Alexander Zverev started off his 2024 Monte-Carlo Masters campaign with a strong win over Sebastian Ofner in two sets.
Zverev has had some notable performances in Monte Carlo before, and it's certainly a court that he likes to play on. He demonstrated all of that by comfortably navigating a somewhat tricky matchup against Ofner in two sets.
The Austrian is no stranger to clay and generally plays pretty well on that surface. Just last year, he downed Sebastian Korda at Roland Garros in straight sets, so he can certainly make his opponent's life miserable.
Zverev, who doesn't want to compare himself to his old self, was fully aware of that, but he didn't allow it to happen in this match. The start of the match was pretty good for the German, who easily won his service game.
He applied some pressure but didn't get the break immediately; however, he would get it in Ofner's service game after that. After getting the break, Zverev continued cruising through the games thanks to his massive serve, which did a lot of damage.
He dropped only a handful of points behind his serve in that first set and did quite well on return. Ofner was the more aggressive player, but he wasn't quite sharp enough to threaten his opponent.
The second set was more impressive from Zverev, who jumped out to an early lead and then added another break later on for the 5-2 lead to serve for the match. He didn't quite finish it off after that because Ofner was able to break him and make things interesting, but he didn't really have enough to completely overturn the score in his favor.
It was just a pretty solid win for Zverev, with the final score being 6-3, 6-4. He had only one ace, adding 11 winners and only ten unforced errors to that.
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