Baltacha battles French Open Champion Schiavone at Istanbul Cup
We have Britain’s Elena Baltacha to cheer on here as she navigated her way to the second round of the tournament. There she will take on French Open champion Francesca Schiavone who beat Brit Anne Keothavong in the first round. Schiavone is perhaps the epitome of the 2010 women’s tennis season which has provided fans with plenty of thrills and spills and upsets. This means that while the top seeds have not perhaps been dominating quite as much, tennis betting has taken on some interesting turns and there have been some great outside bets to take advantage of. Schiavone goes as top seed in Turkey, but the Italian has not really backed up her surprise Grand Slam win with any great form. She will probably be happier getting off the grass court portion of the season and back on to the hard courts.
Schiavone is exactly the sort of highly ranked opponent who Baltacha can bring down. The British tennis star has had a wonderful season, and it’s always nice to get behind the home based talent. She has claimed a couple of major scalps this season, and she is such a gritty and determined player that she really can take higher ranked players to the wire. Schiavone will be favourite for the match, but she probably is not expecting a pushover. Baltacha came through a tough first round match against a Turkish wildcard, which will probably have given her a great workout. Sadly didn’t make an impact at Wimbledon, but look for her to get better. Baltacha is well worth a punt against top seed Schiavone. Already some seeds have fallen at the Istanbul Cup, notably second seed Petra Kvitova who went out in three sets. The ousting of Kvitova, who has been in good form lately including a semi final appearance at Wimbledon, has left a pretty good passage through to the latter stages for young Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Pavlyuchenkova is a great prospect, and punches hard. She stormed through the first round losing just one game in a 6-1 6-0 victory. She won her first WTA Tour title this year, and waiting for her to back that up. One good outside bet to look at is Anastasija Sevastova, who beat Kvitova in the first round. If you like betting with form then she is a good who has reached two quarterfinals in the last three weeks. She is a player on the up and like Pavlyuchenkova, won her first and only WTA Tour title this year. Defending champion in Turkey is Vera Dushevina, who needed to dig deep to get through a tough first round match. Another Tour title which is wide open. All eyes on Baltacha and then Pavlyuchenkova in the primary tennis betting though.
Stanford, California Bank of the West Classic
This WTA Premier Tour event on the hard court is a great one to watch, with some top names and fan favourites at the event. There’s not been too much trouble for the seeds so far, because these are players ranked higher in the world than in the Istanbul Cup. In California, there are two top ten ranked players in Samantha Stosur and Elena Dementieva and then a most of the players making up the teens in the list of World Rankings, from world 15 Maria Sharapova to world 18 Victoria Azarenka. But let’s start our tennis betting by looking after former world number one Ana Ivanovic, who is still trying to rediscover the sort of sparkling and consistent form that took her to the top of the world a couple of years ago. She suffered a huge downturn in fortune but is on the rise again. She has shown glimpses this season that she can add to her eight career titles, but just can’t quite make it. If she continues, in twelve months time she’ll probably be a bigger threat. But the Sports Illustrated swimsuit model had a great victory over Alisa Kleybanova in the first round, and she could be on course to meet a personal favourite in Victoria Azarenka. It was a pretty good mental victory for Ivanovic, who had lost the two previous meetings against Kleybanova heavily.
Victoria Azarenka has had a troubled season after looking ready to beat the world in the early stages of the season. She has really struggled for form in the second half of the season and should be ranked much higher in the world if she could rediscover that. She is a very dangerous, passionate and feisty player though, and definitely has potential to go all of the way. Tournament fourth seed Marion Bartoli should meet Ivanovic in the second round, and the winner of that would play Azarenka in the quarter finals if she gets there. An Ivanovic v Azarenka match has a certain ring about it that makes for an attractive prospect to watch. Maria Sharapova has a tough first round match against Jie Zheng, but Sharapova, seeded fifth for the tournament, just like Ivanovic (but on a more consistent scale), has shown signs that she is really getting on top of her game again this season. Hasn’t played a great deal this season, but has picked up two titles. If she comes in strong in the first round, she will be a threat in the draw. She is on course to meet another personal favourite in Elena Dementieva who is always worth looking at in tennis betting. World number six was a strong bet for the French Open until she had to retire in the semi finals, and injury which cost her her place at Wimbledon. Still, she is such a graceful and strong player, and has been a good world top ten for the past seven years or so. The only question about her will be her injury and her match sharpness. Watching her, it’s hard not to want her to win.
We should mention the top seed, Australia’s Samantha Stosur, who is one of the most improved players on the WTA Tour this year. She has had a great year and defied some expectations and climbed her way back up the world rankings. She’s also a great doubles player, and is currently sitting as world number five after winning her second WTA Tour title this year. Having a 35-10 match record for the season is pretty good percentages to back in your tennis betting, and she’ll be looking to make up for the shock of a first round defeat at Wimbledon when she was being tipped to win the title. Should easily be a safe bet for a quarter final appearance, but realistically any less than a semi final berth would be a disappointment for the Aussie. A very strong bet is Stosur in a strong field, expect good performances from Ivanovic as well as Sharapova. They’ll both be good prices in the betting for the tournament. Azarenka and Dementieva should be stronger bets, but there is a question over consistency and match sharpness for both, not quality.
