We didn’t get any dice with Filip Krajinovic in the Stockholm final on Sunday, but I suppose we have to be pleased with our work in week 42 thanks to the each-way payout on the Serbian 33-1 shot.
We move on to Basel and Vienna in week 43 and it’s the Erste Bank Open that’s provided the higher frequency of betting underdog winners over the last seven years, with 31% of them winning in the Austrian capital, compared to a measly 26% at the Swiss Indoors.
Vienna has produced significantly more tie break matches than Basel, too, with 48% of the Erste Bank Open’s matches featuring at least one, compared with the 41% of the Swiss Indoors in the last seven years.
Last season in Vienna there were 83% holds of serve, compared to the 77% of Basel and both venues are at slight altitude (Vienna 217m and Basel 265m).
We’ve got four evening matches on the card in Basel and five throughout the day in Vienna and I prefer the options in Austria to the ones in Switzerland.
And the ones that appeal are to take a risk on either or both of Kyle Edmund and Damir Dzumhur against short-priced favourites Matteo Berrettini and Grigor Dimitrov respectively.
Edmund has been on an utterly dismal run of form in the last few months and he was unable to even make it out of qualies in Antwerp last week, where he was defending the title, but he needs ranking points badly and hasn’t become a bad player overnight.
The Brit has split with a coach or two and he hasn’t won three straight matches at main level now since winning that Antwerp title and making the last-16 in Vienna a year ago.
Injury and illness have played their part in this slump, for sure, and last week’s loss to Norbert Gombos was a new low, but I don’t mind this match-up against Berrettini, who himself has a lot to prove yet on indoor hard.
Edmund came into his clash with Berrettini just over 12 months ago at the China Open as a 1.59 favourite and won it in three tight sets and now he’s a 3.80 underdog, which shows the differing fortunes of this pair in the last year.
That Beijing clash saw Berrettini win only 64% of the points on his first serve (and oddly, 70% on his second serve) and Edmund nicked it by five points and the Italian hasn’t found the same sort of form indoors that he has outdoors; yet.
Berrettini is 6-5 win/loss all-time and with a service hold mark of 89.2% but a break of serve percentage of just 12.1% and that’s going to need to get a lot better for Berrettini to figure as a title threat this week.
A slowish indoor hard court suits Edmund well and he’s 11-5 win/loss so far at main level, with 84.8% holds and 19.2% breaks and while it’s hard to ignore his recent form the odds may have moved away from him too much here.
Over half of Berrettini’s 11 matches on indoor hard at main level have featured opening sets that have gone to at least 12 games and only one of those 11 matches could be described as an easy win for the Italian.
That was against the clay grinder Roberto Carballes Baena and all of his others have either been losses, or were settled by way of a tie break (or two) or a deciding set (or both).
It’s not that easy to choose the right bet here, but half a point on over 10.5 games in set one when Edmund will be trying his hardest and Berrettini may take a while to settle back into indoor conditions, looks the call at 2.95.
I’ve said a few times that Grigor Dimitrov’s run to the US Open semi final had an element of fortune about it and we’d see if he came back down to earth afterwards and that’s been the case.
Dimitrov has won only one of his four matches since New York and he’s yet to find Damir Dzumhur an easy opponent to put away.
Yes, he’s won all three, but he’s needed to go the full distance each time, including on grass the last time they met at Queen’s Club last season when Dimitrov was a 1.20 chance.
The stats off their career series tell us that it’s Dzumhur that’s won the more points on second serve by almost 5% in their head-to-head, so Dimitrov has had to rely on his bigger serve and heavier forehand to come out on top.
And on all form in 2019 other than that somewhat fortunate US Open run I’ve seen nothing from Dimitrov to make me want to back him at around evens to win this match in straight sets.
Dzumhur has qualified well against two big hitters in Nicolas Jarry and Alexander Bublik and he said last week that he feels he’s getting back to his best form after an injury-plagued year.
“Last few months I feel really better.,” he said. “You know, the injuries made my ranking drop. Two weeks I was out of top-100. But I came back fast. My game is at the good level now. I am still waiting for the results. It can come any week. If you play good constantly at some point you will see the results.”
On a slow court like this one in Vienna usually is Dimitrov will need to play very well to win it in two and Dzumhur +1.5 sets at 1.76 is a fair option here, but I prefer the bigger risk/reward in the Berrettini match.
Best Bet
0.5 points win over 10.5 games in set one of Berrettini/Edmund at 2.95
