The final of the 2016 Olympic tennis tournament is set for Sunday at the Barra Olympic Park in Rio, where 2012 champion Andy Murray faces Juan Martin Del Potro.
We were unlucky with yesterday’s wager, which was the ‘long shot’ of Rafa Nadal beating Del Potro by two sets to one, with Delpo grabbing it at the death in a final set tie break.
So, it’s a best of five set final today, rather than the best of three we’ve been playing all week in Rio and the men’s singles final should start at around (or at least not before) 19:30 UK time.
Andy Murray vs Juan Martin Del Potro
We saw how flat he came out against Joao Sousa in round two after an emotional night when beating world number one Novak Djokovic in round one and anything less than his best surely won’t be good enough on Sunday.
It’s set to be a hot one in Rio at around 15:30 local time when this match is scheduled for at 30C in the shade and over five sets this looks a really tall order for Del Potro.
Having already beaten Djokovic and Nadal to come back after a three-hour plus battle with Nadal and beat Murray as well would be the stuff of legend for Del Potro and surely rank perhaps higher than his 2009 US Open win.
I’d give him a shot over the best of three, but to defeat the super-fit Murray, who had an easy day on Saturday against Kei Nishikori, seems pretty unlikely.
Murray was on court for only an hour and 19 minutes in a comfortable win over a tired-looking Nishikori and in what will be their first clash since Indian Wells back in 2013 I’m looking at the margin of victory for the Brit here.
The Brit is trying to become the first man to defend an Olympic tennis title today and the flag bearer of the GB team won’t want to fail here and I don’t think he will.
The tricky part here is trying to figure out how much Del Potro has left in the tank, but we can assume it won’t be that much, having not played this much tennis in a short space of time for a long while.
I’d say the last time Delpo had a tournament like this in terms of the amount of tennis was Wimbledon 2013 and Murray will surely make him play too many balls today.
Stat-wise this season on hard courts it’s Del Potro that has the marginally better service hold mark at 86.3 percent to Murray’s 85 percent, but the Brit is superb on return.
He breaks 32.2 percent of the time, while Del Potro is some way back in that area on 23.9 percent and Murray has a perfect 12-0 record in main level finals as a sub-1.30 favourite.
I can’t see Murray dropping more than a set at the most here and the -5.5 games on him, as Del Potro likely fades in the heat seems decent value in these slow conditions, with breaks likely coming often towards the end.
