ATP Masters in Madrid, round of 16, Tuesday, 29.04.2025, 21:30
The preparations for the French Open are in full swing. Jannik Sinner (still suspended) and Carlos Alcaraz may be missing from the Masters in Madrid, but the tournament is of course not short of top stars.
In the round of 16, a third seed from the USA will be aiming to progress. In my Fritz Ruud tip, I’ll tell you why I don’t have a real favorite and am therefore betting on “over 2.5 sets”.
Having traveled to Madrid as the world number four, Taylor Fritz is hoping for a decent result. The 27-year-old is making a late start to the clay court season and had to pull out of the Masters in Monte Carlo with an injury. He also did not play the BMW Open. Will he be fit enough to impress in Madrid?
The 6-1, 6-4 opening win against Christopher O’Connell looked quite confident, but a little later the facade crumbled somewhat. Fritz played Benjamin Bonzi and progressed – but nobody knows whether that would have worked without his opponent giving up.
At 4-6, 7-5 from the American’s point of view, the match was over. It was only after the fifth set point that Fritz was able to close out the second set. Not surprisingly, it was his own serve that did the trick. Bonzi was only allowed to break once – but Fritz himself didn’t manage a higher rate
The break from competition was clearly noticeable, and now he’s up against a proven specialist on clay. Fritz reached the semi-finals in Madrid a year ago, but was beaten by Andrey Rublev.
After a break of around a month, meeting Casper Ruud in the round of 16 should not be a great advantage. Or is it? Let’s take a look at the direct comparison together, because these two players have already had one or two cracking duels.
Last year, both secured one victory each. While Fritz won in four sets at the US Open, Ruud took the victory at the French Open. No surprise for me, because we all know that the Norwegian is strongest on clay.
Fritz, on the other hand, prefers the faster surface at almost two meters. So Ruud leads 2:1 in the direct comparison. Of course, it is also interesting to note that none of the three victories have been straightforward. Close duels are the order of the day, so it was not easy to name the favorite.
According to our bookmakers with PayPal function, Ruud is ahead with average odds of 1.70:2.20. Obviously, a lot of value is placed here on who likes to play on clay. Casper Ruud must be happy that he can finally play on his favorite surface again.
The Norwegian only collected six victories at the start of the year, although he did reach the final once (in Dallas). And yet, he had imagined his return to the red clay to be very different. In Monte Carlo, after beating Roberto Bautista Agut, he was defeated early on by Alexei Popyrin.
Ruud showed a slight improvement in Barcelona. Here he won against Daniel Elahni Galan and Hamad Mededovic, but was knocked out in the quarter-finals against Holger Rune. These performances did not live up to his own expectations either
I was all the more surprised by the aplomb with which the 26-year-old is now serving in Madrid. The first match resulted in a 6-3 6-4 win against Arthur Rinderknech, and a little later he gave Sebastian Korda no chance with a 6-3, 6-3 win.
However, Korda missed four out of five break chances, Fritz could be a little more efficient with such opportunities. As much as the Scandinavian enjoys competing on clay, he hasn’t really been able to make peace with the Masters in Madrid.
In 2021, he stormed into the semi-finals here, but since then he has always missed out on the quarter-finals. Last year, after two straight wins in the opening round, he was beaten in this very round by Felix Auger-Aliassime.
My Fritz Ruud tip
Neither Casper Ruud nor Taylor Fritz are in absolute gala form at the moment. The US American still doesn’t look really fit and recently benefited from Benjamin Bonzi’s retirement.
Ruud has improved, but it is difficult to assess how consistent he actually is. Since the head-to-head duels so far have been quite close and I see the two as roughly on a par, I’ve decided on the following tip:
We’ll see three sets!
