The first tennis Grand Slam of the year has finally arrived with the Australian Open underway this week. We’ve had plenty of success with our futures betting tips from the first slam of the calendar year and we’ve got our eye on some more value plays this fortnight. Catch our best futures bets for both the men’s and women’s draw below!
2021 Australian Open Futures
Men’s Outright
Leading the way in the betting for the Men’s title is Novak Djokovic, which is no surprise considering he’s an eight-time winner and comes in as the back-to-back defending champion. He certainly deserves to be the favourite, but we just can’t entice his quote of around $2, especially under these conditions.
Instead of taking the Joker we’ll be siding with the man that pushed him to five sets in last year’s Australian Open final in Dominic Thiem. The powerful Austrian had a career-best year in 2020 with his final at Melbourne Park and a breakthrough Grand Slam title at the US Open. Thiem has transformed himself from an elite clay-courter to an elite player on all surfaces and is certainly worth a shout at around $7 to go one better than last year.
If you’re after someone at long odds, then we don’t mind the price of Russia’s Andrey Rublev. The 23-year-old has surged up the rankings over the past 24 months and comes into the Australian Open at #8 in the world. He’s a fantastic hard-court player and has been dominant in his lead-up matches. You can certainly do worse than having something on Rublev at odds.
Value: Andrey Rublev ($21)
Women’s Outright
We say it at just about every Grand Slam in every year, but again it’s a very wide-open betting market for the women’s outright. There are joint leaders in the market with Australia’s Ash Barty and USA’s Naomi Osaka currently at a $6.50 quote, while Garbine Muguruza ($10) and Serena Williams ($12) are the bookies other key chances.
As much of a fan we are of Barty, it’s hard to justify her being the favourite considering she’s yet to make the final at Melbourne Park and is coming off an extended break from the Tour during the pandemic. Instead, we’re all over Osaka to win at $6.50. The Japanese superstar already has three majors to her name at 23-years-old, which includes the 2019 Australian Open title. She’s the best hard-court player on the women’s Tour and provided she stays fit, we have her going very deep in the tournament.
Another woman we’ll be having something on at odds is USA’s Sofia Kenin. Obviously, she’s proven herself at Melbourne Park with her breakthrough triumph here last year, but she also backed it up with some more fantastic results in 2020. Kenin has already played seven matches in 2021, so she has a great fitness base to work with to help her go deep again at this tournament.
Men’s Quarter 4 Winner
Arguably the most stacked with talent Quarters in the Men’s draw is Quarter 4, which provides plenty of value for us to attack. The odds-on favourite to progress through to the Semi-finals is Rafael Nadal at $1.83; however, considering the talent that he’ll have to go through, that’s just far too short on the Australian hard courts for our liking.
Our best bet to progress through to the semi’s is Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas (currently $4). The 22-year-old has been on the rise for a couple of years now and has the all-round game to go deep at majors. He was a semi-finalist in 2019 when he was just 20 years old and he’s continued to get better since then and is now ranked #6 in the world. Tsitsipas has opened up 2021 with two straight-sets wins against top 25 players in the ATP Cup (Bautista-Agut, De Minuar) and looks primed for a big 2021 at major events, starting with the Australian Open.
