Karen will know he has a tough match against Diego, but he also knows that it is not an impossible task.
Diego Schwartzman had to fight through a very tight second round match in the second round, beating the challenger tour player who is quite unknown Tomas Machac 6-4/7-5. This match was way tighter than it should have been and this does not give me as much confidence in his game coming into the third round. Diego will have to find some more rhythm on his serve is he is to finally reach the level we know he can play at, but this is going to take some time to find it and it won’t happen overnight.
This is going to be the 4th meeting between both players, with Diego having won 2 of their 3 prior encounters. Both of them know each other quite well and they will be determined to leave it all out on the line here in Tokyo to represent their country. I expect a tight match between these two differing style players and they will both have some incredibly entertaining rallies, but I see Karen edging this just because Diego has not been good on his serve and Karen has been solid on his, allowing Karen to break easily and hold his serve with confidence.