Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong Prediction, Stats, Form, H2H, March 5th 2024

We are almost ready to go with main draw action in California at the BNP Paribas Open. One more day of qualifying remains for both tours. Let’s look more at Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong on the ATP side of things.

Hong’s win probability sits at just 34.7% while Nagal is favoured to win at 1.42 odds. The handicap is 3.5 games and the total games line is 22.

For more daily tennis tips, visit the bettingexpert community, but if you want more expert tips from Jon Reid, visit our Expert Insights section.

Our Nagal vs Hong prediction is for Nagal to cover the 3.5-game handicap.

In this article:

• Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong Prediction
• Sumit Nagal Recent Form
• Seongchan Hong Recent Form
• Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong H2H Stat of the Match
• Safer Gambling

Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong Prediction

• Prediction: Nagal -4 Games
• Best Odds: 2.07
• Bookmaker: Pinnacle
• Stakes: 4/10

Odds as at 12:40 pm UK Time on March 5th, 2024. Odds may now differ.

I haven’t been one to typically back Nagal of late. In most matches, I either find his prices fair or rather overvalued.

In this match, however, he is only a 3.5-game handicap against a player that he should be able to beat by a fairly comfortable margin. Not only is Nagal far more likely to enjoy these conditions, but he’s also playing someone that also plays the level of Challenger Tour tournaments he does at the moment. Nagal has proven time and again in the last few months that when playing this calibre of opponent, he’s more likely than not to cover this handicap.

Read on for more expert insights.

Sumit Nagal Recent Form

After qualifying for the Australian Open and reaching the second round with a stunning win over Alexander Bublik, Nagal went back to his native India and impressed there with a series of decisive wins in Chennai to take down the title and then backed that up by reaching the semifinals in Bangalore.

He ran out of steam a bit in Pune and played a much tougher opponent in Dubai, so I avoided betting on him in the first round of qualifying. The potential for lingering fatigue or physical issues seemed to be there. Yet not only did he beat Stefan Dostanic, but he did so losing just four games.

Nagal is known for his never-say-die attitude from the baseline and his ability to construct points that keep his opponents on the run until they miss, or he has enough space to hit through.

His serve isn’t a strength, but his service statistics have improved a bit this year (especially when playing against players of Hong’s calibre) and whether that is thanks to his better spot serving or a slight uptick in pace behind the first delivery I’m not sure, but it has worked.

Given that he has seen a lot of success grinding opponents down in slow conditions in the past, I’m happy to back him here against someone who is far more at home in quicker conditions.

Seongchan Hong Recent Form

Hong’s year has been a bit of an odd one, since I think you could classify it as a success simply based on the fact that he has reached a pair of Challenger tournament finals (one of them from qualifying) and another semifinal.

At the same time, however, that 16-6 record has seen half those losses come in the opening round, and he looked pretty poor and surprisingly vulnerable on serve in Canada at the Davis Cup.

He also needed three sets to win matches against players like Oriol Roca Batalla, Ramkumar Ramanathan and Salvatore Caruso – all players that weren’t very good on hard courts or were just as out of form as can be at the time the match happened. Even his first-round win here came against his countryman Soonwoo Kwon, who has barely played the last few years and who also struggled on slower courts.

Hong has also lost to a pair of very consistent baseliners that pride themselves on eliciting errors from their opponents in Brandon Holt and Maks Kasnikowski this season, with neither of those losses being close.

Throw in a preference for quicker courts that have naturally lower bounces, and a game that often goes haywire and leads to patches of inconsistent missing and I’m not sure if he has the rally tolerance to avoid another lopsided loss today.

Sumit Nagal vs Seongchan Hong H2H – Stat of the Match

This will be the first meeting between the two. In terms of blended hard court elo ratings, Nagal actually leads Hong by a rather significant margin.

This, even though Nagal hasn’t been as strong on hard courts for long chunks of their respective careers. Factor in that these courts are as close to clay as hard courts get (some court speed measurements actually have clay events played at altitude a bit quicker than Indian Wells) and that only plays even more in Nagal’s favour.

SAFER GAMBLING

At bettingexpert, we always take a safe approach to gambling. We’ll never bet more than we can afford or chase losses. For more advice, head to our Safer Gambling hub.