It’s a bit late to be getting to this since the first round is almost in the books, but there has been other pressing stuff to cover so a look at the Aussie Open hasn’t happened yet. I was spurred to do it today by a comment on yesterday’s post. Without further ado:<\/p>\n
Men’s Side<\/p>\n
Andy Murray – He’s the favorite, or at worst the co-favorite, but I really don’t trust him here. He’s been red hot so far this year, but he lost in the first round last year, he’s flighty and unstable, and I don’t trust him to stay at his best through the grueling intensity of a major. He’ll get through to the second week, but I don’t see him making it as far as the finals.<\/p>\n
Rafael Nadal – I don’t believe that he is healthy, and I don’t like how he has played to start the season. Same as Murray, I see him in at least the last eight, but probably not the last two.<\/p>\n
Novak Djokovic – He gets points for being the defending champion, but I don’t like his chances of doing it again. The thing that stands out is that he made a last minute decision to compete in New Zeland last weekend. He hadn’t originally planned to play it, but he obviously felt he wasn’t ready for Australia yet. A guy like Djokovic needs to be at his best to get through the gauntlet here. I’d bet against.<\/p>\n
Roger Federer – I know it isn’t an original pick, but I can’t go against Federer here. He’s ranked number two here, and that’s not going to sit well with his competitive spirit. He has won three times before here, and I expect him to be very hungry to start to wash away the bad tastes of last year. He’s 12\/5 in futures bets. That’s not great, but it’s better than he has been in a long while, and a comparative bargain.<\/p>\n
Gael Monfils – He has world class talent, he’s playing well, and he’s going to break through sooner or later. He’s at 50\/1 now, and you won’t get prices like that on him too much longer. He’s my longshot darling.<\/p>\n
Women’s Side<\/p>\n
The Williams sisters – I will deal with them together because I discount both of their chances equally. Serena doesn’t seem to be healthy, and I don’t think she is tough enough or hungry enough to work her way through a sore knee for two weeks. Venus never seems to have her head together in Australia, so I will bet against.<\/p>\n
Ana Ivanovic – She’s a personal favorite (for more than just her play, I’ll admit), and she was a finalist here last year, but I still have to pick against her. She hasn’t been very impressive since her French Open win, and her recent form is particularly troubling. Not worth a bet.<\/p>\n
Jelena Jankovic – She’s the top seed, but that seems to be more by default than by merit. I’m not convinced that she is fit enough or tough enough to win this tournament.<\/p>\n
Elena Dementieva – She had a very good prep run for this tournament, including a dismantling of Serena Williams. She’s fit, she’s confident, and her win in Beijing shows that she can handle the heat. At 7\/1 she’s an excellent balance of chance and value.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It’s a bit late to be getting to this since the first round is almost in the books, but there has been other pressing stuff to cover so a look at the Aussie Open hasn’t happened yet. I was spurred to do it today by a comment on yesterday’s post. Without further ado: Men’s Side […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[135],"tags":[627,628,231],"class_list":["post-998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-handicapping","tag-australian-open","tag-elena-dementieva","tag-roger-federer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=998"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1000,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/998\/revisions\/1000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}