Events / Sean Calvert / 26 July 2010 /

Marcos Baghdatis is better than his odds suggest and could be a rewarding back-to-lay investment this week, says Sean Calvert

The opening event of the North American hard-court season proved to be a successful one for us, as my tip John Isner traded at odds-on in the final in Atlanta before succumbing to Mardy Fish, so that proved a good investment.

I said last week that this is my favourite time of the tennis year and this week I'm aiming to build on that good start to the swing by cashing in at the next event of the US Open Series, which is the Farmers Classic.

This Los Angeles hard-court event is the longest-running annual sporting event in LA and the field is headed by Andy Murray, who has taken a late wild-card and been installed as the number one seed.

This is Murray's favourite time of the year also and it would be foolish to write him off in the outright market, but at around [2.5] there are more value for money investments around.

Murray does have an easy-looking start against possibly Teimuraz Gabashvili, but a likely last eight meeting against Ernests Gulbis might be a test, as the Scot hasn't played much hard-court tennis this year and his last efforts on the surface were poor.

The lacklustre defeats by Mardy Fish, Robin Soderling and Janko Tipsarevic on hard-courts in 2010 were unexpected and you do get the sense with Murray that his hunger for winning these smaller titles has diminished somewhat of late.

He does have a 4-0 head-to-head over Gulbis, but the Latvian was showing fine form prior to the hamstring injury that's kept him out since the French Open, so that could be a potential pitfall for the Scot.

The other big name who also represents a significant hurdle for Murray to get over in the top half of the draw is Mardy Fish, who continued his great recent run by winning in Atlanta.

The fact that Fish took Murray out in straight sets on hard in Miami in their last meeting will give Fish yet more confidence, but he may be tired after a tough week in the baking Atlanta sun and he doesn't rate too highly as an outright bet at around [9.0].

The bottom half looks the place for value and surely some layers have made a mistake by pricing up Marcos Baghdatis at around [34.0].

The Cypriot has a tasty-looking draw with the recently married Janko Tipsarevic as the seed in that quarter.

Tipsy wed long-time girlfriend Biljana Sesevic a few weeks back and it's fair to suppose that his mind isn't exactly fully focussed on tennis at the moment, as a first round loss to Kevin Anderson in Atlanta suggests is the case.

Baggy is making his first appearance of the hard-court swing this week and it's asking a lot for him to go out and win the event, but [34.0] for a player who looks easily good enough to make the last four seems a bit big.

Other than Tipsy, there are Santiago Giraldo, Ryan Sweeting and Kristof Vliegen in that quarter so you would expect the Cypriot to prevail.

If all goes to form, he would probably face a tough semi-final against defending champion and California lad Sam Querrey, who holds a 3-0 winning record over Baghdatis, but the American is not one to be trusted when a lot is expected of him.

I wouldn't be surprised to see Querrey crumble under the pressure of retaining his title as he is yet to defend a title of any description, it's worth chancing that the run will continue here.

Querrey's poor defeat to Dustin Brown in Newport a few weeks back when number one seed is another example of the hit and miss nature of the man and at [5.5] I'll give it a miss.

Another thing that puts me off about Querrey is that he has Robby Ginepri (who beat Querrey in Paris) and Kevin Anderson (semi finalist in Atlanta last week) in his quarter.

So, to sum up, I'll be siding with Marcos Baghdatis this week on a back-to-lay basis as a great value alternative to Murray and Querrey.

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