Gaël Monfils opens his ATP Canadian Masters campaign on Monday against Kamil Majchrzak in Montreal, a first-round match that lands in the middle of his swan song. The 39-year-old is entering the last stretch of his season, and this one comes with a familiar edge: a crowd that is expected to be with him from the first ball to the last.
That matters because Monfils is not walking into an even betting line. Majchrzak, 30, is a -320 favorite, while Monfils is listed at +255 on the moneyline at FanDuel, a gap that reflects how sharply the market views the matchup. Michael Leboff wrote the betting analysis, and the numbers point to a simple read: the crowd may be behind Monfils, but the board is leaning the other way.
Majchrzak has earned that respect. In June, he won his first career title at 's-Hertogenbosch after beating Felix Auger-Aliassime, Alex de Minaur and Daniil Medvedev, then last week he added Tommy Paul at ATP Washington. That run is the kind of form that changes how a first-round match is priced, especially against a veteran whose name still draws cheers in Montreal.
Montréal gives Monfils something the odds do not. Fans in Montreal are described as adoring him, and that support is expected to carry him through one of the final tournament runs of his career. But the market is built on performance, not affection, and the friction in this matchup is obvious: a beloved 39-year-old in his final season against a 30-year-old who is playing the best tennis of his career right now.
The unanswered question is not whether Monfils will have the crowd; he will. It is whether that support can bend a matchup that already tilts toward Majchrzak, or whether Monday becomes another reminder that this farewell season will be measured less by ceremony than by how much tennis Monfils can still win.
