The Australian Open is getting into full swing now with some big matches already set up for the weekend and plenty more to be set up as the second round concludes on Thursday out in Melbourne.
Wednesday went fairly smoothly for the big names with only Petra Kvitova a real big name who failed to make it into the third round of the tournament. Roger Federer, Serena Williams and Novak Djokovic all sailed into the last 32 on a fairly routine day of action.
The bottom half of the men’s and women’s draw is played down to the last 32 on Thursday and after the shocks that came in this section on Tuesday the big names left in action will be eager to come through unscathed.
Stan Wawrinka, Andy Murray, Victoria Azarenka and David Ferrer are all in action on another busy day of Grand Slam action and all are expected to cruise into the third round.
Wednesday wasn’t the best of days for me betting wise with just one winner from the three bets advised so hopefully we can get back on track on Thursday.
My betting begins on court 8 with a British star in action as Jo Konta takes on a Chinese opponent in the form of Saisai Zheng. I was really impressed with Konta in her win over Venus Williams and while we should guard against the big win comedown I don’t think it will be a problem here because when Konta beat Garbine Muguruza in the US Open she followed it up with another good win over Andrea Petkovic.
Zheng had a really good win in the first round but that was against a very limited opponent rather than one on the up like Konta is. All of a sudden the draw has opened right up for Konta and I’m sure she will be eager to take advantage of that. I see her being as dominant here as she was against Williams.
My next couple of bets come in the men’s event where I’m going with another one sided encounter when Milos Raonic takes on Tommy Robredo. These two have met five times in the past and the Canadian has won all five matches. In their two hard court meetings Robredo hasn’t taken more than three games in any set which isn’t ideal for his chances here.
Raonic looked very good in the first round and is full of confidence having beaten Roger Federer to land the Brisbane title in the lead up to this tournament. Robredo is way past his peak now and is heavily on the decline and while he’s done well to make it this far he should be exiting the competition with a thorough beating here.
Jeremy Chardy came through a titanic tussle with Ernests Gulbis in the first round on Tuesday, eventually winning 13-11 but he could pay the price for that marathon when he takes on Andrey Kuznetsov in the second round.
A near five hour contest in the heat and humidity on Tuesday is sure to have had some impact on the Frenchman and the longer this one goes the more he might fade. Kuznetsov breezed into this round with a straight sets win over Ryan Harrison which was a good result and with the confidence behind him of running Rafael Nadal close in Qatar prior to this tournament he looks overpriced to take advantage of a potentially fatigued opponent.
I took Alize Cornet to come through the first round with plenty in hand and she did just that, losing one game in a thoroughly convincing win. When she had completed that win she could have been forgiven for thinking that she would be facing Simona Halep next but instead she faces Shuai Zheng who sensationally dumped the Romanian out.
Amazingly for someone who was once ranked 30th in the WTA rankings, that win over Halep was her first ever win in the Grand Slams at her 15th attempt so clearly the big stage doesn’t sit pretty with her.
Cornet is in fine form at the minute and is hitting the ball so well. She is full of confidence having won the lead up event to this tournament and I don’t see any let up from the French girl. Zhang had her day in the sun on Tuesday but getting back up for this one won’t be so easy and so I’m expecting another comfortable Cornet win.
Finally for the second time this week Lleyton Hewitt gets the gig on the Rod Laver Arena on Thursday night. All those in attendance could be seeing the last ever match of the Australian legend as he takes on David Ferrer knowing his next defeat is his last as a professional player.
While I don’t think Hewitt will come through this one I don’t think he’ll go down without a fight. It just isn’t Hewitt’s way to cave in to anything easily and if Ferrer is to win we can be sure he will be made to work for it.
Ferrer continues to sit inside the top eight in the world rankings but I don’t think he’s as good now as he was a couple of years ago and apart from a tremendous energy level I’m not wholly sure what he has left at the top level. These two look fairly evenly matched from a style point of view. It just isn’t in the nature of either to give him without a good scrap and that’s exactly what I’m expecting to see here.
The game line for this match is 35.5 which looks a touch on the low side. I’m not expecting a straight sets win for either here so as long as we get at least four sets and one of them is close then this line will be covered with a bit in hand.
Back J.Konta vs S.Zheng – Under 20.5 games for a 4/10 stake at 1.75 with Betfair
Back M.Raonic vs T.Robredo – Under 31.5 games for a 4/10 stake at 1.90 with Unibet
Back A.Kuznetsov to beat J.Chardy for a 3/10 stake at 2.40 with BetVictor
Back A.Cornet (-4.5 games) to beat S.Zhang for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Bet365
Back D.Ferrer vs L.Hewitt – Over 35.5 games for a 4/10 stake at 1.97 with Unibet
Blog tennis YTD: +8.83pts
