Fernando Verdasco aims to see off Juan Carlos Ferrero and reach the last sixteen of the Shanghai Masters today.
Verdasco has never relished competing at the Shanghai Masters and his opening round win was the first time he'd won a match in three appearances at the tournament. The The Spaniard comfortably saw off wildcard Zhe Li 6-2, 6-2 in just over an hour.
Verdasco does not look in the form to go deep this week going by his performances in Beijing. He scraped through to the quarters before getting completely annihilated 6-1, 6-0 by Tomas Berdych.
Ferrero has not beaten Verdasco for three years but he will not get a better chance than this to get a win over his compatriot. Ferrero enjoyed an impressive 7-6(4), 6-4 win over Mikhail Youzhny in the opening round and his confidence is quite high going into the remainder of the season after his run to the US Open fourth round last month.
Verdasco does lead 3-2 on the head-to-head, beating Ferrero twice in 2009. However that was back when he was pushing for a place in the top ten.
Look for Ferrero to even things up with a straight sets win today.
