We got off to a fine start in Miami Gardens on Wednesday when Federico Delbonis and Roberto Carballes Baena provided comfortable odds-against winners for us on day one of the main draw.
Indeed, it was another good day for underdog backers, with all six of the matches that were over on Wednesday going the way of the betting underdog, including an improbable win for Mischa Zverev from a set and 5-2 down.
The rest were rained off, including our remaining bet of Max Marterer against Taylor Fritz, which will now start at around 18:00 UK time on Court 1.
We’ve got just the 26 ATP matches on the card on Thursday, thanks to the rain, which is far too many for me to cover here, but the underdogs that look to be of the most interest include: David Ferrer, Casper Ruud, Martin Klizan, Taro Daniel, Thiago Monteiro, and Malek Jaziri.
Sam Querrey vs David Ferrer
I said in day one’s preview that the slow conditions in Miami (and Indian Wells) often allow the clay courters to have their day against the hard courters and that was the case with Delbonis and RCB – and it could be the case here as well.
Ferrer can’t string more than a couple of matches together these days due to physical problems, but in a one-off match in these conditions he has every chance of taking down Querrey, who has a poor record in Miami.
Querrey is 0-11 win/loss versus top-50 ranked opposition at the Miami Open and 10-13 overall, with most of his wins coming against players such as Estrella, Kubot, Berlocq, Ebden, Stakhovsky, Albot (before he suddenly started winning on hard courts) and a then-438 ranked Robredo.
He’s never in 13 visits to the Miami Open won back-to-back matches and held serve only 80% of the time, which is quite low for a big server like Querrey.
Simply put, it’s just too slow for him here, and Ferrer, having been handed a wild card and playing for the last time at an event where he made the final and has a 27-13 win/loss record and a 110.9 hold/break total can roll back the years.
Okay, he’s not the player he was, but he won’t go down without a fight here, which is something you can’t be so sure of with Querrey, who surely doesn’t have this week on the calendar down as one of his favourites given his record here.
Another player with a big game like Querrey is Ernests Gulbis and, like Querrey, he has a poor record in Miami – even worse than Querrey’s in fact.
Gulbis is 1-7 win/loss in Miami and he’s only managed to hold serve 68.4% of the time in those eight matches, so one would expect the in-form Miomir Kecmanovic to have a good chance of progressing in a M1000 again.
Ivo Karlovic is also on the list of big hitters that struggle in these slow Miami conditions and he’s 4-12 win/loss at this tournament, but he still holds serve 91.2% of the time here and he’s got Pablo Andujar in round one.
Andujar is 1-9 on outdoor hard against the big servers in my database, holding serve only 68.2% of the time, so he’s perhaps not one to rely on to take down an opponent like Karlovic.
Lorenzo Sonego made the quarter finals in Phoenix last week and he’s qualified here by beating Ramkumar Ramanathan and Mackenzie McDonald (another example of a clay courter beating a hard courter here), but I’m not sure he should be as short as 1.53 against Martin Klizan.
The hit and miss Slovak was unlucky last time in Indian Wells when he turned his ankle against one Zverev brother and had to retire against another, and then he withdrew from Phoenix, but if he’s fit today he looks a tempting price.
Andrey Rublev looks much too short in the betting at 1.25 against a baseline grinder like Taro Daniel in these conditions, where hitting winners is tough and the Russian is just 2-4 win/loss in the main draw at the Miami Open.
Daniel may prove tough to shake off unless Rublev has a great day, but 1.25 on that happening seems very short indeed.
Casper Ruud bagelled Felix-Auger Aliassime the last time they met (on clay at Challenger level a year ago) and while FAA deserves to be favourite on current form and hard court form it won’t be easy for him to play his natural aggressive game in these conditions.
Ruud should be effective on these slow courts and has a shot of another win over the rapidly improving young Canadian.
Robin Haase has a weak record in Miami and 1.46 looks rather short about the Dutchman, whose best work these days tends to come on quicker surfaces.
Haase is 9-6 win/loss in his last 15 matches when priced up as a 1.40-1.60 favourite and 4-9 win/loss in the main draw of the Miami Open, where three of his four wins have come against opponents ranked between 122 and 416 (the other was over Yuichi Sugita).
Lukas Lacko also has a weak record in Miami though, but it wouldn’t be a surprise if he won today for me.
A better bet might be to risk Malek Jaziri to take down lucky loser Dan Evans, who looks awfully short at 1.30 given that he’s played a lot of tennis lately and complained of feeling tired in a bad tempered loss to Alexander Bublik yesterday.
Jaziri is 2-0 against Evans, but those matches were years ago, however the Brit was beaten easily by Taro Daniel last week and I’m not sure what he has left in the tank right now.
Finally, Thiago Monteiro qualified with a handy win over Lloyd Harris and served well in qualies, so while I was tempted with Bernard Tomic’s price yesterday I’m certainly not liking his odds on Thursday.
Best Bets
0.5 points win Ferrer to beat Querrey at 2.38
0.5 points win Jaziri to beat Evans at 3.70
0.5 points win Ruud to beat Auger-Aliassime at 2.75
0.5 points win Daniel +1.5 sets to beat Rublev at 2.06
