Jodar vs Shapovalov Prediction 15 August 2026

Rafael Jodar comes into the second round in excellent form - eight wins in his last ten matches confirm his consistency on hard courts. His most recent tournament was the Masters in Montreal, where the Spaniard showed his best tennis, defeating Jack Draper, Jiří Lehečka and Arthur Fils, losing only to Brandon Nakashima in the semifinals.

Rafael is an atypical representative of the Spanish tennis school: he plays more matches on hard courts, although his only ATP Tour title was won on clay. That said, the hallmarks of his style still lean more toward slower surfaces, as evidenced by just 74% of points won on serve. Nevertheless, this does not prevent him from producing outstanding results, including through an effective return game, where he converts 43% of break points.

Denis Shapovalov has been showing less consistent results - six wins in his last ten matches. His road to Cincinnati went through the ATP 250 final in Los Cabos and a first-round exit at the Masters 1000 in Montreal. In Cincinnati, however, Denis started with great confidence, beating Adrian Mannarino 6:1, 6:4.

The Canadian, being a natural hard-court player, puts his main emphasis on serve, yet wins even slightly fewer points on it compared to his upcoming opponent (73%). These modest numbers are linked to his at times overly aggressive style: Shapovalov constantly pushes forward on attack, even when trailing on the scoreboard. He starts building pressure from the very first shot, which shows in his not-so-great first-serve percentage (61%). Denis also doesn't hit as many aces as one would like (4.9), while double faults are more than plentiful - 11%.