Brandon Nakashima vs Mackenzie Mcdonald Prediction & Betting Tips - ATP Australian Open

Prediction published on 14/01/2023, 11:49  by Steve Ashfield | Modified on 14/01/2023 at 16:24 in Tennis Predictions

Brandon Nakashima is up against MacKenzie McDonald in the Australian Open first round. The winner of this match could have a tough time in round two as their potential opponents are Rafael Nadal or Jack Draper. Nakashima is ranked 47th at the time of writing this article. He ended last year by winning the Next Gen Finals and will be looking to build on that in 2023. Last year was a good 12 months for the American with two title wins, the other being in San Diego which is his home town. He also made it to the fourth round at Wimbledon and the third round in New York. It's not gone too well for him in Australia so far. In 2021 he lost in the first qualifying round of this event and last year was beaten in the first round by the seventh seeded Matteo Berrettini in four sets. Now he bids to win his first match in the Australian Open and his first match of the new year. His only tournament this year was the second Adelaide International event, losing in the first round to seventh seeded Alejandro Davidovich Fokina.

MacKenzie McDonald was ranked 16 places below his opponent in the list published on February 8. The American has had more success in this Grand Slam getting to the fourth round in 2021 before losing in straight sets to Daniil Medvedev. Last year saw McDonald fail to get past the third round of any of the four Grand Slam events. 2022 ended with three straight losses. He's played two tournaments this year but only won two of his four matches. That was against Daniel Elahi Galan who retired after losing the first set. McDonald then lost to Yoshihito Nishioka. The second Adelaide International saw McDonald beat fifth seeded Dan Evans but was then beaten by qualifier Mikael Ymer. These two players have had a couple of previous meetings with the score level at 1-1. Nakashima seems to be making more progress up the rankings than his opponent and can get the win here.