Our Andy Schooler make Stefanos Tsitsipas a worthy favourite for this week’s ATP event in Lyon - and he has his best Geneva Open bets too.
Tennis betting tips: Open Parc Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes
2pts win Stefanos Tsitsipas at 5/2 (BetVictor)
Open Parc Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes
- Lyon, France (outdoor clay)
While organisers of this week's Geneva event will be delighted to have Roger Federer in their draw, Lyon’s tournament director, Thierry Ascione, should be very happy with his work.
With Dominic Thiem and Stefanos Tsitsipas both taking wild cards, the draw is packed with talent. Rarely do you see the eight seeds in a ‘250’ level event all from the world’s top 25.
This will be just the fourth staging of the tournament but it is definitely the strongest so far.
The actual draw is somewhat lopsided with five of the top six in the betting in the top half. Four of those are all in the first quarter!
That makes backing those principals tough.
Certainly Jannik Sinner and Aslan Karatsev, both of whom have played some very good tennis on the European clay, are hard to back.
They will meet in round one with recent Estoril champion Albert Ramos-Vinolas (overpriced at 66/1 with Paddy Power/Betfair but also an unlikely winner) set to follow. Then could come Thiem. That’s all before the semi-finals.
Thiem showed some good signs in Rome as he works his way back to top form. But he is also still below his best – hence his appearance this week as he builds towards the French Open.
It’s clear he has the ability to win here but 7/2 isn’t for me.
The second quarter is considerably weaker with the seeds, Diego Schwartzman and Karen Khachanov, both struggling at the moment. It will be worth a look to see who the three qualifiers are in this section, although they may well struggle to overcome whoever wins that top quarter.
The weight in the top half is good news for tournament favourite STEFANOS TSITSIPAS who, as second seed, very much looks the man to beat in the bottom section.
Click here to back Stefanos Tsitsipas with Sky Bet
The Monte Carlo champion and Barcelona runner-up continued to cement his position as a genuine French Open contender last week when he pushed Novak Djokovic all the way in Rome in what was a high-quality encounter which lasted well over three hours.
With a first-round bye and a real lack of serious threats in his part of the draw, it’s not hard to envisage the Greek lifting the trophy next weekend.
I rarely back players at 5/2 or shorter but I’m prepared to make an exception with Tsitsipas, who has shown he’s right there with the likes of Djokovic and Nadal (lost to him from match point up in the Barcelona final) at present.
With that early bye, he should be fully recovered from his Rome exploits by the time he takes to the court here and, having accepted the wild card, he clearly wants another strong week under his belt before Roland Garros, which of course is starting a week later than usual this year.
It would be great to have 5/2 on the coupon heading into any final.
Tsitsipas is 1-1 against Thiem on clay and looks in the better form of the two right now.
He also leads both Sinner and Karatsev on the head-to-head having beaten both men in straight sets during the current clay swing.
For those seeking a bigger price, I did consider both Felix Auger-Aliassime (20/1) and Aljaz Bedene (50/1).
FAA was runner-up here the last time the tournament was staged and he’s showing the anticipated signs of improvement under new coach Toni Nadal.
He’s beaten Denis Shapovalov and Diego Schwartzman in recent weeks, while his clay season losses have all come against strong dirtballers in Cristian Garin, Tsitsipas, Casper Ruud and Federico Delbonis.
He may well come through the weak third quarter – one weakened further by the withdrawal of Rome semi-finalist Lorenzo Sonego - but one issue with backing him is his record in finals which stands at a woeful 0-7.
Bedene has also shown glimpses of his ability on his favourite surface of late.
He was a quarter-finalist in Cagliari and lost only 7-6 in the third to Karatsev in Belgrade.
The former Briton faces Gilles Simon (1-3 on clay this swing) first and, if he wins, the out-of-sorts David Goffin before a possible clash with Auger-Aliassime.
If big prices are a necessity, those two may fit the bill but on this occasion I’ll side with the man I feel is clearly the most likely champion and that’s Tsitsipas.
Published at 1345 BST on 16/05/21
Tennis betting tips: Geneva Open
2pts win Casper Ruud at 4/1 (BetVictor)
1pt e.w. Fabio Fognini at 14/1 (Sky Bet)
Gonet Geneva Open
- Geneva, Switzerland (outdoor clay)
Roger Federer will be back making headlines this coming week as he returns to action.
Tennis fans will rejoice in great numbers; punters should be happy too.
Federer’s presence here means the main title contenders are all a bigger price than they should be.
Despite home advantage, a first-round bye and a frankly pretty weak field to beat, it’s hard to see Federer winning title number 104 on this occasion.
His meeting with either Jordan Thompson or Pablo Andujar will be his first match since March and only his third since January 2020.
It will also be played on his weakest surface.
Federer admitted when making what turned out to be a two-match comeback in Doha in March that his focus was firmly on the grasscourt season – in particular Wimbledon – and his return on the red dirt seems all about getting the feel for matchplay again.
He’ll play here and at the French Open before hitting the grass in Halle, possibly before that in Stuttgart.
Playing at this event for the first time – and possibly for the last in Paris – looks to have something of a box-ticking exercise about it and I just don’t see how a rusty Federer (and he did look rusty in Doha) wins this week.
I’ll happily take him on with CASPER RUUD in the top half of the draw.
Click here to back Casper Ruud with Sky Bet
I last tipped Ruud in Munich a few weeks ago when he was unexpectedly crushed in the semi-finals by Nikoloz Basilashvili.
However, he’s since been to the last four of the Madrid Open – his third consecutive appearance in the semis of a clay Masters event.
After opting out of Rome, he should be raring to go and keen to get a title under his belt before Roland Garros begins at the end of the month.
Ruud’s strong claycourt game has seen him claim victories over Stefanos Tsitsipas, Diego Schwartzman and Pablo Carreno Busta in the past few weeks, while his continually underrated serve should be boosted by the touch of altitude at this venue, which sits almost 400m above sea level. He’s certainly gone well in such conditions in the past, reaching last year’s final in Santiago and making the 2019 semis in Kitzbuhel.
The Norwegian’s quarter of the draw doesn’t look particularly strong with Benoit Paire the other seed in it. Should he come through it, Ruud could meet Federer in the last four although, as suggested, I wouldn’t be surprised to find someone else waiting in line, possibly Cristian Garin, who is a potential quarter-final opponent for the Fed Express.
The bottom half of the draw looks the weaker of the two.
It is led by Denis Shapovalov, a player who has failed to hit the heights on clay, although last week he produced a fine performance to push Rafael Nadal to the brink in Rome. He eventually lost their last-16 clash in a final-set tie-break having held match point at one stage.
He’ll hope to build on that but odds of 11/2 are too short for me.
The issue is, who does convince in this section? It’s not easy to give a positive answer.
Reilly Opelka should have a chance if he continues his Rome form which brought a surprise deep run.
The altitude should aid his serve but, that said, he’s also got little time to get used to the different conditions to those found down at sea level in the Italian capital.
Perhaps it’s worth waiting to see who the three qualifiers are in this half of the draw but this column doesn’t have that luxury and instead I'll give FABIO FOGNINI another chance.
Click here to back Fabio Fognini with Sky Bet
We all know the Italian by now. He has oodles of claycourt talent but also a stinking temperament. The last time I tipped Fognini, he was defaulted in Barcelona. It said much.
However, the draw certainly gives him an opportunity this week and it’s not like he has no form in the book.
Fognini made the quarter-finals in Monte Carlo and while he made early exits in both Madrid and Rome, losing to eventual runner-up Matteo Berrettini at the former and Kei Nishikori at the latter are hardly dreadful results.
Importantly, he’s also got a strong track record at altitude with two of his five most recent titles coming in such conditions (on clay in Sao Paulo and Gstaad). He also made the semis here in 2018.
This week Fognini will open against Guido Pella, a player who hasn’t won a completed match since arriving on the European clay.
Thiago Monteiro, a potential second-round foe, is 1-5 on the European red dirt this year, while the other option, Laslo Djere, hasn’t won a match since reaching the Cagliari final a month ago.
Shapovalov could follow in the last eight with Grigor Dimitrov, another struggling to convince on clay, hence his wild card here, Fognini’s seeded semi-final opponent.
I understand why some people won’t be happy to put Fognini’s name on their betslip but at 14/1 he’s just about a big enough price for me in what isn’t a strong field.
Published at 1630 BST on 15/05/21
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