The sporting calendar has barely wiped its feet and crossed the threshold of the new year, but already it is time to look ahead to one of the biggest events in the sporting calendar. It is tennis Grand Slam time as the 2016 Australian Open starts on January 18th. It a massive early challenge in the new season with not a lot of time for players to get back to full match sharpness after the winter break. But that is one of the great challenges of the Australian Open.
This season it is Novak Djokovic who is back to defend the title on the Men’s’ side of the draw with the usual fellow big-guns all in attendance. Djokovic regained his dominance on the blue courts of Melbourne at the start of February last year by beating Andy Murray in the final. That was Djokovic’s fourth Australian Open title, the fifth of his career. Can anyone stop the Serbian?
ATP 2016 Australian Open Favourite
So naturally it is Novak Djokovic who will march into Melbourne Park as favourite. It was a staggeringly brilliant season from him last season and is justifiably the 11/8 outright favourite at online betting site Bet365 for the 2016 Australian Open. It is five titles under his belt now in his career and three of those Australian Open Grand Slam titles have come against Andy Murray in the final, arguably his closest contender for the title.
So really it is one of those situations where it is Djokovic’s title to lose. He is the only player to have won the Australian Open five times (from five finals) in the open era as well as the only one to win it three seasons on the trot. He didn’t drop as set until the semi finals when he met Stan Wawrinka in an epic five-set tussle last year. He then dropped just one against Murray in the final, so just three sets he gave up in the 2015 edition. It’s tough to beat that.
ATP 2016 Australian Open Main Contenders
Andy Murray 4/1
Four Australian Open Finals, no titles
The fact that Andy Murray hasn’t gotten his hands on the Australian Open title, largely because of Djokovic, just makes you want to throw more weight behind backing Djokovic. Murray is the best hard court player out of the main challengers to Djokovic’s supremacy but he hasn’t been able to go that one step further in Melbourne Park and pick up the title. Murray hasn’t fallen short of the quarter finals in the last five editions of the Australian Open.
Roger Federer 6/1
Five Australian Open Finals, Three titles
The evergreen Federer is back for another season. The maestro can of course boast being a former Australian Open champion. He won back to back in 2006 and 2007 and then had to wait to 2010 to get his hands on this third Australian Open title when he took down Andy Murray in the final. That’s it for Federer who hasn’t been back to the final since then. He had a major blow-out in the third round last year and that snapped a streak of eleven years of finishing no worse than the semi final stage. Immense record nonetheless, does he have the legs?
Stan Wawrinka 16/1
One Australian Open Final, One Title
Well, like Djokovic, Wawrinka has a 100% strike rate in Australian Open finals. However, that’s because he’s only been to one, which he won in 2014 over Rafael Nadal. He proved it wasn’t a flash in the pan by winning the French Open last year for his second Grand Slam career title. It’s good that Wawrinka is around to mix things up among the big four, because he is such an unpredictable wild card that you don’t know what’s going to happen with him. He was heavy underdog in last season’s French Open final against Novak Djokovic, but Wawrinka just went for bust, tried everything in the book and literally went balls to the wall without holding anything back. It was one of the greatest, bravest final appearances that has been seen in the open era. Underestimated and unpredictable as he’s prone to throw out a stinker here and there.
Kei Nishikori 18/1
No Australian Open Finals
There was a solid quarter final appearance from Nishikori last season but he couldn’t get past Stan Wawrinka. He just doesn’t have the proven track record at Grand Slam to be any shorter priced than this. His best ever Grand Slam effort was as losing finalist in the 2014 US Open. He didn’t get past the quarter finals of a Slam last year. Unlikely to go all the way.
Rafael Nadal 20/1
Three Australian Open Finals, One Title
The enigma that is Nadal. The Spaniard is a former Australian Open winner, claiming the title back in 2009. It’s no secret that he has been bothered by injuries and setbacks over the last year or so, so you don’t really know what Nadal you are going to get. But the rub of things is then, even when he was on top of his game he struggled to put the title in the bag. That suggest of course that it is unlikely to do it while he is still searching to get back to some kind of peak in the game. Will carry more of a threat at the French Open of course.
Stats to consider for 2016 Australian Open betting
There were some interesting trends from the latter stages of the 2015 Australian Open that you could use to move forward with into 2016 Australian open tennis betting. All four of the quarter finals last year were settled in three straight sets (Djokovic, Wawrinka, Tomas Berdych and Andy Murray). Then the two semi finals and the final itself all went over three sets.
The last three Australian Open Finals themselves have been settled in four sets. Four of Djokovic’s five finals at the Australian Open have been over four sets, the other one a straight sets victory over Andy Murray. Only two of the last eleven Australian Open Finals have gone to five sets, so it’s not that much of a common occurrence.
Between last year’s finalists, Murray and Djokovic, they dropped just four sets between them on the way to the final itself. So it is worth backing the outright market leaders to come through their first four matches by a 3-0 set scoreline more often than not. Just to further press that point home, losing semi finalist Stan Wawrinka dropped just one set en route to the semi finals while the other losing semi finalist Tomas Berdych didn’t drop one in getting there.
ATP 2016 Australian Open Winner Odds
Novak Djokovic 11/8, Andy Murray 4/1, Roger Federer 6/1, Stan Wawrinka 16/1, Kei Nishikori 18/1, Rafael Nadal 20/1, Milos Raonic 33/1, Main Cilic 33/1, Tomas Berdych 33/1, 40/1 bar
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