The bottom half of the ATP Tokyo draw has plenty of star power on day two. Casper Ruud takes on Luciano Darderi in a match that looks straightforward on paper but carries a few question marks. Stefanos Tsitsipas renews acquaintances with Tomas Martin Etcheverry. And then there is the main event: defending champion Carlos Alcaraz opens his title defence against Alex Michelsen in what should be one of the most watchable first round contests of the week.
Ruud leads their head to head at 1-0, and it was a convincing one. The Norwegian dismantled Darderi 6-1, 6-1 in a Rome semifinal, which is about as emphatic as it gets. The catch is that result came on clay, which is Darderi’s natural habitat, so Ruud was already beating him on his best surface. Moving to a hard court in Tokyo actually adds a layer of uncertainty rather than making this more clear cut.
Darderi is a more dangerous proposition on hard courts. He takes the ball early, generates real pace off the forehand, and can hurt opponents before they get comfortable in rallies. Ruud will want to slow things down, use his serve to control the tempo and drag Darderi into longer exchanges where his superior consistency tends to tell. The Italian has the firepower to cause problems, but Ruud is simply the more complete operator and his mental solidity on tour is genuinely underrated.
Prediction: Ruud in 3
Tsitsipas holds a 2-0 head to head advantage over Etcheverry, with wins at Monte Carlo in 2024 and then at the French Open in 2025, both in straight sets. That tells you something about who tends to impose themselves when these two meet.
The key battleground here is the forehand exchange. Etcheverry can produce serious weight from the baseline and will look to grind Tsitsipas into uncomfortable positions. The problem for the Argentine is that Tsitsipas has considerably more variety. He can attack short balls, step inside the court and take the net away from Etcheverry, and his one handed backhand gives him options that a flatter ball striker simply does not have. Etcheverry needs his serve firing to keep Tsitsipas from getting comfortable. If he does not get that free point early in rallies, the Greek tends to take over. Based on form and the pattern of their previous meetings, Tsitsipas looks the safer pick.
Prediction: Tsitsipas in 3
These two have not faced each other before, which adds a small element of the unknown. What we do know is that Alcaraz won this tournament on debut last year, dropping only one set across the entire week. He arrives as the man to beat and in the kind of form that makes him extremely difficult to plan against.
Michelsen has had a genuinely impressive season after shaking off injury troubles earlier in the year. Reaching the US Open quarterfinals was a real statement and pushed him to a career high ranking. He has a big serve and hits through the court with conviction, which means he will get his moments in this match. The issue is that Alcaraz is one of the few players on tour who can take a hard hitter’s pace and redirect it before they have time to reset. The drop shot, the change of direction, the ability to suddenly rush the net on a short ball, all of those tools make him uniquely awkward to prepare for. Michelsen will win games and likely a set of points here and there, but Alcaraz should close this out without too much stress.
Prediction: Alcaraz in 2
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