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Notes from the Tour: Anticipating a 100/1 surge...
Wednesday 25th March 2026
So far this year the number of 100/1 finalists is running low. But that could all be about to change…
This time last year, there had already been five 100/1+ finalists on the tour. And by the end of March 2025, that figure had climbed to six…
In 2024, once the Miami Open was done and dusted to see off March, my records show three 100/1+ finalists had already gone on the board…
In 2023, two… in 2022, three… in 2021, five… and five again by March in 2020…
With six x 100/1+ finalists recorded by this stage of the season in 2019… two in 2018… five in 2017… and six in 2016…
But so far in 2026, the tally rests at just one. That was 20-year-old Czech, Sara Bejlek, winning WTA Abu Dhabi last month as a qualifier…
We could be about to witness a swing in the stats…
This week’s Miami Open is at the quarter-final stage today (play continues 7pm UK time). Four of the eight men left in the field started the tournament last week at whopping odds of 150/1+ in the Outright Winner market:
Jiri Lehecka
Martin Landaluce (qualifier)
Francisco Cerundolo
Frances Tiafoe
While in the women’s event in Miami, fast-improving American youngster Hailey Baptiste takes on world no.1 Aryna Sabalenka in the quarter finals tonight. Baptiste started the tournament as a 400/1 rank outsider.
March isn’t done yet, and there are five tournaments starting from Monday next week…
Including ATP Houston and WTA Charleston, two long-standing fixtures on the US circuit, as we start to think about clay courts, with the French Open the next Major, coming up in May.
The week after Miami has proven to be big-odds territory in recent years…
In the five seasons played since the March 2020 Covid lockdown (when there were no tournaments played), the week directly after the Miami Open has produced finalists at these giant odds, one year after another:
100/1
50/1
50/1
150/1
500/1
Plenty of giant-price potential for us, as always, as we target the next batch of appealing youngsters and underdogs, at chunky Each Way prices…
AND…
Ones to Watch members are still cheering for a Big One this week, with our 80/1 shot Arthur Fils taking on home hope Tommy Paul in the men’s Miami quarter finals, late tonight (Midnight+). Fils is now 16/1 to go all the way…
If you’re not a member yet…
Don’t miss next week’s big picks…
Enjoy the tennis…
Oliver Upstone