Events / Sean Calvert / 03 May 2010 /

Sean Calvert looks in disbelief at the Betfair market which has made Tomas Berdych favourite to win the BMW Open in Munich and tells us who provides far better betting options.

It wasn't the greatest of events last week in Rome, but then again trying to pick out someone to beat Rafa Nadal on the red dirt is a thankless task at the best of times.

The Spaniard eased to a record-equalling 17th ATP Masters Series title by comfortably beating David Ferrer and rewarding those who were brave enough to go all-in on an outright price of around [1.58] at the start.

Thankfully, there's no Rafa around in any of this week's three clay events, so for once we have open markets in Munich, Belgrade and Estoril.

The most competitive and open market as far as value is concerned is in Germany, where Tomas Berdych tries to defend his BMW Open title and heads the field at around [3.25].

This is a price that is asking to be layed and I shall be doing just that, despite the Czech's much talked about 'return to form', which seems to be uppermost only in the thoughts of those who watched the Masters event in Miami.

This is Tomas Berdych we're talking about here, not Rafa Nadal, and if there's one player on the circuit you can rely on to let you down, its Berdych.

He has never been vaguely close to defending any of his five singles titles and he's never reached more than two finals in the same calendar year throughout his entire career. I see no reason for this to change now.

Apart from his poor career return (only Gael Monfils and Radek Stepanek from the world top 20 have less career titles) Berdych must overcome last year's finalist and old foe Mikhail Youzhny to reach the 2010 Munich final and the Russian looks a much better bet at over twice the price.

In their 11 career meetings, Youzhny has the edge 6-5 and he only lost out to Berdych in a final set breaker in last year's Munich final.

Currently back up to number 13 in the world, Youzhny has reached the final in each of his last two visits to this tournament and other than Berdych, there looks little to stop him reaching another this year.

He is drawn against Jeremy Chardy in the first round, which might prove to be the only test Youzhny encounters early on, after being drawn in the same quarter as the woeful Benjamin Becker and if he gets past Chardy his outright price of [7.5] will begin to look big.

The price is based on Youzhny losing in the first round of his last two clay court events, but being drawn against David Nalbandian and Lleyton Hewitt first up in any event is tough and he'll be desperate to put that right this week with ranking points to defend.

In the top half of the draw, the number one seed Marin Cilic also looks lay material at around [5.8].

The lanky Croatian has never looked at home on the red dirt and has fallen at the quarter final stage in his last two visits to Munich. Throw in a poor loss to Feliciano Lopez in Rome and you have a number one seed who's there for the taking.

Cilic has never reached a clay court final in his career and a better bet from the top half would have to be former champ and home favourite Philipp Kohlschreiber at [7.0].

Never the most reliable of individuals, Kohlschreiber was beaten in this by Cilic last year, but avenged that defeat the very next week in Madrid, also on clay, and the German looks the man to beat in the top half after good efforts in Monte Carlo and Rome, where he lost to Nadal.

Also in that section of the draw are Nicolas Almagro and Marcos Baghdatis and the former might have a say in the shake-up, as he is in Cilic's quarter of the draw and will be playing the Croatian on clay for the first time.

Overall though, the bottom half of the draw looks by far the easier and Youzhny looks the best value in the BMW Open 2010. I would recommmend a back of Youzhny at around [7.5] and/or a lay of Berdych at around [3.25].

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