Rafael Nadal v Dominic Thiem French Open Tennis Betting Odds & Preview

Experience of Nadal to win semi final battle

Dominic Thiem
Dominic Thiem (Austria) © GEPA pictures

For two players who have gone well on clay this season, the two are miles apart in the betting for this semi-final showdown at the French Open. Rafael Nadal is running as the heavy odds-on favourite to win this match as he goes in search of a record 10th French Open title. With Novak Djokovic having fallen out of the draw (to Thiem), Nadal’s path to success became a little bit clearer and he has just the one hurdle left now to get back to the showcase match.

Nadal got a bit of a boost in his quarter final as well because his opponent Carreno Busta quit the contest through injury less than an hour into the match. Nadal was already a set and a break up before that happens. It just means that he got a bit of extra rest in the bag ahead of this semi final clash. But Nadal will know that his opponent has been fantastic as well as he has been on clay this season when they meet up on Court Philippe-Chatrier.

Rafael Nadal v Dominic Thiem Betting Odds

Rafael Nadal 1/5, Dominic Thiem 7/2

They are no strangers to each other having met three times in the past six weeks. Nadal beat Thiem in the final of Barcelona and in Madrid but fell to the Austrian in the quarter-finals of Rome. That has been Nadal’s only defeat on clay this season. His Austrian counterpart has massive power in his game and is fulfilling his massive potential. There’s no real weakness in terms of power in either Team’s forehand or backhand game and he has a mean serve up his sleeve as well and that combined will make life difficult for Nadal on the clay.

But will it be able to top Nadal’s classy forehand weapon? Neither player has dropped a set in this season’s tournament so far, but Nadal has only lost 22 games in his five matches which is a remarkable average of just 4.4 per game and he has dropped just the eight games in his last three matches. He powered through his third round game against Nikoloz Basilashvili by dropping just the one game in the match.

Thiem scored his first career win over Novak Djokovic in the quarter-finals, but if you look back at the Rome tournament, after beating Nadal Thiem went out in his next match and losing heavily to Djokovic, looking a bit of a spent force. So will he be able to keep his momentum and energy high after such a big win over Djokovic? He is just one of seven players to have beaten Nadal more than once on clay. In the bet365 set betting for the match, Rafael Nadal 3-0 is even money, while a 3-1 in his favour is trading at a price of 11/4.

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