The third round of the BNP Paribas Open takes place this Thursday. Bookmakers Review breaks down the fixtures below and lists the best available odds from green listed bookmakers.
Nishikori vs. Tsonga
Kei Nishikori and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga will fight this Thursday for a spot in the ATP Masters 1000 Paris quarter-finals
After reaching the Swiss Indoors Basel final last week, Kei Nishikori started his campaign in Paris with a straight sets victory over Viktor Troicki. Looking now to Nishikori’s numbers on his debut, the highlight clearly goes to his performance at the net with the Japanese ending the match with 13/14 net points won. Despite his solid triumph, Nishikori struggled to perform at a consistent level with 18 winners and 20 unforced errors.
Playing in Paris brings great memories to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga with the 2008 BNP Paribas Open champion holding an outstanding 22 – 9 career record on this event. As we mentioned in a previous article, the Indoor Hard Court conditions clearly suit Tsonga’s game style with 8 of his 12 career titles achieved on this surface. Known for his powerful serve, Tsonga fired 14 aces on his first round match against Albert Ramos-Vinolas, dismissing the Spaniard by 6 – 3 6 – 4.
These two players know each other well with Nishikori winning five or their previous seven meetings. Despite Kei’s lead on the h2h, Tsonga is always a tough opponent on French soil, especially if he keeps serving at such a high level. With this in mind, the value is definitely on the underdog with Tsonga available 147/100 at Pinnacle while William Hill offers you 31/50 for Nishikori to emerge victorious.
Cuevas vs. Raonic
Looking now to the matches scheduled for this Thursday in Paris, the contest between Pablo Cuevas and Milos Raonic clearly deserves a closer look.
After a disappointing first round loss in Basel against Ricardas Berankis, Milos Raonic began his journey in Paris with a much better performance against Pablo Carreno Busta. As usual, Raonic’s serve was the key to his success with the Canadian winning 97.62% of the points played with his first serve and firing an average of 1.55 aces per service game. However, Milos only won 27.27% of the points on Carreno Busta’s serve.
Known as one of the best clay courters on the ATP World Tour, Pablo Cuevas can also produce some outstanding tennis on faster surfaces. Cuevas’ successful run earlier this year in Nottingham’s grass is a great example of that with the Uruguayan reaching the final on that event. The high bouncing courts in Paris clearly suit Pablo’s kick serve with the world no.22 crushing Paolo Lorenzi on his debut by 6 – 1 6 – 2.
This will be the 4th career meeting between these two players with Raonic leading on the h2h by 2 – 1. Looking now to their previous encounters, the last one took place earlier this year in Monte Carlo’s clay with Milos emerging victorious by 7 – 5 2 – 6 7 – 6. As we mentioned before, Cuevas’ serve is extremely effective on these courts and for that reason, we expect a much closer match that the odds suggest. The bookmakers consider Raonic the heavy favourite to win at 29/100 at Coral while Cuevas can be found at 277/50 at Pinnacle. Having said that, the Over 22 at 91/100 at Pinnacle is definitely the best approach for this match between two terrific servers.
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