Australian Tennis Mens Open Preview

Federer is a prohibitively short priced favourite at best priced 2-5. His record in this Grand Slam event is the weakest of the Grand Slams, excepting the French Open. He is of course the most likely winner, however there is much better E/W value in the other half of the draw.

Nadal was out of form in the 2nd half of 2006, so is no value at 8-1. In the forth quarter his much difficult openents will be Blake (20-1), Hewitt (50-1) and Murray (40-1). Blake has a tough first round match against Moya - if he gets through this he has a great chance of reaching the final. Therefore at this stage he is probably best avoided. I still have doubts regarding Murray's fitness, therefore with a relatively hard draw, he may lose in the last 16 (Nadal) or last 8 (Blake) if either match goes to 5 sets. Hewitt is not the force of old, although he will be motiuvated for his 'home' event.

The 2 top 8 seeds in the 3rd quarter are Nalbandian and Davydenko. However, both have injury doubts so there is some great value to be found. My preference is to have 1pt E/W on both Soderling (100-1) and Malisse (125-1). This event has a recent history of haveing a least one big priced finalist.

Soderling has been steadliy improving. He has the game to suit hard court tennis and good recent hard court form, losing in the Doha semi final in 3 sets (on a tie break) to eventual winner Ljubicic. The onw worry is whether he has the right psychological make up - he seems to lose too many games when he is playing the better tennis (e.g against Ljubicic in Doha).

Malisse reached 2 hard court semi finals last year and also has good recent form, winning in Chennai beating Nadal in the semi-final.