World number two Carlos Alcaraz will face surprise entrant and 65th-ranked Jan-Lennard Struff in the FINAL of the 2023 ATP Madrid Masters on Sunday, May 7. Get the predictions and odds of this Carlos Alcaraz v Jan-Lennard Struff match along with its preview, head to head, and tips here.
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Carlos Alcaraz v Jan-Lennard Struff Head to Head
There have been two previous meetings between these two and the head to head is tied at 1-1. Interestingly, Struff had defeated Alcaraz at the 2021 French Open – on clay – before the Spaniard had his revenge at the 2022 Wimbledon.
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Alcaraz Bandwagon Extends to Another Final
Alcaraz began his season only in mid-February but he has been making up for lost time since then. In fact more than that.
Featuring in his sixth tournament of the season at Madrid, Alcaraz has now made it to five finals already. On clay, this record gets even more superlative with the Spaniard winning 18 of the 19 matches he has played and his only defeat coming in the final of the Rio Open to Cameron Norrie.
To get to the title-decider here, Alcaraz was taken to a three-setter by Emil Ruusuvuori in the second round in this tournament but since then has barely been tested.
Grigor Dimitrov took five games off him in the third round and Karen Khachanov did the same in the quarterfinals but nobody else has been able to win a set. The latest casualty was Borna Coric, whom he sent packing 6-4, 6-3.
A break in the first set is all that he needed to wrap things up while in the second set, Alcaraz went a break up, dropped his serve in the next game before clinching the decisive break in the very next game.
He then broke Coric as the Croat served at 3-5 to stay in the match.
Alcaraz shouldn’t face too many issues here by most estimates.
Struff No Lucky Loser Any More
He might have made it to the main draw as a lucky loser following his second qualifier defeat at the hands of Aslan Karatsev but six successive wins from that point onward, including five in three sets have meant Struff will start the new week coming Monday having broken into the top 30.
To be honest, Struff had already shown what he is capable of at the Monte-Carlo Masters, where as a world number 100, he had not just qualified for the event but also made it past Albert Ramos-Vinolas, Alex de Minaur and Casper Ruud to enter the quarterfinal.
Here, he has gone two better.
While one would have expected Struff to do a good job against the likes of Lorenzo Sonego, Ben Shelton, Dusan Lajovic and Pedro Cachin given the kind of form he’s been in, a shock win over the 1/5 favourite Stefanos Tsitsipas earned him a place in the semifinal.
And more recently, Struff overcame the loss of the first set to Aslan Karatsev to enter just the second ever title-deciding round of his career.
While Alcaraz is a bridge too far for most players, Struff will know he has nothing to lose here and should spice things up as a result of that.
Alcaraz v Struff Prediction and Tip
It would be tough for us to make any prediction other than a straight-set win for Alcaraz despite all that Struff has done in this tournament. At the most he might push Alcaraz to 7-5 in one of the sets but even that might not seem like the most prudent of calls.
Tips:
- Low Risk Tip: Alcaraz to win in straight sets: 2/7
- Moderate Risk Tip: Under 19.5 games in the match: 8/11
The 2023 ATP Madrid Open will be played from April 26 to May 7. You can get all the tennis betting news with our tennis betting blog here. Also get rest of the tennis match previews here.
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