The Wimbledon warm-up continues this week as the women’s tour moves on to Birmingham. Johanna Konta is back in action after a shock defeat in the final of the AEGON Open in Nottingham to Donna Vekic on the weekend. Konta heads to Birmingham as 3/1 second favourite at Bet365 in the running, with only Petra Kvitova ahead of her in the market. World number one Angelique Kerber was supposed to be there, but she pulled out through injury.
That leaves just three of the top ten appearing in Birmingham, with world number 5 Elina Svitolina going as the top ranked player, along with Dominika Cibulkova and Konta. The tournament does represent a big return for Petra Kvitova who is there on a wildcard and this is just her second tournament back after suffering her hand injury when she was the victim of a home invasion at the back end of last year.
It’s a tough enough switch to grass for players who are getting matches in, and is worth avoiding Kvitova perhaps at 9/2. So there is some big value in this field now and you can look down the field at the double-figure price on Elina Svitolina who could go well on grass here. She has a shocking record in Birmingham actually but this isn’t a particularly deep field and she has been bang in form on both hard court and clay this season which suggests she is versatile enough to get close.
Dominika Cibulkova is just one of those players who can turn around from nowhere to come through a field. She’s huge price, not helped by her recent dip in form. Former Wimbledon champion Garbine Muguruza may come into play a little bit more here on grass and isn’t a bad price at the 8/1 mark in the field and will look more value that Kristina Mladenovic who is the same mark. The French player had a good Roland Garros but doesn’t have the grass game to back things up.
So what makes this even more interesting is that Svitolina, Konta and Muguruza are all in the bottom half of the draw which opens up the To Reach Final betting market at bet365 from the top half of the draw. That’s where Kvitova, Mladenovic and Cibulkova is. Australia’s big outsider Daria Gavrilova looks to have good appeal in a wide open draw because she did alright on her debut last year, pushing Angelique Kerber to three sets in the second round. She and Cibulkova look decent value in the top half of the draw. But Svitolina tops it for the title with us.
AEGON Classic Birmingham Tennis betting odds
Petra Kvitova 9/2, Johanna Konta 3/1, Kristina Mladenovic 8/1, Garbine Muguruza 8/1, Elina Svitolina 10/1, Coco Vandeweghe 10/1, Barbora Strycova 232/1, Dominika Cibulkova 22/1, Lucie Safarova 22/1, Ashleigh Barty 22/1, Alison Riske 33/1, Daria Gavrilova 40/1, bar 66/1
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