Lloyd Harris plays Aslan Karatsev in an unheralded 2021 Dubai ATP 500 final on Saturday, March 20th. The match is yet to be scheduled. Get the live streaming options of this Lloyd Harris v Aslan Karatsev match along with its preview, head to head, and tips here.
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Lloyd Harris v Aslan Karatsev Head to Head
This is the first meeting between both players.
Also Read:
Best Week Of His Career Sees Harris In ATP 500 Final
24-year-old South African Lloyd Harris has been on the tour for only a couple years now, but done well to break into the top 100 of the ATP rankings.
The winner of 13 ITF Futures titles, Harris had a good start to 2020 before the pandemic hit. The South African made the finals of the 2020 ATP 250 at Adelaide, where he lost in the finals to Andrey Rublev who went on a run last year.
2021 did not get off the best of starts for Harris, but the South African started to get it it together with a strong win last week in Doha against Stan Wawrinka before a narrow loss to in-form Hungarian Marton Fucsovics.
Coming to Dubai this week, he looked clinical in the qualifiers and followed it with a good comeback three set win against Aussie Christopher O’ Connell in the first round. Against top seed and 2020 US Open champion Dominic Thiem, Harris played perhaps the best match of his career against a somewhat rusty Austrian and prevailed in straight sets.
Another impressive win against the uncanny Serb Filip Krajinovic in straight sets continued the run for Harris setting up a quarter-final against Kei Nishikori who himself is on a comeback trail.
The young South African was off to a flier against Nishikori, rushing to a 5-0 first set lead and although the Japanese fought back to equalize the match, Harris claimed a semi-final encounter against rising Canadian Denis Shapovalov.
Shapovalov got off to a good start, but Harris hung in as the Canadian took a tight opening set tiebreak. Up 4-2 in the second, Shapovalov looked all set for the semi-finals, but a drop in level and a run by Harris saw the South African clinch the set 6-4.
The decider stayed on serve, but Harris put the breaks on the Shapovalov serve and eventually the tie-break was a matter of inches with Harris clinching it 8-6 and making his first ever ATP 500 final, and in turn hurting Shapovalov’s ATP semi-finals further to a 2-10 win loss record.
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The Karatsev Dream Continues..
Playing in his first ever Grand Slam at this year’s Australian Open, Russian Aslan Karatsev had a magical run, making the semi-finals defeating the likes of Diego Schwartzman, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Grigor Dimitrov before falling at the hands of world number one and eventual champion Novak Djokovic.
Karatsev’s spectacular run saw him become an overnight star on the tour as his ranking went up more than 100 places from being a qualifier ranked in the top 150 in the world to within the top 40 right now.
Coming to Dubai, he was off to a convincing straight sets win against Belarusian Egor Gerasimov, but has since come up with three wins in deciders against seeded players all in good touch, i.e. Dan Evans, Lorenzo Sonego, and Jannik Sinner.
This set up a semi-final against the in-form fellow Russian Andrey Rublev who was on a 23 match winning streak at ATP 500s across Hamburg, St.Petersburg, Vienna, Rotterdam and now Dubai and it did not seem like there was any stopping him from another win and a shot at another title tomorrow.
However, Karatsev had other plans as he came out all guns blazing and broke Rublev twice to clinch the first set 6-2. A tight second set followed where Rublev saved several break points at 3-3 to hold, and then upped the pressure on the Karatsev serve and clinched the set 6-4.
A tight start to the third set followed but before one knew it, Karatsev was off the blocks leading 5-2 and serving for the match. Nerves followed as he got broken at 5-2 and when serving at 5-4 had to save break points and miss converting match points before sealing the match and a spot in the title round 6-4 in the third.
Harris v Karatsev Prediction and Tip
An unexpected but well deserved final for both players makes for an intriguing encounter. Karatsev has continued the Aussie Open dream story into the Middle East this week, and Harris has had a phenomenal week through qualifiers and defeating top ranked players.
A tussle on the cards, but the Karatsev game is looking very promising at the moment. Expect the Russian to scrape out a tight win in a decider.
Tip: Karatsev to win in three sets: 4/7 (bet365)
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The 2021 ATP Dubai Open will be played from March 14-21. You can watch & bet on these matches here. Get your latest premium tennis predictions here.
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