These are exciting times for tennis fans what with a golden era of the Big Three (or Four if you must!) in men’s tennis having just passed us by and with the retirement of Serena Williams having come at a time when the likes of Iga Swiatek, Aryna Sabalenka and some of the next-gen of women’s tennis taking over.
This has its own ramifications on tennis betting too as you might have guessed, or even experienced if you are betting on this sport.
In this piece below, we look at the various aspects of tennis betting while doing that on matches consisting of some of the best players in the business.
Would you adopt a similar strategy if you are betting on a tennis match that pits a world number 24 against a 56th-ranked player as you would in an encounter between Swiatek and someone ranked outside the top 30? May be not.
What we try to do here is to look at how tennis punters can approach betting on matches where the moneyline tennis odds heavily favour the favorite.
Strategies While Betting on Djokovic, Nadal, Swiatek, Sinner, Alcaraz & Sabalenka
The aforementioned list of tennis superstars is just an indicative one of the current times. Players will come and go but each generation would still have the kind of tennis stars who would absolutely dominate the rest of the world.
That would mean that bookmakers would be left with no option but to push out match winner odds that are so heavily in their favour that it would make no sense to directly bet on them.
Like why would you put your money on Rafael Nadal winning his opening round match at the 2022 French Open against Jordan Thompson at 1/100 odds? So what do you do about it instead?
Here are some of the strategies you can consider while betting on some of these aforementioned big-ticket players. These include the usage of betting markets other than moneyline betting in order to balance the odds in question.
Parlay or Accumulator Bets
We have spoken about tennis accumulator betting in depth in our section here. If you aren’t well-versed with this concept or if you want to brush your skills on accumulator betting in tennis, you can give it a quick read.
In short, how betting on tennis accumulators (or accas or parlays) help is you can get way better returns by combining multiple low odds outcomes. This allows you to increase potential winnings by multiplying the odds of each selection. However, keep in mind that the risk also increases with each additional selection.
Take the example of a day in April 2024, in which there are multiple tournaments being played concurrently on the ATP and WTA circuit.
Casper Ruud, Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Cori Gauff and Aryna Sabalenka are all playing in an early round in Barcelona, Munich and Stuttgart, starting out at 1/7, 1/13, 1/13, 1/14 and 2/5 odds to win their respective matches.
Individually it might not make too much sense to bet on a single result but there is a good chance of all of them winning their matches and an accumulator five-fold bet on the above selection will earn you about 1/1.
Not a bad return here, right?
Handicap Betting
In sports betting, handicap betting is way to even things out between the two outcomes. Applying this to tennis, handicap betting involves giving one player a virtual advantage or disadvantage in terms of games or sets.
A set handicap bet consists of giving odds on an outcome in case of a player winning the battle if he/she was given a handicap of +1.5 sets (in a best of three sets encounter). What this implies is that if you have bet on the aforementioned outcome and this player steals a set off the opponent but still loses, your bet would still be a win.
A games handicap bet works on similar lines with the underdog given a plus (+) handicap on the number of games won and a favourite given a minus (-) handicap.
So, instead of betting on Player A to win the match (at saying 1/7 odds), you could bet on Games Handicap for Player A at -5.5 (at say 5/6 odds). What this means is that player A would win the games match-up even if 5.5 games were reduced from his/her total games won number.
Take a similar example from above in which Casper Ruud is 1/7 to overcome his second round opponent Alexandre Muller at the 2024 Barcelona Open. Those aren’t very tempting odds but if you think that Ruud will be a runaway winner, then you could look to bet on the Games Handicap market in which Ruud is 4/6 to win it at -4.5 as well.
What this means is that a 6-3, 6-4 (or better) win for Ruud will be enough for you to win the bet but if he won 6-4, 6-4, you would lose the bet.
Set Betting
Instead of betting on the overall outcome of the match, you can bet on the number of sets won by each player. This can offer better odds than simply betting on the favorite to win outright.
This is fairly straightforward to understand.
Using the same example as above, instead of betting on Casper Ruud winning his match against Muller, we can bet on Ruud to win it in straight sets. While the odds on offer, 4/9, are still not the best, you can get a lot better return on this.
One thing to note here is the need to research a little bit on how a player plays on a particular surface and whether there are a lot of easy wins in the initial rounds or if there is a certain amount of complacency and hence, scrappiness in the way he/she wins.
In-Play Betting
Watch the match closely and look for opportunities to place bets while the game is in progress. If the favorite starts slow or encounters unexpected challenges, you might find better odds for them to win.
So while it might not make sense in backing Ruud to win at 1/7, if Muller takes an early lead in the match by breaking his higher-ranked opponent, the odds could sway a little. At 3-1 in the first set, Muller might still not be a favourite but we could get Ruud at a better, 1/2 odds to win this one.
It’s important here to also take a look at how the two players are playing because at times the favourite might have fitness concerns or is getting troubled by the weather or simply not into it.
This is why it’s vital to watch the live streaming of tennis matches while betting in-play to get a fairer idea about how things are actually going on court. Bookmakers like bet365 and Unibet offer live streaming services for their customers (but this could be geo-restricted and needs you to deposit some money into your bookmaker account) and you can take advantage of that while betting.
Proposition Bets
Consider exploring prop bets or exotic bets related to specific aspects of the match, such as the number of aces served, total games played, or whether there will be a tiebreak in a set.
These bets can sometimes offer more value than traditional moneyline bets.
In one of the matches mentioned above, Cori Gauff starts off 1/14 to beat Sachia Vickery and given her form, that looks like a done result. However, you could also look at the Total Games market in which the bookmaker is offering 4/5 for Over 17.5 games and 10/11 for Under 17.5 games.
Similarly there are markets for Under and Over Games in the First Set (5/6 odds for Over or Under 8.5 Games), for number of aces (1/1 for 5+ aces for Gauff) and for number of double-faults (4/6 for 5+ double faults for Gauff).
Final Word on Betting on Matches With Very Short Odds
While moneyline betting doesn’t offer a lot of returns while betting on one of the players who is a heavy favourite going into his/her match, there are ways one can still bet on that match.
The aforementioned passages discuss this in greater detail but one thing to be noted that as the odds increase, the risk also increases and there is only one way to reduce one’s betting risk – to understand tennis betting in greater detail and research on the players and the matches in greater depth.
Photo Credit: Carles Rabada on Unsplash
