Tennis Betting Advice - May 2022
French Open Day 2: Match acca, bagels, and a 100/1 shot…
Monday 23rd May 2022
Welcome to Day 2 of your French Open 2022 daily service…
Good morning. We’re underway in Paris. The tournament kicked off on Sunday with a total of 40 singles matches across the men’s & women’s events. Eight of those 40 1st round contests were won by the pre-match underdog in the betting…
The biggest price shock of the day came very early on, with one half of my 70/1 Outright Winner double, Ons Jabeur (12/1), beaten by Magda Linette in three sets. Linette was 5/1 in the Match Winner market – but ended up playing like the favourite. No excuses; Jabeur froze. Ons is a determined personality though, and she has the chance to get back in our good books at Wimbledon next month, where we’re on Jabeur at early prices of 40/1 & 33s for SW19 (now trading at 28/1 – 20/1).
Elsewhere on day one here in the French capital, our two other picks in action in the targeted bottom half of the draw both won through to the 2nd round, in straight sets – Maria Camila Osorio Serrano, and Jil Belen Teichmann. Bianca Andreescu and Anett Kontaveit look to get their Roland Garros campaigns underway today. You can catch up on yesterday’s Outright Winner preview featuring those selections, here.
Day 2…
Moving on to the Day 2 schedule then, and we have lots to get through this Monday morning. The opening couple of days of a Grand Slam are always busy. And that’s fine by me: lots of matches means lots of potential opportunities to bag a winning price or two. The French Open spreads out the 1st round over the first three days. There are 50 matches on the Order of Play today…
17/1 match acca…
I’m putting up these seven players as my Monday picks for a Match Winner accumulator. The full house comes in at 17/1:
Men’s:
SEBASTIAN BAEZ to beat Dusan Lajovic – two clay-courters here, but I’m with the young Argentinean. 21-year-old Baez is starting to make a name for himself, winning a first ATP title this season. Lajovic showed what he can still do on clay with an upset win against Casper Ruud the other week. But over the years, that’s been part of the problem with the 31-year-old Serbian; able to raise his game on the odd big occasion, but lacking the consistency to ever break into the Top 20. Lajovic has never been past the 3rd round at the French Open, and went out in the 1st round last season.
KAMIL MAJCHRZAK to beat Brandon Nakashima – a closely-matched one here, with just four ranking places separating them. But Majchrzak boasts the far superior career record on clay, and reached the quarter finals in Geneva last week. In these conditions, I’m with the Polish player.
Women’s:
MARTINA TREVISAN to beat Harriet Dart – the Brit has little if any clay-court pedigree to point to, and lost her last match to a player ranked no.773 in the world. In comparison, Italy’s Trevisan loves the red dirt, and arrives here on the back of a maiden WTA title win in Morocco last week.
LIUDMILA SAMSONOVA to beat Danka Kovinic – this is world no.27 v no.95. The younger, higher-ranked Samsonova won their only previous meeting, 2-0 on hard courts in the USA in March. On clay, the Russian made the semi finals in Stuttgart last month.
ANGELIQUE KERBER to beat Magdalena Frech – German former world no.1 Kerber landed us a match win in Strasbourg last week, then went on to win the whole tournament, for her first WTA title on clay since 2016. Frech looks an honest battler, but has never been higher than no.86 in the rankings. Ten years the senior of the two, I trust in Kerber here.
VIKTORIJA GOLUBIC to beat Katie Volynets – while Volynets might have one of the best and most appropriate tennis-player names of all time, my money is on Golubic. While 20-year-old Katie could prove one to look out for in the future, right now I find it hard to read too much into the lower-tier form that saw her win the USA wildcard place here in Paris.
PETRA KVITOVA to beat Anna Bondar – Kvitova’s current form is a far cry from when she reached the semi finals here in 2020, but the Czech can get her spring/ summer season going with a 1st round win this morning. Petra has cleared this hurdle in her last 10 visits to Roland Garros. Bondar has the potential to cause problems, but the 24-year-old has never won a main draw match at any of the four Grand Slams.
Bagels for the world no.1…
Women’s odds-on tournament favourite Iga Swiatek gets her challenge started today. The world no.1 is just 4/5 (1.8) to lift the trophy. And just 1/50 (1.02) to beat no.119 Lesia Tsurenko in the 1st round. That 1/50 Match Winner price offers just 20 pence profit from a £10 stake. We can use the stats and markets to do better than that…
Backing the 6-0 Set Correct Score is a tactic we’ve used before. And the way this season is going for the 20-year-old, the whitewash ‘bagel’ score-line is one to look out for in Swiatek matches…
Backing the 6-0 score can provide a handy way to cash-in on Iga’s dominance – and in one foul swoop, gain much greater returns that the odds-on 4/5 price for her to win the entire tournament:
Consulting the prices for today’s match against Tsurenko, the 6-0 is the price that I like. With bookies offering a 1st Set Correct Score market going 11/2 (6.5) and 5/1 (6.0) for that outcome.
The 2nd Set market is much harder to come across as I write, although you’ll be able to get it in-play (or the equivalent, eg. ‘Under 6.5 Games’ in 2nd Set).
Additionally, we can look to profit from a one-sided score-line by going to the Match Total Games market, where Under 16.5 Games would pay out on a dominant result for either player – eg. 6-2, 6-2, or indeed, 6-0, 6-0. For example, Under 16.5 Games is 5/6 (1.83) with Bet365.
66/1 and 100/1 outsiders…
Last but certainly not least (I told you it was a busy day), two big prices to add to our women’s Outright Winner book…
In the top half of the draw, Ones to Watch regular JESSICA PEGULA can mount a challenge at 66/1 and 50/1. The American looks a bit calmer about her game again lately, and recently played very well to reach the final on clay at the big WTA 1000 in Madrid.
In the bottom half, ANGELIQUE KERBER can take advantage of the hole left by Ons Jabeur’s early exit. And at 150/1, 125/1, and 100/1 here, after winning the title in Strasbourg last week, the resurgent 34-year-old might well fancy her chances of going deep this fortnight.
Kerber found some great form in that Roland Garros warm-up tournament last week, drawing on all her considerable experience and match-play toughness to come through the longest WTA final of the season, 7-6, 6-7, 7-6, against the dangerous young hitter Kaja Juvan.
Angie has won three Majors in her career. Like Stan Wawrinka and Wimbledon, the French Open is the one trophy missing from her Grand Slam collection. How she'd love to go deep here, turning back the clock, and taking her chance in this broadly open side of the draw…
While the vast majority of our Ones to Watch business is done by searching out youngsters and upcoming players. We don't discriminate on age. Kerber at 34 might not be done yet. Last season, while the US Open final in New York was contested by a pair of teenagers (Emma Raducanu and Leylah Fernandez), the French Open 2021 saw Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova reach a maiden Major final, at the age of 29, at odds of 150/1. Stanger things have happened…
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Ones to Watch picks:
French Open 2022
Match Winner:
Iga Swiatek v Lesia Tsurenko:
Women’s Outright Winner – Each Way (1/2 odds 1-2 places):
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Play starts from 10am.
I’ll be back at 8am tomorrow with your Day 3 email.
Enjoy the tennis…
Best wishes,
Tom Wilson