Jie Cui and Pavel Kotov will fight against each other in the 2^nd round of the Shenzhen Challenger for the 1^st time in their career. They are scheduled to play on Wednesday at 11:00 am on CENTER COURT. In this post, we analyze their head to head performance and prediction.

Prediction, odds and live streaming

The pick for Tennis Tonic is Pavel Kotov who should win in 2 sets.

As per the initial odds, Pavel Kotov is the pick to win this match.
Pavel Kotov -> 1.39
Jie Cui -> 2.83

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Prediction and head to head Jie Cui vs. Pavel Kotov

There is no head to head record between Jie Cui and Pavel Kotov since this will be the first time that they will play each other in the main tour.

Jie Cui

Ranked no. 342, the Chinese got to the 2^nd round after defeating James McCabe 6-4 6-4.

In the 1^st round, Cui had a good straight sets win against McCabe (6-4 6-4). During the match, Cui scored 63 points vs McCabe’s 47. The Chinese was exceptionally aggressive to blast 26 winners.

Talking about the service games, Cui couldn’t to score even 1 ace and he committed only 2 double faults. Jie Cui was exceptionally efficient on serve to win 87% (26/30) of his 1st serve and 74% (14/19) on the second serve. This was the main reason for not conceding a single break during the match. The Chinese broke McCabe twice after converting 50% of his break points (2/4).

Cui has a winning win-loss record in the last 8 years having won 56% of his matches (185-144). 30-22 on hard in 2025. In connection with his performance on the same surface of this event, Cui has a composed166-124 win-loss record in the last 8 years on hard.

The Chinese’s best result of the season was reaching the final in the Nonthaburi 2 Challenger,M15 Luan and M25 Luzhou.

The Chinese has an aggregate 31-25 win-loss record in 2025, 30-22 on hard (See FULL STATS).

Previously in the Shenzhen Challenger

Pavel Kotov

Ranked no. 471, Kotov reached the 2^nd round after beating Tianhui Zhang 6-4 6-4.

In the 1^st round, Pavel had a good straight sets win against Zhang (6-4 6-4). During the match Kotov scored 65 points vs Zhang’s 54. The Russian was quite aggressive to blast 31 winners.

Talking about serving, Kotov struck 12 aces and he committed only 5 double faults. Pavel Kotov conceded no breaks for the entire match to save 1 break points. Furthermore, Kotov put 63% of his first serves in, winning 91% (31/34) of the points behind his 1st serve and 50% (10/20) on the 2nd serve. The Russian broke Zhang twice after converting 50% of his break points (2/4).

The Russian has a compiled 11-21 win-loss record in 2025, 9-13 on hard (See FULL STATS).

Previously in the Shenzhen Challenger

Kotov has never competed in this tournament before.

H2H Performance in the tournament

Matches, sets, games and points

Points	Cui	Kotov
Match played	1	1
Tot Set	2	2
Tot Games	20	20
Pts	63-47	65-54
Total Points	110	119
Winners	26	31
%Winners	41%	48%

Both Cui and Kotov played 1 match. Both players have not lost a single set in this event so far. Talking about their workload, Cui and Kotov have played the same amount of sets 2. They also played the same amount of games (20). Jie scored 26 winners (41% of the total points). On the other side, Pavel made 31 winners (48%).

Serve Performance

Serve	Cui	Kotov
Aces	0	12
Avg per match	0	12
1st in	30/49	34/54
%1st in	61%	63%
1st pts	26/30	31/34
%1st pts	87%	91%
2nd pts	14/19	10/20
%2nd pts	74%	50%

Cui didn’t manage to fire a single ace to far. Kotov managed to score 12 aces . Cui won 87% points behind his first serve. He had a solid display on his second serve to win 74% of the points. On the other side, Kotov won 91% of the points behind his first serve. He had a solid display on his second serve to win 50% of the points.

How they played the important points

Breaks	Cui	Kotov
Won	2	2
Converted	2/4	2/4
% Converted	50%	50%
Conceded	0	1
Saved	0	1
% Saved	0%	100%
Times Broken	0	0

The Chinese broke his opponent twice with a 50% conversion rate. Jie quite strong on his serve as he has never surrendered a single service game after saving 0 break points. Kotov broke his opponent twice with a 50% conversion rate. Pavel was rock solid on his serve as he has never conceded a single service game after saving 1 break points.

Cui
	R1 McCabe	Total
Score	6-4 6-4
Tot Set	2	2
Tot Games	20	20
pts	63-47	63-47
Total points	110	110
Winners	26	26
%Winners	41%	41%
SERVE
Aces	0	0
Double Faults	2	2
1st in	30/49	30/49
% 1st in	61%	61%
1st pts	26/30	26/30
% 1st pts	87%	87%
2nd pts	14/19	14/19
% 2nd pts	74%	74%
Breaks
Won	2	2
Converted	2/4	2/4
Converted %	50%	50%
Conceded	0	0
Saved	0/0	0
Saved %	–	0%
Times Broken	0	0

Kotov
	R1 Zhang	Total
Score	6-4 6-4
Tot Set	2	2
Tot Games	20	20
pts	65-54	65-54
Total points	119	119
Winners	31	31
%Winners	48%	48%
SERVE
Aces	12	12
Double Faults	5	5
1st in	34/54	34/54
% 1st in	63%	63%
1st pts	31/34	31/34
% 1st pts	91%	91%
2nd pts	10/20	10/20
% 2nd pts	50%	50%
Breaks
Won	2	2
Converted	2/4	2/4
Converted %	50%	50%
Conceded	1	1
Saved	1/1	1
Saved %	100%	100%
Times Broken	0	0

Tennis Scores in Shenzhen Challenger

• Yi ZhouZhou – Xiaofei WangWang (6-1 6-2) – See score progression
• Fajing SunSun – Jason Murray KublerMurray Kubler (6-2 7-5) – See score progression
• Sergey FominFomin – Arthur WeberWeber (6-4 6-4) – See score progression
• Aoran WangWang – Yuta ShimizuShimizu (3-6 7-5 6-3) – See score progression
• Jason JungJung – Kasidit SamrejSamrej (6-4 7-6(7)) – See score progression
• Henrique RochaRocha – Luca CastelnuovoCastelnuovo (6-3 6-4) – See score progression
• Sho ShimabukuroShimabukuro – Petr Bar BiryukovBar Biryukov (6-4 7-5) – See score progression
• Ye Cong MoCong Mo – Khumoun SultanovSultanov (6-1 6-2) – See score progression
• Omar JasikaJasika – Yasutaka UchiyamaUchiyama (7-6⁵ 1-0 ret.) – See score progression
• Kyrian JacquetJacquet – S D Prajwal DevD Prajwal Dev (6-1 6-4) – See score progression
• Hyeon ChungChung – Rigele TeTe (7-6⁴ 3-0 ret.) – See score progression
• Jie CuiCui – James McCabeMcCabe (6-4 6-4) – See score progression
• Pavel KotovKotov – Tianhui ZhangZhang (6-4 6-4) – See score progression
• Henrique RochaRocha – Luca CastelnuovoCastelnuovo (6-3 6-4) – See score progression
• Ye Cong MoCong Mo – Khumoun SultanovSultanov (6-1 6-2) – See score progression
• Fajing SunSun – Jason Murray KublerMurray Kubler (6-2 7-5) – See score progression
• Yi ZhouZhou – Xiaofei WangWang (6-1 6-2) – See score progression
• Aoran WangWang – Yuta ShimizuShimizu (3-6 7-5 6-3) – See score progression
• Jason JungJung – Kasidit SamrejSamrej (6-4 7-6(7)) – See score progression
• Omar JasikaJasika – Yasutaka UchiyamaUchiyama (7-6(5) 1-0 ret.) – See score progression
• Kyrian JacquetJacquet – S D Prajwal DevD Prajwal Dev (6-1 6-4) – See score progression
• Sho ShimabukuroShimabukuro – Petr Bar BiryukovBar Biryukov (6-4 7-5) – See score progression
• Sergey FominFomin – Arthur WeberWeber (6-4 6-4) – See score progression

Upcoming matches in the draw

• Omar JasikaJasika – Kyrian JacquetJacquet (0-0) – H2H and prediction
• Fajing SunSun – Hyeon ChungChung (0-0) – H2H and prediction
• Lloyd HarrisHarris – Harold MayotMayot (0-1) – H2H and prediction
• Sho ShimabukuroShimabukuro – (0-1) – H2H and prediction
• Pavel KotovKotov – Jie CuiCui (0-0) – H2H and prediction
• Rio NoguchiNoguchi – Kaichi UchidaUchida (3-2) – H2H and prediction
• Kasidit SamrejSamrej – Jason JungJung (0-0) – H2H and prediction