Jack Houghton's Betting Challenge Week 47: Are there chinks in Nadal's armour?

Wimbledon Betting / Jack Houghton / 27 June 2010 / Leave a Comment

Is Nadal operating at peak performance? Jack Houghton says 'no'

"Nadal’s game relies on a physicality that, whilst irresistible when he’s in peak condition, quickly becomes impotent when he’s not."

The clay court genius needs to be operating at full throttle to win at Wimbledon but there are signs that he is not, says Jack Houghton, who will be taking the Spaniard on

There is a truth professional gamblers hold to be self-evident: to be profitable, you must specialise. Losers gorge themselves of all that the great buffet of betting has to offer; winners only ever eat the cheese and pineapple sticks. Who knows what might be lurking in that couscous salad? Therein lies uncertainty, and winners have no truck with uncertainty.

Jack Houghton was a long-time follower of the specialisation theory. Many learned academics credit him with its invention. But now he's turned his back. August 2009. Armed with a £1,000 bank and oodles of likely misplaced confidence, he sets out to prove that, in a year, betting on everything Betfair has to offer, he can turn a profit.

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Rafael Nadal's performances in reaching the fourth round at Wimbledon - needing five sets to beat both Haase and Petzschner - will not inspire confidence in anyone who backed the Spaniard at his pre-tournament odds of [2.6]. He is now three-times that price and, watching him limp through the third-round against a shattered opponent, even that [5.3] looks miserly.

As stated here before, Nadal's game relies on a physicality that, whilst irresistible when he's in peak condition, quickly becomes impotent when he's not. Think back to his French Open defeat to Robin Soderling in Paris last year: recurring knee problems dented his usual court omnipresence that day, allowing Soderling to out-muscle the usually out-muscleable.

It took Nadal nearly a year to regain full fitness and form after that defeat and, when eventually a clay-court winning machine again, he proceeded to play and win 22 matches on the red-stuff, in less than six weeks. And all that coming on the back of a month of hard-court action. Is it especially surprising then that Nadal was so limp when going out to Lopez at Queen's?

Nadal next faces the lowly-ranked Paul-Henri Mathieu, who has seen off Gicquel, Youzhny and De Bakker on his way to the fourth round. Nadal has a 9-0 head-to-head record against the Frenchman and so, you'd expect, should easily progress. However, Mathieu - with his heavy hitting from the baseline - has shown in the past that he is able to stretch Nadal, twice taking a set off him, including when keeping Nadal on court for nearly five hours at the French Open in 2006.

This is the first time the two will meet on Grass and, if Mathieu can push Nadal when the Spaniard was at his peak and on his favourite surface in 2006, then he certainly has the chance to cause an upset given the very different conditions the two will play under on Monday. The Betting Challenge is laying Nadal in the match for £150 at [1.12].

Even if Nadal is able to progress against Mathieu though, he looks poor value at [2.4] to reach the final when it is likely he will have to beat both Soderling and Murray on route. On this basis the Betting Challenge is laying Nadal for £20 at the price.

The World Cup trundles along and our pre-tournament bets on the Netherlands and Germany look solid enough. I make the Germany-England match on Sunday afternoon a coin-toss and, by that reckoning, can't really fathom the price discrepancy between the two teams in the outright market. Whoever progresses from that match though should be favourites to reach the semi-finals, with Argentina not impressing me half as much as they seem to have impressed others.

Adding to our World Cup portfolio then will be £10 bets on Paraguay at [50.0] and Uruguay at [15.0]. Both teams have impressed in the tournament so far and find themselves in the easier sections of the draw.

This week's bets:
£150 LAY Nadal at [1.12] against Mathieu at Wimbledon.
£20 LAY Nadal at [2.4] to reach final of Wimbledon.
£10 BACK Paraguay at [50.0] to win World Cup.
£10 BACK Uruguay at [15.0] to win World Cup.

Already recommended:
£20 BACK Netherlands at [10.0] to win World Cup - 10/06/10.
£20 BACK Germany at [15.5] to win World Cup - 10/06/10.
£20 BACK Federer at [2.4] at Wimbledon - 20/06/10.
£40 BACK Federer/S Williams at [7.4] at Wimbledon - 20/06/10.