The Australian Open moves into the fourth round stage on Sunday, and with plenty to discuss ahead of the four scheduled men's singles matches, Dan Weston returns...
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Murray out as Djokovic pushes on
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Korda fancied by the market to continue
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Sinner capable of winning match of the day
Fatigued Murray finally bows out
There were plenty of talking points from Saturday's action in Melbourne, with British interest coming to an end after Dan Evans was beaten by Andrey Rublev, plus Andy Murray inevitably fatigued in his brave defeat to Roberto Bautista-Agut.
We did pick up a decent underdog winner with Ben Shelton 3-0 winner over Alexei Popyrin, while Novak Djokovic also won in straight sets, against Grigor Dimitrov.
The market, however, is still unconvinced by the tournament favourite, cutting him only slightly from a pre-match 2.47/5 to a current 2.35/4. With a hamstring issue, and looking in some discomfort on occasion throughout that victory, the outright market is still in a defensive mindset about his chances, trading around 35 ticks higher than his post-draw price.
Hurkacz with potential fatigue ahead of Korda clash
With quarter one wide open, we see some fairly unheralded names in round four action tomorrow, with action getting underway at a slightly later 3am UK time. In the first on the schedule, Hubert Hurkacz takes on Sebastian Korda.
After defeating Daniil Medvedev in round three, Korda is the favourite at 1.664/6, which you can also understand given that Hurkacz has needed five sets to win both of his previous rounds, against Denis Shapovalov and Lorenzo Sonego. However, if they'd met in round one, I'm fairly certain the market would have been stronger on Hurkacz's chances.
This is a battle of two contrasting styles - the strong serve of Hurkacz versus the better return game of Korda - and 12 month hard court data finds little to split the duo. However, Korda's improvement is illustrated with slightly better all-surface numbers over the last six months, and with the context given in the previous paragraph, you can understand why Korda is shorter-priced than data would suggest.
Nishioka not without a chance against Khachanov
The other clash in quarter one sees Karen Khachanov as a strong 1.491/2 favourite against Yoshihito Nishioka, who features in his first ever Grand Slam round four match. Nishioka has really improved of late - he's won over 70% of matches in the last six months - and this could be quite a bit closer than the market anticipates.
Khachanov was around 1.501/2 the last time they met, in Washington on hard court in August last year, but Nishioka has improved since then, yet Khachanov is similarly priced here. Nishioka +4.5 games is around the 1.9010/11 mark in general market pricing, and this doesn't look like bad value to me.
Sinner's return could help him earn underdog victory
From quarter two, we have a cracking match in prospect with Stefanos Tsitsipas facing Jannik Sinner. Both players haven't had much difficulty to get to this stage, although Sinner did need to come back from 2-0 down against Marton Fucsovics, who failed to provide much resistance after taking set two.
I'm not sure I understand this market line. Of course, regular readers of this column will know that I often find Tsitsipas hugely over-rated by the markets, and Sinner's better return game certainly gives him a solid chance here.
The Italian has won over 50% of return points in the tournament so far - better than Tsitsipas' 42% - again illustrating the pressure he's consistently been putting on opposition's serve. Sinner here doesn't look worthy of being such a heavy underdog.
Auger-Aliassime strong favourite to end Lehecka's surprise journey
Finally, our outright pick for Q2, Felix Auger-Aliassime, is 1.261/4 to get past Jiri Lehecka, who shocked Cameron Norrie in five sets in round three. Auger-Aliassime hasn't had it all his own way so far in the event, dropping at least one set in each round, but it would be great for his outright chances if he was to get past the Czech man with minimal fuss tomorrow.
That's not an unrealistic prospect - there's a fair ability differential between the duo, particularly on serve - but 21-year-old Lececka looks to be improving and reached the NextGen final in November as well, and beat Alexander Zverev at the United Cup. It's not a foregone conclusion, but Auger-Aliassime supporters will be hoping Lehecka is overawed by the big occasion.