Munar vs Hijikata — ranking on one side, hard-court mileage on the other
Preview · National Bank Open, Montréal (ATP Masters 1000) · First round · 2 August 2026
On paper this is a mismatch: a top-forty Spaniard against an Australian scrapping at the edge of the top hundred. Look at what each has done on hard courts in 2026 and the picture inverts. Both are direct entries into a first round the seeds have skipped, and the gap between their rankings is wider than the gap between their prospects.
The matchup
Munar is 29, from Mallorca, and sits inside the world’s top forty-five with a career high of 33. He is the archetype of the modern Spanish grinder: heavy topspin, exceptional court coverage, and a willingness to make a match last as long as it needs to. His best weeks came early, with a quarter-final in Adelaide in January where he beat Daniel Altmaier and Francisco Cerundolo, and another in Rotterdam in February that included a win over Karen Khachanov. At the Australian Open he came through five sets against Dalibor Svrčina before Casper Ruud ended him.
Hijikata is 25, Australian, ranked in the mid-nineties in singles with a career best of 62, and considerably higher regarded in doubles, where he has been inside the top twenty-five. What matters here is the surface breakdown: fifteen of his wins this year have come on hard courts against nine defeats, comfortably his most productive ground. He is small by tour standards and plays accordingly, taking the ball early and using the return to compress rallies rather than extend them.
They have met once, at Rome in 2024 on clay, where Munar won 6-4 7-5 — useful on how the Spaniard handles a compact ball-striker, though on entirely the wrong surface for present purposes.
Form & conditions
Hijikata has been the busier man by a distance. In June he qualified at Queen’s and then beat Alejandro Tabilo and Jiri Lehecka to reach the quarter-finals on grass, losing there to Ugo Humbert. At Wimbledon he went five sets with Jesper de Jong and came out the wrong side. Last week in Los Cabos he took the opening set off eighth seed Denis Shapovalov before losing in three. That is a player at a decent level losing to good opponents.
Munar’s summer has been quieter, and his hard-court balance for the season is a losing one. His game is built for slow, high-bouncing conditions, and Montréal is neither: these courts reward first-strike tennis and punish players who need four shots to construct a point.
The deciding factor
Whether Munar can drag the exchanges out to a length that suits him. Hijikata’s route to an upset is to keep points short, return aggressively and force the Spaniard to hit winners rather than wear him down. Munar’s route is the reverse — absorb, extend, and let the Australian’s smaller margins catch up with him. Pace is the variable, and pace favours the underdog.
The call
The lean is Munar, because the ranking gap reflects a real difference in quality and he has solved this puzzle once already, though confidence is genuinely low: Hijikata’s hard-court record and sharper recent match play make this the sort of first round where seeds are glad to be watching.
