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Vondrousova again with opportunity to justify potential
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Garcia could be tested by Fernandez
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Mertens again looking like value
Jabeur slight favourite over Vondrousova
While the men's schedule on Thursday features a number of heavy favourites, the women's event has some truly competitive clashes as the tournament continues. These include Marketa Vondrousova versus Ons Jabeur and Leylah Fernandez against Caroline Garcia in particular, so we will start off with thoughts on those two matches.
We've been waiting for Vondrousova to convert her obvious potential into big results, but we've been waiting a while now with the Czech struggling with injury issues. However, there's no doubt that her current ranking just inside the top 100 is false. Interestingly, there's very little between the duo on hard court data, so the market looks like it's not a million miles off having priced the two players fairly close to even money - the higher ranked Jabeur being the 1.814/5 favourite.
Garcia slightly short-priced against Fernandez
As for the other match mentioned, I make Garcia the favourite but more like around the 1.608/13 to 1.654/6 mark against Fernandez, a slightly bigger line than the current 1.454/9 about the Frenchwoman, who finished 2022 in such a positive way with a WTA Finals triumph.
Fernandez got through a potentially tricky round one match against Alize Cornet on Tuesday, and will be looking for a second consecutive French scalp tomorrow. I feel she will have to serve well in order to cause a surprise, but this match could well be closer than the market anticipates.
Mertens again for the double-up
We picked up a winner on Tuesday with Elise Mertens getting the better of Garbine Muguruza, and I'm in favour of the Belgian again in round two. This time around, she faces Lauren Davis, and is barely favourite at 1.845/6.
I'm surprised about this line - Mertens has better serve and return data on hard court in the last 12 months, despite not playing close to her best level, and I can't help thinking this is an over-reaction to Davis taking the title in Hobart against what was a pretty weak list of opposition, in all honesty.
Davis didn't face a single top 30 opponent in that event, and only one inside the top 60, so her title may not be as noteworthy as it first appears. I'm also wondering a little about how much seven matches (Davis played qualifiers as well in Hobart) will have taken out of the American, and playing eight matches in a week and half could well take its toll. Given this, and the data discrepancy, Mertens is our Thursday pick.