Betting on tennis is very exciting and presents a good way to engage with the sport, particularly for fans who are seeking to make the most out of their experience while watching any given match. But tennis betting is far from being easy. In fact, it is very demanding and requires that bettors have done a lot of reading and analysis, before choosing their wagers and develop realistic chances of beating the house, whether we are talking about brick-and-mortar bookies, sports betting sites or all online casinos featuring sports wagers.
Besides the most profound factors that bettors need to consider before placing a bet on a tennis match – such factors are usually player stats, previous confrontations, weather conditions, rankings, court type, etc – the role of the event itself turns out to be a major issue affecting outcomes and therefore, betting decisions.
Betting on Grand Slam events is much different from betting on ATP tours. The reason for this is that statistical evidence has revealed a different win rate of favorites at the four majors compared to every other tour.
Favorites have considerably higher win rates than dogs in three of the four Slams – the Australian Open, the French Open, and Wimbledon- while things are a bit different in the US Open, but we will get into this later on. Analysis of Grand Slam records has illustrated that favorites close the match in more than 78% of the cases when the three tours -but the US Open- are studied. The fourth Slam also has a very high win rate of favorites, but it’s not as high as in the other three, though it remains a fact that the favorites have way more chances of beating the outsiders.
In other ATP tours the win rate of favorites is considerably lower and this is why it is in these tours that we get to see unexpected turnarounds and upsets more often. It’s not that upsets don’t happen at Grand Slams – they do happen and sometimes they are glorious and amazing – but for the most part, underdogs get to shine in the non-Grand Slam events.
So, what difference does it make to play in a Grand Slam match than to play in any other match? Well, the answer is rather straightforward. If the rule of ‘best of five sets’ doesn’t have to do with this, then what does?
Every other ATP tour has the ‘best of three sets’ rule, which means that players get to win when they are the first ones to reach two winning sets. The Grand Slam matches have the ‘best of five sets’ format, which means that the players get to win they are the first ones to reach three winning sets. This raises the number of sets played and consequently the number of games played.
The more games players get to play, the more their chances of winning improve. For the favorites, this implies that a favorable probability for winning at the pre-game odds grows considerably as the match unfolds and as we move towards a greater number of games. Empirical evidence has demonstrated that the more games the players play, the more they fine-tune their strategy, understand their opponents’ game, and advance their tennis capabilities in the match. For the favorites – which are obviously the ones with the greater experience, greater talent, higher rankings, etc – this is a gift from God!
If we accept that the favorite is also the better player in the tennis match we want to bet on, at one of the online casino sites in Germany, then we also need to accept that more sets mean lower chances of any other factor affecting the final result of the match (that’s kind of basic in the ‘what to do’ and ‘what not to do’ in sports betting). Variance becomes smaller as the number of games becomes bigger and so random variables or other factors that can potentially impact the outcome are gradually extinguished.
So, the next time you want to bet on tennis, don’t forget to incorporate the event itself in the factors affecting your decision. A Grand Slam event will certainly need you to take into account the fact that men’s matches feature the ‘best of five sets’ format and this has implications on the favorites’ growing probabilities of winning.
