We made a decent profit on day four in Tokyo and Beijing on Thursday when two of my three odds-against wagers were winners in the form of ‘tie break played’ in Taro Daniel’s victory over Jordan Thompson and over 2.5 sets in Nikoloz Basilashvili’s clash with Stefanos Tsitsipas.
We did lose outright Diego Schwartzman in disappointing fashion on Thursday after the Argentine blew a double break lead in set one of his clash with Sam Querrey and then after a trademark Querrey choke Schwartzman surprisingly failed to capitalise in set three.
The weather had a hand in proceedings on Thursday, with the cloudier, more humid day making it slower and fluffing the balls up, making it harder to hit winners.
It’s set to be very windy in Tokyo on Friday, with gale warnings issues, so the conditions could play a big part again on day five of the Japan Open.
The obvious play, perhaps, is to take on Reilly Opelka, with his clash versus Yasutaka Uchiyama set for 11:00 local time when the wind speed is expected to be 33kph and with 70% humidity.
So, not much sun, high humidity and lost of wind and maybe that will be a big test for 1.57 favourite Opelka, but Uchiyama has no sort of record against big servers (played two/lost two in his career against the ones in my list).
The wind is set to drop and sun likely to make an appearance by the time that David Goffin and Hyeon Chung play at (not before) 19:00 local time, but the matches featuring John Millman and Taro Daniel and Novak Djokovic and Lucas Pouille will be played while the wind is strong.
Daniel beat Millman at Winston-Salem the last time the pair clashed and I’d have been tempted by Daniel at 2.75 again today, but that weather puts me off betting in Tokyo.
In Beijing at the China Open tie breaks look nailed on in the clash between John Isner and Stefanos Tsitsipas, which is scheduled for (not before) 16:30 local time (09:30 UK).
But it’s set to be a much cooler day in Beijing on Friday than it has been all week, with the sun nowhere to be seen and rain around in the morning and cloud in the afternoon and evening.
Indeed, it might be positively chilly at 14C when Isner and Tsitsipas arrive on court, so that puts me off the tie break bet rather, but Tsitsipas plays breakers in all conditions against the big servers in my database.
In his 12 main level matches against them on grass, clay and hard courts Tsitsipas has played breakers in 11 of them and set one has gone to a breaker in five of the last eight.
Four of his five sets against Isner have gone to tie breaks and 2.75 about over 1.5 tie breaks would probably be the bet there if it was a sunny day, but it looks very cool indeed.
And that fact (assuming the forecast is correct) will surely make life hard for Sam Querrey against an Alexander Zverev that looks much better at the moment than he has at any point this season.
Slow conditions (11C temperature) when they start at around 19:30 local time (12:30 UK) probably giving Zverev a boost against the big serve of Querrey and I’m not feeling an upset there, with the more complete game of Zverev, now that he’s back in form, likely to prevail.
But our remaining outright hope Fabio Fognini can reward underdog backers again when he takes on Karen Khachanov in these slower Beijing conditions on Friday.
This first career clash between the Russian and the Italian is scheduled for 12:30 local time (05:30 UK) but it could be later, as rain and showers are forecast.
Whenever it gets on it won’t be warmer than 14C and with zero sunshine, so that will suit Fognini, who’s looked up for it this week, which is half the battle with the unpredictable Fogna.
Fognini has half an eye (probably) on qualifying for the year-end Tour Finals in November and surely he knows this is his only realistic chance of doing it at the age of 32 and with a body that’s breaking down often these days.
He’s been good in beating Andrey Rublev and Mikhail Kukushkin and can make it a Russian treble on Friday (Kuku was born in Russia and only moved to Kazakhstan in 2008) if he carries on in that form.
Khachanov has played three tie breaks in four sets against a Pablo Cuevas who couldn’t buy a first serve and a Jeremy Chardy who was playing his first event since New York and barely sneaked past Marco Cecchinato.
So, Fognini has been tested against better opposition this week and we haven’t seen anything like the best of new dad Khachanov this season, with the Russian just 9-13 win/loss against top-50 opponents in 2019.
Khachanov may have been a fair favourite in quicker conditions, but he hasn’t been able to find any consistency at all this season and was beaten by Joao Sousa in straight sets at home in St. Petersburg last time out (and by Vasek Pospisil at the US Open before that).
His hold/break total for the season is just 100.7 and he’s lost as a 1.20 to 1.70 favourite nine times in 2019 in just 15 such matches, so I’m happy with the 2.40 on Fognini here.
Finally, Dominic Thiem is likely to be too physically strong for Andy Murray, whose fitness is likely to be suspect after two tough matches already this week, but the price is still a bit tight on Thiem for me.
Best Bet
0.5 points win Fognini to beat Khachanov at 2.40
