Clay season 2013

Mónica Puig to beat Carla Suárez @3.47 – WTA Oeiras – (Pinnacle)   2/10

Conditions favour Carla, that´s for sure, but even with that, I can´t resist taking this one. If she´s playing well, Pica´s style is not good for Carla, as she´s aggressive on second serves, backhand is a killer and she can defend well. Therefore she can pound weak Suárez´s second serves, play attacking flat backhands which will take time away from Carla when hitting shots and frustrate her into errors. On hardcourts, because of her style. I believe Puig would even be favourite today, but even in Estoril´s slow conditions I give her a good chance to upset unstable Suárez.

Carreño-Busta to beat Fognini @2.53 – ATP Oeiras -  (Pinnacle) 2/10

Duarte´s kid Pablo Carreño-Busta is really on a mission, playing excellent tennis and although Fabio has the tools to beat him, of course, I don´t think Fognini is solid mentally enough to stop him here at the moment, it will require a lot of effort and after what I saw yesterday against Lorenzi I think Pablo stands a much bigger chance than the odds say.

Puig might be a better play at +1.5 Sets might be a better play

Puig beat Schiavone today -which I was on- the difference here is Schiavone is all hustle, not a lot of great tools. Suarez Navarro is a dirt baller who is in form. I don't think an upset is likely here (not to say it doesn't happen) but odds of success favor Puig taking a set rather then the upset.

BOL in your plays but these are two matches that really don't interest me a lot.

Gun to my head Fognini on ML but a little juiced

YTD: 1-1  +1.06 units

Alejandro González to beat Marinko Matosevic @3.40 -ATP Madrid Q- (Bet365)  2/10

Three tennis tips for today:

Pere Riba to beat Xavier Malisse @2.70 -ATP Madrid Q- @2.70 (Pinnacle) 2/10

I feel this one will be way closer than this. Riba won a difficult match against Donskoy yesterday which will give him a confidence boost. Pere has a good first serve to win free points in Madrid´s conditions (a bit of altitude and a sunny day), he´s hungry to get some wins after his injuries and surgeries and Malisse is always an accident waiting to happen if you show grit and make him work for he points hard enough.

Pablo Andújar to beat Marin Cilic @3.60 -ATP Madrid- (Pinnacle) 2/10

I simply have to fade Marin after his horror show in Munich, it´s not like Pablo is red hot at the moment, but I must try him at these odds after what I saw from Cilic against Dodig a few days ago.

Tita Torro-Flor to beat Francesca Schiavone @2.84 -WTA Madrid- (Pinnacle) 2/10

I have high hopes on Tita Torro for the future, specially on clay. She has breezed through qualies and looks like Madrid´s conditions suit her powerful game, Schiavone´s talent and craftiness could be a very tough nut to crack, but I trust a lot on this girl, despite she´s still far away from what she could become one day

GL folks

Four tips for today, 3 in ATP, 1 in WTA:

Dimitrov +1.5 sets against Djokovic @3.97  (Pinnacle) 2/10

After choking sets away against Murray and Djokovic earlier in the season, Grigor finally "broke the duck" against Nadal in Montecarlo. That should give him a confidence boost and I think he has a better chance than this 3.97 to nick that set he should have in Indian Wells. He looked very solid against Martí yesterday so it looks like he enjoyed Madrid´s conditions.

Mayer +1.5 sets against Murray @3.22 (Pinnacle) 2/10

After Murray´s horror show in MC, I´d certainly wouldn´t like to back his odds until he shows something different on clay. Mayer, while a headcase, is already adapted to the conditions having won two matches already and he is very capable of taking a set off him imo, certainly has a bigger chance than 3.22 odds

Copil to win 1st set against Wawrinka @6.32 (Pinnacle) 2/10

Marius will try to make the best out of this WC Tiriac has handed to him. He has a great first serve and attacking game which should be very useful in Madrid´s conditions, although his defence is quite bad, he has the tools to hold his serves and Stan might have a little problem at the start with the very different conditions here than in Estoril, he might have some mistakes here and there and if he lets his serve go once at the beggining I believe Copil can take full advantage of it and nick the first set.

McHale +6.5 games against Sharapova @2.08 (Pinnacle) 2/10

Sharapova was quite average in 1st round and McHale has shown good tennis here in Q and 2st round. plus she had her against the ropes in Rome last year. 6.5 game is a bit high of a line imo.

1-3 yesterday with a tiny minus, I should have done better than that, despite Mayer really should have won us the bet and give us a nice profit for the day.

YTD: 4-5-1 +7.66

Three plays on today:

Anderson to beat Mónaco 2.92 – ATP Madrid – (Betfair) 2/10

Price has shortened a bit and weather is so so in Madrid today, even with that, I feel this one is still overpriced. Anderson disposed easily Levine in R1 and his serve works beautifully in Madrid´s conditions. Mónaco is still far from last year´s level imo and he´s perfectly opposable at these odds.

Robredo to beat Haas @2.65 – ATP Madrid – (Betfair) 2/10

Too red-hot players, it should be a dog fight, and it´s very hard to pick a winner between both, but like in Barcelona against Berdych, I will put my money on the guy who´s more hungry and whose will to fight today for as long as it is necessary is bigger at the higher odds. And that´s the Spaniard Tommy imo

 Giraldo to beat Wawrinka @5.85 -ATP Madrid – (Betfair) 2/10

Simple reasoning here, Stan is red hot, but even with that, I don´t mind opposing him against a very capable player like Giraldo, with enough confidence after winning 3 matches here at these odds.

GL folks

Anderson to beat Berdych @3.59 – ATP Madrid – (Pinnacle) 2/10

Yes, I know Anderson is labelled a “poor man´s Berdych” and I can see why people think like that. Despite this, I will back him tomorrow because I think Berdych´s mind and form is quite questionable at the moment, he has already told season looks already too long and Kevin has finished his match against Mónaco hitting the ball very well, this is the kind of thing that gives you a big boost of confidence for your next match imo.

Lepchenko to beat Errani @3.19 – WTA Madrid- (Pinnacle) 2/10

Varvara knows how to play Errani, she´s solid enough not to feed her off a high number of ues and she has the flat shots to hit through the Italian, so it´s no surprise she leads their h2h (last one a huge win in Fed Cup). Madrid´s conditions won´t help Errani, plus Sara was very lucky to get past Cirstea in R1, while Lepchenko got the best of always dangerous Vinci quite convincingly.

Verdasco to beat Tsonga @3.21 – ATP Madrid – (Pinnacle) 2/10

I was hesitant to take Verdasco even in his beloved Madrid until he showed some breaths of life, which he did against Raonic. Tsonga was not impressive at all against Haase and if Verdasco can build on that win against Milos, he can beat JW as well imo.

GL all

Also like Lepchenko

YTD: 5-10-1 +1.50 units

Odds will surely drop, so I will advise it now:

Ivanovic to beat Sharapova @4.33 -WTA Madrid- (Bet365) 4/10

Ana has played some vintage Ana stuff today. She ran Maria close in Stuttgart and she should do it again tomorrow. I  do believe she has an excellent chance to cross the finishing line as well.

GL

Two tips, one for each SF:

Andújar +1.5 sets against Nadal @5.17 – ATP Madrid – (Pinnacle) 2/10

Nadal was very lucky to get past Ferrer yesterday and after watching the match I think the two main reasons for such a big struggle were:

1 – Rafa is traditionally more vulnerable here than in the rest of clay tournaments as Madrid´s quicker conditions doesn´t suit his style, balls fly faster and he has less time to defend, and this year this fact is aggravated because he´s a tad slower than usual, either because of the lay off or because of being afraid to push his knees to the limit as he used to.

2 – Against Ferrer his knee bothered him, I can even see him skipping Rome this year to get ready for RG. His forehand worked well, but when hitting his bh, he looked like he was very uncomfortable when putting his weight on his left knee to hit it, therefore he either hit a very short and with little pace ball, or he opted for slicing it.

Even with that, he could beat Ferrer and he´s very likely to beat Pablo as well, but Andújar is playing well enough to take advantage of this, he has a great double handed backhand to manage Nadal´s topspin cross-court forehand and even his weaker side worked reasonably well yesterday against Nishikori (he attacked well with it when having a short ball and he will need to do this today as well). If Rafa doesn´t improve from yesterday´s showing (I think it won´t be easy because both points above should stand the same for today´s match), Andújar will have at least in one set a good chance to take it. Hopefully he learnt something from that third set in RG ´11 where he blew a gazillion setpoints.

Wawrinka to beat Berdych @2.11 – ATP Madrid – (Pinnacle) 4/10

I believe the wrong player is favoured here. I don´t think tiredness will play a significant role and Stan´s confidence and form is much better than Berdych´s one. Being a night session match should also help the Swiss bc of a higher humidity and slower conditions.

GL all today

Golubev to beat Zemlja @2.65 – ATP Rome Q – (Pinnacle) 2/10

Simple basis here. Golubev looked very solid on stats in his win against Levine, and when he has one of those rare weeks, he´s a tough player to beat and Zemlja´s clay skills are in very overrated in my opinion.

GL

Halep to beat Kuznetsova @3.10 -WTA Rome- (Pinnacle) 2/10

Halep coming off a couple of good shows in qualies, against an out of form Kuzzy. Of course Sveta has a lot of more class, but I feel I have to fade her until she shows some signs of life.

Lorenzi to beat Nishikori @3.60 -ATP Rome- (Pinnacle) 2/10

Halep to beat Radwanska @3.75 -WTA Rome- (Betfair) 2/10

Same reasoning as yesterday´s tip. Radwanksa comes off an embarrasing outing agaisnt Robson, until she shows some signs of life, I feel she´s fade material.

Robson to beat Serena Williams @9.60 -WTA Rome- (Betfair) 2/10

I feel Serena could start like in many Madrid´s early rounds, not moving her feet, slow, lazy, and Laura is playing too well at the moment to get through her with a lazy performance imo. Slower night conditions won´t help SW to wit winners on serve and I think it´s possible that if Serena starts like this and goes down a set, she could start thinking more about RG, where she will want to win it all after her fiasco last year´s against Razzano.

GL all