South_African_Punter

John Isner to beat Milos Raonic at 2.26 with Pinnacle
I took the exact same bet in this year's Wimbledon, it won, and I feel that there's some justification in taking it again here at odds against. Sure, Isner has had more struggles than Raonic so far in this event, but I don't feel that his level has been that poor overall, he was just troubled by some decent players that gave him trouble from the back of the baseline. The match-up against Raonic is completely different in that rallies aren't going to happen - and Isner has always had the Canadian's number in shorter points, as evidenced by the 4-1 record and the fact that Raonic has never won a non-TB set over those five meetings. At 2.26, give me Isner.

Milos Raonic vs Stan Wawrinka - Wawrinka to win @ 2.10 with SportingBet
I'm surprised to see Wawrinka as the underdog here. Yes, Raonic has won their last two clashes (the last one in the Australian Open, 2016), but they are now both coming back from injury and I will be happy to back the "Stan train" here. The way he easily won against Dimitrov was great.

Milos Raonic vs Stan Wawrinka - Wawrinka to win @ 2.10 with SportingBet
I'm surprised to see Wawrinka as the underdog here. Yes, Raonic has won their last two clashes (the last one in the Australian Open, 2016), but they are now both coming back from injury and I will be happy to back the "Stan train" here. The way he easily won against Dimitrov was great.

Mikhail  Kukushkin (+5.5) vs Hyeon Chung @ 1.90 with SportingBet
Since coming back from injury, Chung has not impressed me greatly. He is very weak on serve and was, in my opinion, lucky to win against Berankis, who was in a position to take 2-0 sets lead. Kukushkin was more impressive against Rubin, so I'm happy to take the handicap here.

www.sportingbet.co.za
As far as I know, same prices as the UK parent (also called  SportingBet, I believe).

Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Jack Sock @ 2.6 with Sportingbet
Given Jack Sock's awful record this year, I'm not sure anyone can really be confident in backing him.

Mikhail  Kukushkin (+5.5) vs Hyeon Chung @ 1.90 with SportingBet
Since coming back from injury, Chung has not impressed me greatly. He is very weak on serve and was, in my opinion, lucky to win against Berankis, who was in a position to take 2-0 sets lead. Kukushkin was more impressive against Rubin, so I'm happy to take the handicap here.

Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Jack Sock @ 2.6 with Sportingbet
Given Jack Sock's awful record this year, I'm not sure anyone can really be confident in backing him.

Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Jack Sock @ 2.6 with Sportingbet
Given Jack Sock's awful record this year, I'm not sure anyone can really be confident in backing him.

Alright, here we go with the final Grand Slam of the season and, before I begin, I'd just like to wish good luck to everyone who's going to be betting on it!
Now - I haven't had a long post in a while and this is a good excuse to have one, so here we go. This season has been quite juicy so far, especially if compared with the disaster that went by the name of 2017, so I'm going to be slightly more ambitious with the first round than I usually am. There are many interesting matches and I have a good feeling about quite a few of them, so I'm going to go for all kinds of bets in the very first round and no outrights at all. If I was asked for some tips, however, I'd have Nadal and Halep as the favourites and Bertens and Tsitsipas as the dark horses. Let's hope all goes well and that there will be a profit to be collected before the second round begins.
Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Aljaz Bedene at 1.90 with Ladbrokes
The first bet that I'm going to go for is on the man who's made me so many points a few weeks back. That was on clay and this is on hard, but Nikoloz is reasonably universal and the fact is that he should be in a much better position going into this than Bedene, who's had pretty much zero match practice in recent times and who might be here just to collect the check. The last point might be stretching things a bit, but really, one needs to have some matches under the belt given the long match format and Bedene doesn't have that, so opposing him at odds that aren't even all that skinny makes a lot of sense to me.
Jil Belen Teichmann to beat Dalila Jakupovic at 1.67 with BetVictor
The one player that I really liked in the qualifiers was Jil Belen Teichmann and I think that she has every chance of getting a first round win as well. Jakupovic is one of those players that have just dodged having to qualify - and I have to tell you that I'm not sure that she would've been able to go through three rounds of tennis if she was asked to do that honestly. She made a lot of great results during the grass court seasons, with wins over Mertens and even Osaka, but, since then, she's done little of note. And, even more importantly, her last outing ended with her retiring in the middle of the second set. It's the same case as with Bedene then, with us getting two ways of winning here - either Teichmann beats her fair and square or Jakupovic just shows up for the check. I'm more than happy to chance that.
Dayana Yastremska to beat Karolina Muchova at 1.53 with Paddy Power
Karolina Muchova was another player that I quite liked in the qualifiers, but she faces a much sterner test than Teichmann here in the form of the in-form Yastremska, who really has impressed me on quite a few occasions in this season. What I really appreciate about her is the fighting spirit that she brings with herself, every single time that I saw her she was fighting to the end, with her recent match in New Haven being a splendid example of that if I remember correctly. She's one of the younger talents that I've been tracking in this season and she's generally been playing a level above Muchova, so, despite the qualifying success, I think that the Czech is going to come up well short here.
Fernando Verdasco to beat Feliciano Lopez at 1.66 with Ladbrokes
As much as one might like these two guys, it's fair to say that this match is going to be played in the twilight of their careers. That said, it seems to me that Lopez is losing his skills almost as quickly as Ferrer, while Verdasco still has a couple of good performances in himself, which is why I'm going to back him here. The big problem that I have with Lopez is that he seems to have lost a lot of endurance over the last year or two - and that is a tremendously important issue given that this match could go on for four or five sets.
Marco Cecchinato to beat Julien Benneteau at 1.67 with William Hill
Julien Benneteau is another player that's in the twilight of his career. I can't quite remember when exactly he wants to call it quits, whether it's this very US Open or it's one of those French tournaments at the end of the season, but that doesn't really matter. He was quite poor in Winston Salem and I'm not sure that he will be able to put up one last heroic performance. Cecchinato has almost no (or no) wins on hard courts, but he came close to getting some recently against much tougher and sharper players, so this is his chance - and, over five sets, he could even just outlast the Frenchman and win that way.
Vasek Pospisil to beat Lukas Lacko at 1.82 with Pinnacle 
Just a few months ago, I was ranting about how I don't like Pospisil in the singles and I was backing Bolt to win a set against him in one of the grass court tournaments, that much I remember. I haven't fallen in love with him since, don't get me wrong, but he has got some wins and some confidence back, while Lukas Lacko has been just moving around without soul in recent months. I was thinking about backing him against Zeballos in Winston Salem, but I dodged that bet and luckily so. Pospisil also has the home advantage here in a sense, so I'd have him as a somewhat bigger favourite than the odds suggest.
Jason Kubler to beat Roberto Bautista Agut at 4.33 with Ladbrokes
I haven't really covered any underdogs just yet, but here we go, I did manage to find one that I quite like in the form of Jason Kubler, who did really well in a couple of Challengers recently and who could find himself in a favourable spot against Roberto Bautista Agut, who didn't really play on American hard courts in the recent weeks. In fact, he hasn't played for more than a month now, with fitness issues troubling him the last time out. I reckon that he's sufficiently fit given that he's decided to show up, but Kubler is a good enough player to take advantage of any rustiness and I think that he'll be more than fired up for it given all the injury struggles he had in his career. He appears to be without pain now - and the odds for him to win a match against a presumably rusty opponent look tasty enough.
Jan-Lennard Struff (vs. Smyczek) + Agnieszka Radwanska (vs. Maria) at 1.95 with Paddy Power
Robin Haase (vs. McDonald) + Natalia Vikhlyantseva (vs. King) at 2.08 with Bet365
Aryna Sabalenka (vs. Collins) + Daria Gavrilova (vs. Sorribes Tormo) + Kiki Bertens (vs. Kr.Pliskova) at 1.93 with Bet365
Diego Schwartzman (vs. Delbonis) + Barbora Strycova (vs. Lao) + Fabio Fognini (vs. Mmoh) at 1.95 with Paddy Power
Backing a lot of reasonably big favourites isn't particularly difficult, but these picks aren't completely mindless, so there you go. Smyczek has been rather dreadful recently and I'm afraid that the end of his career might be near, Radwanska looked decent against much tougher opposition in recent weeks, Robin Haase has played himself into some solid form (and McDonald's desperate performance against Edmund doesn't inspire any confidence either), Vania King has played pretty much no successful singles in this season, Collins was desperately poor out there in recent weeks (I saw the match against Yastremska and I was shocked actually), Gavrilova nearly upset Sabalenka and SST is two steps down, Kr. Pliskova has been largely non-existent lately, etc. As always, it'd be a bit lucky to see all these guys deliver, but I'm hoping that we get only one letdown in this batch.

Hmmm...I'd be worried opposing Stephens. She usually picks it up on the big stage (final French Open) and will probably be a little more motivated since it's in her home country. But good luck all the same.

Cilic looks good for me @2.62 bet365
It's at least 55/45 game for me, so it worth try at this odds.
 

Robin Haase (-1.5 sets) to beat Filip Krajinovic at 2.50 with Pinnacle
Filips first match after Wimbledon ended in a straight sets loss to Karen Khachanov and this one wont be any easier. Robin can be very efficient in serving and he's always dangerous with stable play from the baseline. I don't trust Filip on faster hardcourts either since it's obvious from his stats on the challenger tour that he isn't a hardcourt player. Clay is his best surface. Robin should take this in straight sets.

Kiki Bertens to beat Ashleigh Barty at 1.83
Ok, I'll preface this by saying I'm a Kiki Bertens fan, so maybe I'm a bit biased, but I have been impressed that she has scored two top 10 wins (over Pliskova and Kvitova) this week, both by a 2-0 scoreline. As hard court isn't her favoured surface, these are stunning results. Barty has also won in convincing fashion this week but against lower-ranked players, so I think Bertens deserves to be slight favourite.

Kiki Bertens to beat Ashleigh Barty at 1.83
Ok, I'll preface this by saying I'm a Kiki Bertens fan, so maybe I'm a bit biased, but I have been impressed that she has scored two top 10 wins (over Pliskova and Kvitova) this week, both by a 2-0 scoreline. As hard court isn't her favoured surface, these are stunning results. Barty has also won in convincing fashion this week but against lower-ranked players, so I think Bertens deserves to be slight favourite.

Grigor Dimitrov to beat Kevin Anderson at 2.21 with Pinnacle
Kevin isn't serving at his best right now. He's a bit lower in his standard than usual. He made up for it with good baseline play in his last match but that was only what was enough to beat Ilya Ivashka but Grigor can do a lot more damage than Ilya did. Grigor also owns a 6-1 record in this matchup having won all last 5 meetings with last one being in Stockholm 2016. Grigor seems to have picked up some form in Toronto that I haven't seen from him all season so I think he'll beat Kevin again. It's at least more likely than the odds suggest so at 2.21 I'm more than happy to bet on the bulgarian.

Adrian Mannarino to beat Sam Querrey at 2.37 with bet365
I think Adrian deserves a bet here. He reached the quarterfinal of Rogers cup last season and Sam is in awful form and add that Adrian owns a 3-1 record in this matchup having won 3 times on american soil in US open, Cincinnati and Miami. And what we get is a probable win for Adrian.

Taro Daniel to beat Jaume Munar at 2.05
Daniel has been on a very good run recently, notching up two wins in Gstaad, losing to Bautista-Agut in the quarterfinals. He has also played two matches in Kitzbuhel, winning easily against an out-of-form Struff and fatigued Laslo Djere. Munar also went out against Bautista-Agut in Gstaad, although he did take a set off him, unlike Daniel. In Kitzbuhel, he has beaten Hanfmann, however, he did drop a set, and then coasted to victory against an out-of-form Haase. However, the main deciding factor for me was that Daniel beat Munar only last year, 6-2 6-1, in Munar's home town. So I will back him in this match-up.

Jared Donaldson (-2.5) to beat Jordan Thompson at 1.80
Although Jared hasn't been particularly good on the clay or grass, I will back him to win here. He beat Thompson earlier this year in Australia, and his favourite surface is clearly hard courts. Furthermore, the crowd will be behind him, giving him further impetus to end his current bad run.

Jared Donaldson (-2.5) to beat Jordan Thompson at 1.80
Although Jared hasn't been particularly good on the clay or grass, I will back him to win here. He beat Thompson earlier this year in Australia, and his favourite surface is clearly hard courts. Furthermore, the crowd will be behind him, giving him further impetus to end his current bad run.

Wasn't last week good enough? 
Svetlana Kuznetsova (-3.5) to beat Kristie Ahn at 1.80 with Paddy Power
Mihaela Buzarnescu (-3.5) to beat Sachia Vickery at 1.80 with Paddy Power
Malek Jaziri to beat Evgeny Donskoy at 1.90 with Paddy Power
One of the last chances that I'm giving to Kuznetsova, but yeah, she should still be way too strong for Ahn, who's dropped down a level recently. Buzarnescu is a very straightforward pick, on the other hand, I don't rate Vickery all that much, she's just average and home conditions can only get you so far. Finally, Jaziri has always been quite useful on American hards and he has a 4-0 record against Donskoy. The Russian's run in Umag means nothing to me, everyone's beating Lorenzi these days and Dzumhur was a bit mental on the day.

Ryan Harrison to beat Cameron Norrie at 1.80 with bet365
Ryan played a big match last night, didn't drop serve all match and deserved to reach the semifinal. The same cannot be said about Cameron who only reached the semi by benefit of a second set withdrawal by Nick Kyrgios who showed no eagerness at all to play and practically gave the match away to Cameron. Ryan showed some great composure in saving several break points in his last match and his big serve and good baseline play saved him several times in those situations. I expect him to do the same here and eventually reach his second consecutive Atlanta final.

Wow. What a job!!!!!! 

Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Pablo Carreno-Busta at 3.75 with Unibet
Leonardo Mayer to beat Diego Sebastian Schwartzman at 2.40 with Pinnacle
I like these two underdogs in Hamburg today, both should have a decent chance of winning given their forms and the conditions. I do like PCB and DSS as players, but they are grinders more than anything and the Hamburg conditions aren't exactly great for grinding, as evidenced by many of the recent results. On top of that, Schwartzman also looked injured in his previous match (which is why I'm taking Mayer with a one-set bookie).

Nikoloz Basilashvili to beat Pablo Cuevas at 3.22 with Marathonbet
Pretty drastic odds given that Basilashvili has already won three matches against decent opposition in this tournament. Cuevas has always been the better clay court player of the two and everything, but his form has been VERY shaky in recent times and I just don't believe that he can be trusted as a big favorite against players that can actually play, which Basilashvili can. In terms of value, there's only one play to make here and I prefer the outright win over the handicap lines (if Basilashvili loses, chances are that it's going to be by a big margin, he's often that kind of a guy).
Vaclav Safranek to beat Rogerio Dutra Silva at 4.97 with Pinnacle
Odds odds odds. Dutra Silva has many of these odd losses against worse players and Safranek will have the home conditions on his side here, so 5.00?