The ATP Gstaad Open starts on Monday. It promises to be an entertaining tournament with all four seeds Denis Shapovalov, Roberto Bautista Agut, Casper Ruud and Cristian Garin. They will join the fray later in the week, but on day one twelve players will battle for a second round spot and we here at LWOT will be offering our predictions for all six games, including Feliciano Lopez v Marc-Andrea Huesler. But who will reach the second round?

ATP Gstaad Predictions Day 1

Marc Polmans v Sandro Ehrat

Face-to-face: first meeting

Sandro Ehrat is a 30 year old Swiss currently ranked 397^e in the world. It mainly competes on the ITF Tour and rarely participates in tournaments outside of Europe. But after a spirited performance in the qualifying rounds, Ehrat entered the main draw of a ATP 250 for the first time in many years and he will undoubtedly be motivated in the hope of securing his second victory at the circuit level.

Australian Marc Polmans is a constant presence on the ATP Challenger Tour, with a title at this level to his credit. But although their past results indicate Polmans is the better player of the two, Ehrat will surely be ready to challenge him at home. Yet Polmans has already won majors and has a lot more experience at this level than Ehrat. Expect it to come out on top thanks to this experience and its superior gameplay.

Prediction: Polmans in 2
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Benoit Paire vs. Jozef Kovalik

Face-to-face: Pair 1-0 Kovalik

Benoit Paire showed his finesse in his match against Juan Pablo Varillas at the ATP Hamburg Open. He effortlessly hit the winners throughout the game, which reminded us of his old abilities and charm. He fell in the second round in three sets, despite four match points on serve, but it was still a relatively promising performance from the Frenchman. Paire also leads the one-on-one against their first-round opponent in Gstaad, Jozef Kovalik, after winning their only previous match.

Kovalik hasn’t fired in recent times, having suffered losses to players ranked outside the top 150 in the past three weeks. These recent results suggest that he has a lot to improve before he can challenge a player of the quality of Pair. If Paire keeps his cool, not always his strong suit, it should be a relatively easy game for him.

Prediction: Pair in 2
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Mikael Ymer vs. Alex Molcan

Face-to-face: first meeting

Mikael Ymer has made third round appearances at the Australian Open and French Open this season despite playing the majority of his tennis at Challenger level. However, he seems more and more comfortable at the highest level. The Swede has good quality groundstrokes and is an excellent defensive player on clay. His run in the third round at Roland Garros in particular showed his ability to hang on in difficult times.

Alex Molcan, meanwhile, recently played two clay finals, one on a Challenger and another on the ATP Belgrade Tour, where he put world No.1 Novak Djokovic to work for the win. However, while he played honorably in this game, he doesn’t have significant results against a top player. In short, Molcan is not at Ymer’s level. It might be a hotly contested game, but Ymer should win.

Prediction: Ymer in 3

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