It’s been a pretty good Australian Open for my bets and suggestions and we landed another decent one in the semi finals on Friday when Dominic Thiem took down Alexander Zverev by the required score of three sets to one.
That provided a handy 4.10 winner and we move on now to the title match of this year’s men’s singles between Thiem and seven-time champion Novak Djokovic.
This one is scheduled for (not before) 19:30 local time (08:30 UK Sunday morning) and by the looks of the weather forecast there’ll be no need for the roof on Rod Laver Arena, as there was for the women’s final on Saturday.
It’ll be cool again at no more than 19C and so again the conditions are falling right for Thiem, whose progress here this fortnight has certainly had its roots in favourable conditions.
A slower, rougher playing surface than in previous years, combined with balls that fluff up on this surface very quickly and barely any very hot days, have seen this year’s AO played in unusually slow conditions.
That’s favoured Thiem, who loves time on the ball to wind up his heavily top spun groundies, while he can also hit the flat backhand as well if he gets the opportunity.
Whether he’ll have the opportunity against an opponent like Djokovic, who’ll be keeping an impeccable length most of the time is questionable and it’ll have to be a Wawrinka-like slam final display from Thiem if he’s to win this.
He does have it in his locker against Djokovic though, as he’s shown in winning four of his last five matches against the Serb, and while all were on clay barring the last one Thiem showed he can do it on hard as well in their last meeting.
That was only a few months ago at the Tour Finals when he hit 50 winners past Djokovic in a final set tie break win over the Serb – and that came on a day that started with Thiem feeling under the weather.
“I woke up on Tuesday morning feeling like crap and thinking about the worst stuff because I was feeling really sick. And then on Tuesday, I played this legendary match against Novak Djokovic and I got way better again with my body.”
And that might be the case again thgis time, as Thiem was indicating to his team that he was feeling sick during his semi final win over Alexander Zverev, but in any case the Austrian has played a lot more tennis this fortnight than the Serb.
Thiem’s been on court for 18 hours and 7 minutes so far, compared to just 12 hours and 29 minutes that Djokovic has spent on court and that’s equivalent to a couple of matches more.
We can also add to this equation that due to the bizarre scheduling of the Australian Open one finalist always has one extra day off than the other and in this case it’s Djokovic that’s had his feet up for 24 hours more.
That may well become a factor if this match heads into a fourth or fifth set, but it’s the starts that Thiem has made against Djokovic lately that are of interest to the bettor.
Four of the last five and five of the last seven opening sets between this pair have gone to a tie break, with Thiem either taking set one or losing it in a breaker in six of their last seven meetings – and most of those were on clay.
It seems very likely that Thiem, who’s no stranger now to major finals, will come out all guns blazing in this one, with an ultra aggressive policy surely the only one that will work against this opponent on this court.
And I wouldn’t be surprised if it works for a while, as it did ultimately at the O2 in London in that Tour Finals clash, but winning three sets against Djokovic in a major final at a tournament the Serb has owned over the years is a bit different to taking two sets in an end-of-year glorified exhibition.
But Thiem is a confident character on all court surfaces these days and if we look at the head-to-head stats between the two in the four matches played in 2018 and 2019 it’s very much in Thiem’s favour.
In those matches, Thiem has held serve 80.6% of the time against Djokovic, who, in turn has held only 70.8% of the time, but three were played on clay and Djokovic is far more effective on hard courts and in hard court majors especially.
Getting back to the point about the possibility of Thiem starting well, both of these men have held serve around 90% of the time this tournament (Thiem 89.2% and Djokovic 92.2%) and given also their record of playing set one tie breaks the 7-6 to Djokovic at 6.10 appeals.
Almost a third of Thiem’s set this fortnight have gone to a breaker and while he’s won his last five of them I’d wager Djokovic to be the calmer if it came to a set one tie break.
That service hold stat (and the 0.78 aces per game that he’s hit this tournament) highlight the improvement that Novak has made this fortnight on first serve after making some off-season tweaks with the help of Goran Ivanisevic.
In all main level outdoor hard court matches in 2019 Djokovic made 65.8% of first serves, winning 77.4% of his first serve points and hit 0.53 aces per game.
This Australian Open he’s made 69.2% of first serves, won 81.8% of those points and hit 0.78 aces per game, which is a decent improvement and takes the pressure a little bit off his ground game (not that he really needed it to).
I’m expecting a decent final here and while I expect Djokovic to make it 8 from 8 in Australian Open finals I like the idea of backing him to win it 3-1 at 3.65 and I’ll take that 7-6 to the Serb in set one, too.
Best Bet
0.5 points win Djokovic to win 3-1 at 3.65
0.5 points win Djokovic to win set one 7-6 at 6.10
