Tallon Griekspoor vs Quentin Halys Prediction & Betting Tips - ATP Qatar Open

Prediction published on 20/02/2023, 08:12  by Steve Ashfield | Modified on 20/02/2023 at 09:13 in Tennis Predictions

Tallon Griekspoor begins this Qatar ExxonMobil Open at a career high ranking of 40th. He takes on Quentin Halys with the winner facing a tough draw in round two with number one seed Andrey Rublev the scheduled opponent. Griekspoor began this year ranked 95th in the world but has been steadily rising up the list. In the ATP Race (based on points earned this year) the Dutch player is in 38th place. This year has already seen him win one title. He won the ATP 250 (the same level as this tournament) held in Pune, coming from behind to beat Benjamin Bonzi in the final. He followed that up with a run to the third round of the Australian Open. He'd have loved his second round win over Dutch number one Botic Van de Zandschlup who he's now only six places behind in the rankings. Griekspoor lost to eventual runner-up Stefanos Tsitsispas in round three. Since then, Griekspoor has played just one singles tournament. That was in Rotterdam last week where he had a win over Alexander Zverev but lost in the semi-finals to Jannik Sinner. Only nine players on the ATP Tour have earne more points than Griekspoor.

Quentin Halys is the world number 64, that's just three places below his career high of 61 achieved in January. The French player has risen 56 places in the last 12 months. He has work to do this week though as he'd down to 73rd in the live list. That's because last February saw him win a Challenger Tour tournament and those points are due to expire on the 27th. This year has seen him make steady progress on the main ATP Tour. He took on Novak Djokovic in the first Adelaide International and lost in straight sets but both went to a tie-break. That was followed up by a run to the last eight in Auckland, losing to Jenson Brooksby in another match decided by two tie-breaks. He lost to Stefanos Tsitsipas in the Australian Open first round but since then has reached the last eight in Montpellier and the last 32 in Rotterdam where he lost to Van de Zandschlup. In the qualifying rounds, he had one match that saw three tie-breaks, so a bet on one here could be a winner. He lost that to Gregoire Barriere in the qualifying rounds but got into the main draw as a lucky loser. Back Griekspoor to get the win though